Sex Pistol Steve Jones Finally Outgrew His Punk Outlaw Past
With a new memoir, the famed punk rocker airs some dirty laundry and sets the record straight.
"I'm not looking forward to people reading this book, with all the weird shit that's in it," former Sex Pistol Steve Jones confesses at the outset of our interview about his fantastic new memoir, Lonely Boy: Tales of a Sex Pistol. And "weird shit" indeed abounds.
Jones confesses to the kind of sordid, outlaw upbringing that would make even Keith Richards blush. His frank tales about his childhood addiction to masturbation, run ins with the local pedophile in his rough and tumble London neighborhood, his abusive stepfather, homosexual dalliances, and acute kleptomania read like the tales of a crazy uncle who comes to holiday dinner and shares hard-to-believe stories of his youthful exploits with abandon. But it also ensures that Lonely Boy is unique amongst rock star memoirs: Jones is the real deal, and he isn't afraid to put it all—the good, the bad, and the truly ugly—out there for all to see. In fact, those tales of his early life make Jones' days as a Sex Pistol seem almost the least remarkable part of his story.
"I swear to you, all the stuff in the book, it's not for shock value or anything," Jones insists. "It was just my life. When you do something enough, from the beginning as a kid, it really doesn't seem that big of a deal. What I used to do seemed totally normal to me."
He also says there was a bigger picture to the story he was trying to tell. "I thought I'd always be second fiddle in the Sex Pistols story because of the image of Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious. But I wanted people to know the truth about how the band started and how it all came about, and I just want my two cents out there."
Still, as wild as Lonely Boy gets, Jones admits there was plenty of "weird shit we took out."
Johnny Rotten and Steve Jones
As for the oft-maligned Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood, whose King's Road store Jones and his gang would frequent and who would go on to mastermind the launch of the Sex Pistols and the birth of London's punk scene, Jones is clear about what the pair saw in him. "I had what they didn't have," he says. "That wild, youthful thing? They were drawn to that."
He also still harbors intense affection for the pair, whom he says have gotten a bad rap over the years. Punk's origin story, he insists, is often relayed by people with an axe to grind or those who simply weren't even there. "Where I came from, prior to hanging out with them on the King's Road, it was all about going to football matches and stupid kid stuff," Jones says. "They showed me there was this other life, one that I'd never experienced and that I was immediately drawn to. I'll always be grateful to Malcolm and Vivienne for that."
Another person who gets what might seem to many readers like an inordinate amount of respect from Jones is Rod Stewart. While most folks know Stewart these days from, at worst, his American Songbook series or, at best, his "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?" days, Jones is a diehard fan of early Rod the Mod and his role as front man of the Faces—the 1970s band that gave the Stones a run for their money.
"His style was fantastic, his voice was different, and the Faces were a great rock band," Jones explains. "I was just obsessed with them. I couldn't have cared less about the Rolling Stones at that point, or other bands that were maybe a little bit earlier than the Faces. I don't know what it was. I loved his face and everything about him. And he wasn't this far off seeming guy. He appeared to be a guy you could connect with, and the band seemed that way, too."
Jones was an obsessed fan, of course, but felt as if he was also part of a movement that Stewart and the Faces ushered in. "I say in the book that I was at one of the gigs and he and [keyboardist Ian] McLagan threw out a tambourine, and I got it! I was just obsessed. And I was really proud of myself that I bought Every Picture Tells a Story before anyone else got it, and then it became a huge album, because it was like I was a part of it, or something, before anyone else got into it."
For Jones, it may have been a badge of honor, but for a kid who stole his way through adolescence (he'd proudly accumulated 13 pricey Ben Sherman shirts and numerous pairs of Doc Martens at one point), the tale holds special meaning.
"I don't think you could steal records," Jones tells me when I press him as to why he didn't simply purloin the album. "No, I actually bought that. I even remember where I bought it: I bought it at HMV on Oxford Street, on a Saturday afternoon. But I don't know why I paid for it, now that you ask. I don't know, but I guess that must mean something."
While Jones protests that the story of his legendary band has been told "10 million times, by everyone" and that his "least favorite thing to do at this stage of the game is to talk about Pistols stuff," the detail and honesty about the band's meteoric rise and painful fall in Lonely Boy is staggering. Just don't hold out hope of another reunion any time soon.
"The only reason the Pistols ever go out on the road is to make a bit of bread, and, to be honest, I don't make enough to put up with the rest of them," Jones admits. "It's never fun. It's always a pain: from the dynamics, the whole relationship, the whole marriage. Besides, it's not like we were making Rolling Stones money! If we were getting Rolling Stones money, I'd find a way to put up with them."
Still, Jones does think fondly about his days in one of the seminal rock bands of the '70s. "Don't get me wrong, the Pistols were fantastic," he says. "It probably started getting weird when we went to the U.S., and maybe even a little bit before that, but even with all the bullshit there were still great moments. And, you know, most people never experience anything like that. So don't get me wrong, it was a great time. But now, 40 years later, it's just hard to wanna keep talking about the fuckin' Sex Pistols."
The Sex Pistols in 1996
Now 25 years sober ("There'd be nothing if I didn't get sober," he says, "I was in the fucking toilet."), and a staple of radio with his long-running Jonesy's Jukebox now on KLOS in Los Angeles, Jones enjoys the occasional acting gig ("Don't give me too many lines and I'm alright") and says his life has settled into a far different pace than the old days.
