Up to the age of twelve he grew up in Hammersmith with his young mother who worked as a hairdresser and his grandparents. He then moved to Benbow road in Shepherds Bush with his mother and stepfather where they lived in a one bedroomed basement. Jones never got on with his stepfather, who made his living making gaskets for electric cookers, “he was an a*****e, I was just extra baggage”. Problems began to occur from a young age and in 1972 he was the subject of a council care-order. As a teenager Jones was frequently in trouble with the police. He was a kleptomaniac and was arrested for a range of crimes including car theft, shop lifting and burglary. In the documentary 'The Filth and the Fury' Jones said he grew up watching his parents steal from shops and during his teens he racked up 14 criminal convictions. He spent a year in a remand centre - which he says was more enjoyable than being at home - and admits that the Sex Pistols saved him from a life of crime or even prison.

In late 1972/early 73 Jones formed ‘The Strand’ with his school friends Paul Cook and Wally Nightingale who he had met at the Cristopher Wren school. By 1975 after several line up changes and musical differences the band was finalised - minus Wally who had been sacked the year before . They consisted of Glen Matlock, Paul Cook, Johnny Rotten and Jones himself. Over the next three years, the band would become the most famous and notorious band in the UK (possibly the world), Sid Vicious would join and they would eventually end disastrously in 1978 on their only American tour.

He attended the Christopher Wren school in White City Estate, Shepherds Bush and it was here where he met Steve Jones. There was a considerable amount of difference between Cook’s school report cards before and after he met Jones, the latter warned of ‘bad influences‘. In 1972/73 Cook and Jones - and their school friend Wally Nightingale - formed the Strand. Within the next 3 years the Strand would transgress into the Sex Pistols.

After the band split in 1978 Cook and Jones recorded a few singles, under the name of the Sex Pistols, each taking turns on vocals until they formed The Professionals with Andy Allen. They released 3 singles and 2 albums, but never regained the success of their Pistols days.Paul Cook’s other musical activities included ‘Chiefs of Relief’ in 1988 and also playing drums for Edwyn Collins and Bananarama.Today Cook is a content family man, living in Shepherds Bush with his wife Jenny and their daughter Holly. He continues to work as a session musician for Edwyn Collins.

Sid Vicious was born in London on May 10th 1957, various accounts list his real name as John Beverley, Simon Ritchie, or "John Simon" followed by one of those two surnames. Sid grew up idolising glam-rock stars like David Bowie, Roxy Music and T. Rex, often imitating their style of dress. While attending school as a teenager, in 1975 he met and befriended John Lydon, who christened him "Sid Vicious" after a seemingly cute pet hamster who had once bitten a chunk of flesh out of Lydon's father's hand, it was actually a name that Vicious himself disliked. Lydon, Vicious and several other friends began squatting in vacant buildings in London and the two occasionally busked in subway stations. When Lydon joined the Sex Pistols as Johnny Rotten, Vicious became one of the band's most visible followers, creating a dance named the "pogo" which arose from him jumping up and down to see the band better. Sid played drums for mutual Pistols fans Siouxsie and the Banshees at their first gig, but his pre-Pistols days are more remembered for the occasional violence he stirred up at shows. During a Damned show at the 100 Club Punk Festval he was arrested for allegedly throwing a beer glass at the stage, the glass instead hit a pillar, shattered and struck a female spectator, partly blinding her in one eye. In another notorious incident in June 1976, Vicious attacked music journalist Nick Kent with a bicycle chain.

Early in 1977, shortly after Vicious officially joined the Pistols, Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers arrived in the U.K. for a tour. Following them was a groupie and heroin addict named Nancy Spungen, who had once had a brief affair with drummer Jerry Nolan. Thunders was credited as introducing Heroin to the London scene, in one instance waving a heroin-filled syringe in Sid's face and saying "Are you a boy or a man?". But it wasn't until a short while later, when a repulsed Johnny Rotten attempted to halt Spungen's unwanted advances by introducing her to Vicious, that Sid's heroin habit began. The couple took to each other immediately, as Spungen fulfilled her ambition of dating a Sex Pistol, while Vicious identified with her outcast status and fell into her ways almost immediately.

