“‘Til this day, every time I see pink and yellow paired together, I can hear it: the angry, driving kick drum that introduced the world to the Sex Pistols via Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols’ opener ‘Holiday In The Sun.'”
“I was twelve-years-old, quietly ransacking my uncle’s basement for something incriminating to read or play with when I stumbled upon his well-concealed, immaculately kept record collection. I combed through shelves of vinyl, studying the names, the faces, and the artwork until I finally found one that peaked my interest. I remember grimacing at the word “sex” plastered across the lemon backdrop as I plucked it out of place. I scanned the room to make sure I was still alone and tiptoed over to my uncle’s record player—a machine I had seen in movies, but never in real life. After fumbling with it for a moment, the raspy fuzz kicked in and I panicked, thinking I had broken it.
Panic shifted to genuine confusion as soon as the music came blaring through the built-in speakers. The frantic guitars, Rotten’s unhinged vocals, the speed—it was chaos. Perfect fucking chaos.
By the end of “No Feelings,” the Pistols had me hooked. Unfortunately, my revelation was interrupted when I heard my uncle rumbling down the stairs. I instinctively jabbed at the machine in an attempt to silence it, but it was too late. I avoided eye-contact as I waited for my uncle to scold me for going through his shit, however, instead of addressing my failure to adhere to any sort of personal boundaries, he high-fived me and shouted, ‘The Pistols! Man, I love that record.’
We spent the next few hours pouring over his hoard of old punk records. London Calling, Raw Power, Blank Generation, Love Bites, Milo Goes To College, and my long-standing favorite: The Clash’s 1977 self-titled. He pointed out his favorite tracks and explained as best he could why each of these records was so impactful. I wasn’t quite old enough to catch the distinctive social or political undertones that characterized many of them, but the angsty, anthemic vocals, the catchy riffs, and the momentum spoke to me with more clarity than anything else I’d ever heard before.
By the end of our listening party, my pre-teen self concluded that if it wasn’t punk, it didn’t matter. Sensing my appetite for more, my uncle was kind enough to lend me his record player and let me choose a handful of records to take home with me. I spent the summer going into seventh grade memorizing and chanting every impassioned line they contained.
As I transitioned into high school, my musical palate expanded to include more contemporary artists and my evenings spent listening to vinyl were eventually traded out for Lil’ Wayne dance parties. My uncle’s record player—which I neglected to return—collected dust in the years following my introduction to non-punk music, but as the saying goes, once you go punk, you eventually phase out, possibly get into Eno, and sometimes circle back around.
While unpacking boxes after my post-college move to LA, I did just that. Buried underneath my collection of Harry Potter books hid my uncle’s old record player, along with all of my seventh grade favorites. I thought back to that day in my uncle’s basement as I put on Nevermind The Bollocks and started chanting “Now, I got a reason.””
—Lexie Papilion
BLOODBOY’s debut single, “Human Female” is in stores now.
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