Glen Matlock @ Landowne Hotel

Glen Matlock

Landowne Hotel

Sydney, Australia

November 16, 2017

Chances are that if you are on this website, you know who Glen Matlock is, as he is  not only known for being the bass guitarist in the original line-up and co-author of the better known ditties of the Sex Pistols, but he has left his mark on the music industry throughout his career with stints at The Rich Kids, Iggy Pop, The Damned, a reformed Faces, The Philistines, et cetera.

Ah, worn out sayings . . .

“It seems that you can take the boy out of the Sex Pistols but you cannot take the Sex Pistols out of the boy” as the tour was meant to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Sex Pistols’ one and only studio album Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols, and Matlock’s band will be performing the Pistols’ classic hits as well as plenty of music from his own repertoire.

Legend has that Matlock was sacked by Malcolm Mc Laren and replaced by someone who could not play but looked the part, which in my formative years was at least equally as important – needless to say that the evening was testament to Matlock’s musical prowess and the fact that style does not have to culminate in wearing a padlock around your neck.

The focus of the evening was on classic Sex Pistols era crowd-pleasers with more recent offerings from his extensive oeuvre, slower songs and cover versions of classics sprinkled in along with some blues and some all-out rockers, mixed with banter, anecdotes, storytelling and other forms of interaction that he helped eliminate the barrier between himself and the audience.

Sex Pistols’ classic were presented in Matlock’s own unique style, at times inviting the audience to help revamp the chorus or doing backing vocals and creating renditions which everyone again got involved with.

An enjoyable and relaxed evening, more rock in nature than an exercise in recreating whatever is commonly perceived to be the DNA of 70s-era punk, with one of the original characters of punk rock that ticked quite a few boxes, not only in in terms of being able to bask in the presence of an original Pistols but also in terms of musicality and entertainment conveyed via the spoken word.