Sid Vicious played his first live show with the Sex Pistols on April 4th 1977. Although his efforts to learn the bass were sincere, he showed up at recording sessions for Never Mind the Bollocks too drunk/stoned to play at all effectively, so Steve Jones took over the bass guitar parts. In between all the Pistols controversies of 1977, Sid's friends spent most time trying in vain to get rid of Spungen and to break Sid of his heroin habit.

In January 1978, the Sex Pistols embarked on an ill-fated tour of the United States. Most Americans who had heard of Sid Vicious knew only of his media image, and upon his arrival, Vicious did his utmost to live up to that violent tough-guy persona, which usually resulted in him getting beaten up. Since he was separated from Nancy on the tour (she remained in London) Rotten tried again to help Sid kick his drug habit, but he would often "disappear" for hours only to come back high on heroin. Tales of Vicious excesses and self-mutilations on the tour abound, in San Antonio he called the audience "a bunch of faggots" and hit someone on the head with his guitar. In Dallas he appeared onstage with the phrase "Gimme A Fix" carved on his chest,.At a truck stop on the way to Tulsa, a trucker put a cigarette out on his hand and challenged Vicious to beat that, so Vicious sliced his own hand open with a knife and calmly continued eating. Two days after the Pistols' final gig in San Francisco Sid suffered his first heroin overdose, three days later on a flight to New York, he slipped into a drug-induced coma. Upon his return to England he and Rotten fell out completely over his drug abuse and after John had announced his decision to leave the band Sid went to Paris for the Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle film, for which he recorded covers of "My Way" and a couple of Eddie Cochran songs. In August 1978, he and Nancy moved to New York, raising money by performing a farewell gig at the Electric Ballroom in London with a backing band called the Vicious White Kids featuring guitarist Steve New, bassist Glen Matlock and drummer Rat Scabies.

Upon arriving in New York, Vicious formed the Idols which included guitarist Steve Dior and Arthur Kane and Jerry Nolan ex New York Dolls members. They performed several nights at Max's Kansas City. A live album from these shows called "Sid Sings" was released in 1979. It consisted mostly of Pistols, Dolls, and Heartbreakers covers, plus demo of My Way. Many compilation albums from these shows have been released since, with varying recording quality.

On October 12, 1978, Sid Vicious awoke in his Chelsea Hotel room to find Nancy Spungen lying in the bathroom, dead of a stab wound. Although he could not remember the events of the preceding evening due to his drug-induced stupor, he confessed to the crime and was arrested. After Virgin Records bailed him out, he attempted suicide several days later by slashing himself with a razor and was committed to Bellevue for two weeks. On December 9, at the Max's Kansas City club, Vicious propositioned the girlfriend of Todd Smith (Patti Smith's brother), when Todd Smith approached him about it, Vicious broke a glass across his face and was subsequently arrested again. He was released on February 1st 1979 and that night took some bad heroin supplied by his mother, he took more of the drug later that night and was found dead of an overdose the next morning. He was just 21.

The murder of Nancy Spungen was never conclusively solved, and several theories exist as to what really happened. Vicious' own confession told the story of a dispute over a failure to buy any heroin, which escalated into violence and finally the stabbing. Spungen apparently failed to dress the wound properly, and died several hours later. However, Vicious own condition rendered him unsure of the night's events, and those close to him doubted that he could have brought himself to murder her. A team of private detectives hired by manager Malcolm McLaren turned up evidence suggesting that someone else could have committed the murder, several other people had been in the apartment that night, one of whom was unknown to the group, and some sort of drug deal had taken place while a large cashed check from Virgin was lying out in the open. The true details of what happened that night will never be known.