"I'm an old man, I do normal things, I'm a part of society," Jones says, adding, "I don't do anything crazy, but my mind still is nuts." And he'd love to make a solo album one of these days, but reality gets in the way: "I'm lazy, I'm fat and old, and I don't give a fuck."
As for the inevitable comparisons between Lonely Boy and Life, by that other rock and roll outlaw, Keith Richards, Jones laughs: "Keith Richards is a middle-class fucking bastard."
"I'm not looking forward to people reading this book, with all the weird shit that's in it," former Sex Pistol Steve Jones confesses at the outset of our interview about his fantastic new memoir, Lonely Boy: Tales of a Sex Pistol. And "weird shit" indeed abounds.
Jones confesses to the kind of sordid, outlaw upbringing that would make even Keith Richards blush. His frank tales about his childhood addiction to masturbation, run ins with the local pedophile in his rough and tumble London neighborhood, his abusive stepfather, homosexual dalliances, and acute kleptomania read like the tales of a crazy uncle who comes to holiday dinner and shares hard-to-believe stories of his youthful exploits with abandon. But it also ensures that Lonely Boy is unique amongst rock star memoirs: Jones is the real deal, and he isn't afraid to put it all—the good, the bad, and the truly ugly—out there for all to see. In fact, those tales of his early life make Jones' days as a Sex Pistol seem almost the least remarkable part of his story.
"I swear to you, all the stuff in the book, it's not for shock value or anything," Jones insists. "It was just my life. When you do something enough, from the beginning as a kid, it really doesn't seem that big of a deal. What I used to do seemed totally normal to me."
He also says there was a bigger picture to the story he was trying to tell. "I thought I'd always be second fiddle in the Sex Pistols story because of the image of Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious. But I wanted people to know the truth about how the band started and how it all came about, and I just want my two cents out there."
Still, as wild as Lonely Boy gets, Jones admits there was plenty of "weird shit we took out."
As for the oft-maligned Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood, whose King's Road store Jones and his gang would frequent and who would go on to mastermind the launch of the Sex Pistols and the birth of London's punk scene, Jones is clear about what the pair saw in him. "I had what they didn't have," he says. "That wild, youthful thing? They were drawn to that."
He also still harbors intense affection for the pair, whom he says have gotten a bad rap over the years. Punk's origin story, he insists, is often relayed by people with an axe to grind or those who simply weren't even there. "Where I came from, prior to hanging out with them on the King's Road, it was all about going to football matches and stupid kid stuff," Jones says. "They showed me there was this other life, one that I'd never experienced and that I was immediately drawn to. I'll always be grateful to Malcolm and Vivienne for that."
Another person who gets what might seem to many readers like an inordinate amount of respect from Jones is Rod Stewart. While most folks know Stewart these days from, at worst, his American Songbook series or, at best, his "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?" days, Jones is a diehard fan of early Rod the Mod and his role as front man of the Faces—the 1970s band that gave the Stones a run for their money.
"His style was fantastic, his voice was different, and the Faces were a great rock band," Jones explains. "I was just obsessed with them. I couldn't have cared less about the Rolling Stones at that point, or other bands that were maybe a little bit earlier than the Faces. I don't know what it was. I loved his face and everything about him. And he wasn't this far off seeming guy. He appeared to be a guy you could connect with, and the band seemed that way, too."
Jones was an obsessed fan, of course, but felt as if he was also part of a movement that Stewart and the Faces ushered in. "I say in the book that I was at one of the gigs and he and [keyboardist Ian] McLagan threw out a tambourine, and I got it! I was just obsessed. And I was really proud of myself that I bought Every Picture Tells a Story before anyone else got it, and then it became a huge album, because it was like I was a part of it, or something, before anyone else got into it."
For Jones, it may have been a badge of honor, but for a kid who stole his way through adolescence (he'd proudly accumulated 13 pricey Ben Sherman shirts and numerous pairs of Doc Martens at one point), the tale holds special meaning.
"I don't think you could steal records," Jones tells me when I press him as to why he didn't simply purloin the album. "No, I actually bought that. I even remember where I bought it: I bought it at HMV on Oxford Street, on a Saturday afternoon. But I don't know why I paid for it, now that you ask. I don't know, but I guess that must mean something."
While Jones protests that the story of his legendary band has been told "10 million times, by everyone" and that his "least favorite thing to do at this stage of the game is to talk about Pistols stuff," the detail and honesty about the band's meteoric rise and painful fall in Lonely Boy is staggering. Just don't hold out hope of another reunion any time soon.
"The only reason the Pistols ever go out on the road is to make a bit of bread, and, to be honest, I don't make enough to put up with the rest of them," Jones admits. "It's never fun. It's always a pain: from the dynamics, the whole relationship, the whole marriage. Besides, it's not like we were making Rolling Stones money! If we were getting Rolling Stones money, I'd find a way to put up with them."
Still, Jones does think fondly about his days in one of the seminal rock bands of the '70s. "Don't get me wrong, the Pistols were fantastic," he says. "It probably started getting weird when we went to the U.S., and maybe even a little bit before that, but even with all the bullshit there were still great moments. And, you know, most people never experience anything like that. So don't get me wrong, it was a great time. But now, 40 years later, it's just hard to wanna keep talking about the fuckin' Sex Pistols."
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