Sid Y Nancy

Sid and Nancy

I’m going to talk about a very famous couple better known as “the punk Romeo and Juliet”. They are Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen.

Although they are both deceased, their story is alive and and is a huge part of ‘punk’ history.

Now, I’m going to tell you a little more about the life Sid. Born John Simon Ritchie in London, England May 10th, 1957.

He was primarily raised byhis mother. His father, John Sr. played trombone but was a not recognized musician. John Jr and his mother moved to Spain right after his birth with the expectation that his father, John Sr. would join. John Jr’s mother soon realized however, that his father would not be joining them in Spain.



John Jr’s parents divorced and his mother got married again. And in 1965 his stepfather died. Johnwas a very shy teenager and had a self-destructive streak and relish for rebellion and anarchy. He was a poor student and because of this he quickly left school and began to study photography but soon after he left school again.

He played in a few bands before he met Malcolm McLaren, the manager of a band known as ‘The Sex Pistols’. He was given the nickname “Sid Vicious” by a friend of hisafter having a hamster named Sid as a pet. One day the hamster bit him and he said: “that Sid is really vicious.”

Although he didn’t how to play the bass he became The Sex Pistols’ bassist. The first time that he played with them was in 1975 at a bar London. There are rumors that he never played in a show, and that there was another person in their crew behind the scenes, but Sid never knew ofthis rumor.

At just 17 years old, Sid was one of the most important and popular people in all of England. He was the classic teenager: “Live fast, die young”. Vicious’ many fans saw him as the “real thing” of the punk philosophy –aggressively nihilistic and intentionally rude and offensive in all situations. His physical appearance: dyed spiked hair, rail-thin body, knock-kneed posture, wornblack-leather motorcycle jacket, and his trademark dog chain and padlock around his neck.

He struggled with alcoholism, was drug addict, and was often very violent at shows and even with his friends. Once he carved “Anarchy Never Die on his chest with a knife. Another thing that I have to mention, he had a knife collection in case people that live on the street attack to him.

Nancy Spungen wasan American girl, born a year after Sid 1958 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In her mother’s book ‘Seas’ it was written that Nancy was only three months when given her first sedative. Nancy cried more than any child should. At age four Nancy saw her first psychiatrist and when she was eleven, she attacked her mother with a hammer because she wouldn’t take her to a museum. Spungen was very violentand her behavior was so out of control that even some doctors refused to take her, and she was finally diagnosed as schizophrenic.

She first tried drugs at age 13, and only two years later she became a heroin addict. When Nancy was 17, her parents asked her to leave home and she had to resort to prostitution to support her addiction that increased once she was on her own.

Nancy graduated fromDevereux Manor High School and she was accepted at Colorado University but five months later she was arrested for purchasing marihuana and other misdemeanor charges such as theft. Shortly after Nancy was expelled from the University.

She dressed in heavy, think attire. Leather clothes, chains, black jackets and her wild trademark curls dyed blond, and a lot of makeup. Known as a punk groupie,she followed bands such as Aerosmith and The Ramones, and in 1976 she moved to London with sole purpose of meeting a Sex Pistols band member. She became well known as ‘Nauseating Nancy’ a tag for her frequent public displays of verbal abuse and violence, that didn’t seem so bad to her.

Sid and Nancy met in London in 1977 at the house of a mutual friend. Soon after they met, Sid and Nancy fell...