Sid Vicious.

A Story by Autumn

Late one night, John Simon Ritchie is sitting on the bed next to Nancy Spungen, his life time girlfriend, in their hotel in London after a concert. Sid (John Ritchie's stage name) reaches over to Nancy taking the syringe she just filled with herion, " 'Gimme that damn thing." He jabbed the needle into the vein that was in the crease of his arm. He pressed the end of the syringe genlty and the liquid flooded into his blood stream. Hot heat surged through his body as his ultimate high began. Nancy sitting beside him started to get irritated, for she also had an addiction and was craving the feeling too. Everything inside Sid began to buzz as Nancy stood up fast yelling, "Don't f***ing take it all!" He ignored her, pushing the rest of the liquid into his body fast, stealing the chance that she had to take away this feeling. He took it all and the rush began better than ever, he slowly pulled the needle out and tossed it beside him on the bed. Nancy stood in front of him yelling about him and how he wasted the stuff she went out of her way to find, he didnt hear anything, he was on a rush. She kept yelling while his breath started to get shorter and his head filled with static. Blackness formed in his eyelids as his body grew faint and he passed out laying back on the bed. Nancy still yelling, aware of the situation snatches the syringe off the bed and barges out of the room slamming the door behind her, leaving Sid on the bed, in his herion contaminated dream, motionless. This is the life of Sid Vicious.

Sid was an outcast, but he took that image and moulded himself into what he wanted to truley be; a rockstar. He went through life taking the stage and jamming out with the Sex Pistols, the band he was involved in, while having his ultimate rush of herion. His life revovled around three things. Rocking out, any drug he could get his hands on, and his love Nancy Spungen. His life was complicated, in and out of jail a few times for doing small troubling acts of violence such as getting into fights at clubs, which he happened to do alot. Also, he earned himself a spot in Rikers Island prision for second degree murder of the one who he was most dearest to, Nancy. After getting out of prision he went to a party and overdosed on his favorite drug, herion. Soon as the life of this rockstar began, it was over.

Sid was a young boy considered a rebel, moved from private school to private school. Being the kid he was he was always into trouble, getting caught in the act. From the violence and the self distruction, Sid moved on to a more on the edge life of doing drugs and becoming a rockstar.

John was born into a life of chaos. His early life was really hard. His mother, Anne Beverly, was really into drugs. Snorting, smoking and shooting up anything she could get her hands on. Anne supported the two of them in their small home, just getting by, with the money she made from selling dtreet drugs. She started really getting into drugs after Annes second husband had passed away. Anne moved on quite fast, finding someone else to replace him. That new someone was Chris Beverly. John's mother was more in love with her and Chris's fabricated "love life" than Chris himself. While Anne lived her drug induced life, she send John from his normal school and put him in a private school, having a nanny replace her as his mother. Sid was quite the little rebel, so the effect to this is he was bounced around from school to school. "He was never in a table situation, it was like a mirror of my entire life," says Anne.

At the age of 15 John Ritchie dropped out of school. He got a job making jeans but after a week at the job he quit, for the fact that he kept messing them up. After quitting his job, he decided to go back to collage. This is where his wholre life began, Hackney college.

In 1974 John Ritchie first met John Lydon at Hackney Technical Collage, If it was for him meeting John his whole musical carrer might of never existed. John had three new friends; John Wardle (Jonny Rotten), John Grey and Keith Levine. This is where the whole band scene came into lay. They had nothing better to do on Friday nights after school than to sit around and make their own music that appealed only to them. On their Friday night jamming sessions it didn't even cross their minds that this could be the rest of their life, hanging out with the people they care the most about.

Before these new friends, John Ritchie never had any friends that he was close to like these people. He was a "punk", dressing in leather and studs didn't appeal to anyone much before. "He had never been a part of a gang, always something of a loner right through school, people did come around but I wasn't aware of a single name, they all just came and went. But the punck scene was a bond for him, a reality. I always got the impression that from day one of the punk scene, he felt very much like he belonged," says Anne.

In the years between 1974 and 1976, the punk rock culture started to begin. It formed from the genre "garage rock", which is a raw form of rock and roll. The punk rock bands created fast paced, hard-edged, short songs that were about rebellion, anti-authoritariansim, individualism, free thought, and discontent. Most music was made with one or two electric guitars, and electric bass, and a drum kit, along with vocals that were sometimes distorted. The band members of the punk rock culture usually werent found with out wearing black leather jackets and leather pants, with a pair of boots and usually acessories of chains and studs. These people had a D.I.Y (do it yourself) ethic that was built in with watered down fashion of Euro-American culture that had to have ideals that fit in with liberal individualist values.