Never Mind the Bollocks: An Album Review

By: Emily Eade

During the late 1970s, there was a rise in a new fad called Punk. Although the birthplace of this trend is unknown; some of its founders are very well known. During this craze there were bands created; the Ramones, the Damned, Dead Kennedys, and many more, but one of the most influential and most known is the Sex Pistols. They were known for their crazy antics, groundbreaking music, and revolting against the government. This is an album review on their only studio album, Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols. This album is known to be one of the most controversial and influential punk rock albums of all time. 

This album has such an important impact because these musicians took it into upon themselves to create such a gutsy album in which they “attacked” the British royal hierarchy. They did this by writing about multiple different political views, some of which are still around today.

Starting off the album with a gripping feeling through the sounds of marching that blended perfectly into the beat of drums, guitar riffs, and the furious voice of Johnny “Rotten” Lydon. The first track, “Holiday in the Sun,” was written after a vacation to Berlin in which the band felt good and came back to London where they felt like they were in prison. The lyrics “I don't understand this bit at all. I'm gonna go over and over the Berlin wall,” is a way to show the irony in which Rotten coming from this “free world,” and that his attempt to climb the Berlin wall was a way to say that he was going into Communist East Germany, feeling as if it was superior to the democracy in which he came from. 

On this album came two singles which ended up being the band's most infamous songs of all. These songs created some of the most controversial moments in not only the UK but also in music history. The Sex Pistols took their beliefs towards the government status of England and put them together into two songs “God Save the Queen,” and “Anarchy in the UK". 

“God Save the Queen" is the fifth song on the album. Starting the song with the perfect blend of the drum beat, bass, and guitar riffs. This song was written as a way to give a big middle finger to the British monarchy. As stated by Johnny Lydon in the documentary The Filth and Fury, “You don't write "God Save The Queen" because you hate the English race, you write a song like that because you love them, and you're fed up with them being mistreated.” The other single off this album is, “Anarchy in the UK.” The song starts with Rottens' furious voice saying, “Right now'' followed by a laugh going straight into the song. This song was created to show the creation of the punk revolution. The punk revolution took place to have anarchy and run down the government (which never happened). 

Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols is the world at large in what the thoughts of government were during the punk revolution. Making music about many political topics from communism to abortion; creating this picture that even during the late 1970s we were still fighting some of the same fights. Here’s to the only Sex Pistols album to come alive and show their truth about the world.