Lydon spent his early youth living around the country and at the age of eight he contracted Meningitis, which left him in and out of a coma for six months and unable to attend school for a year. When he recovered from the illness he was left with bad eyesight, a hunched back due to the penicillin injections he had to endure and loss of memory.

When he was 11 the family settled in Finsbury Park London, where they lived in a council flat. It was here where Lydon began to attend the William Of York Catholic school. “A s~~~t hole” Lydon states in the book England’s Dreaming, “I learnt hate and resentment there. I learned to despise tradition and this sham we call culture”.

In 1975 Lydon was asked to audition for the band by singing along to an Alice Cooper song plated on the jukebox in SEX. His performance was so outrageous he was hired immediately. He had several ideas for songs and coupled with Glen Matlocks gift for writng tunes they created the Sex Pistols repertoire. Being the singer with the band meant that he would get the most publicity, but this also meant he would be the first to be attacked both verbally and physically. After the Pistols split he went on to form a band name Public Image Limited or PIL for short, with a few old mates. After many line up changes and 10 albums he put the project on hold. He did a bit of acting and appeared on several US TV shows and after the successful Sex Pistols reunions of 1996, 2002 and 2003 he appeared on a UK reality show called "I'm a celebrity get me out of here", this pit Lydon back in the spotlight and he followed this with a documentary series about insects and bugs. John Lydon is currently married to heiress Nora (Ari Up's mum) and lives a very comfartable life in Los Angeles.

Glen Matlock was born on the 27th August 1956 in Kensel Green, a working class area in north west London. His father was a coach builder and his mother worked as an accounts clerk for the gas board. He was an only child who got on well with his parents. The family lived on the top floor of a two-up two-down flat on Ravensworth Rd in Kensel Green. They then moved to a four -bed roomed house when Matlock was 14. In 1968 attended the St Clement Danes grammar school. It was while playing football games on the grounds of Wormwood Scrubs prison, which was right next to the school, where he met Paul Cook for the first time.

While in his last year of school, Matlock began to work as the Saturday boy in ‘Let it Rock’ a shop on the Kings Road owned by Malcolm Mclaren and Vivienne Westwood. It was while working here that Matlock got the job as bass player of ‘The Strand’ a band formed by Paul Cook and Steve Jones. The band - Steve, Paul, Glen and Wally Nightingale - played their one and only gig as the Strand in a flat above Tom Salter’s café on the Kings Road. In 1975 they became the Sex Pistols and recruited Johnny Rotten as their front man.

In February 1977 Matlock left the Sex Pistols, due to the problems that had been brewing inside the camp. There are many stories said to be the reason Glen left or was sacked depending on who you believe. Mclaren claimed it was because he liked the Beatles too much. But one of the main resons was his love/hate relationship with Johnny Rotten and the bad boy image the Pistols had acquired. To the rest of the band he seemed to be too straight and te was always worrying about what his mother would think. The band now admit his departure (and Sid’s recruitment) was a bad idea and in an interview in 2002 Steve Jones said he believed the Pistols would have made more than one album if Glen had stayed in the band.

19 years after leaving the Pistols, Matlock rejoined them for the Filthy Lucre tour in 1996. Matlock has continued to record since his departure from the Pistols his main success being in ‘The Rich kids’ with Midge Ure, Steve New and Rusty Egan. They signed to EMI on the 5th of November, 1977 and their debut single ‘Rich Kids’ (written by Matlock) was released in January 78 in the UK. The album ‘Ghosts Of Princes in Towers’ followed in August and was produced by Mick Ronson. The Rich Kids split up in 78 despite having recorded new album material.

Matlock has formed many bands since the Rich Kids, including The Spectres, the Mavericks and the Philistines. He’s also played as a session musician on tracks by Primal Scream, the Dammed, Iggy Pop and Johnny Thunders. In 1996 he released his first solo album ‘Who does he think he is when he’s at home’ on Peppermint Records. That was followed by 'Open Mind' in 2000.

Today he still tours both as a solo artist and with his band The Philistines - which currently consists of Glen, Koozie Johns, Chris Musto and Ray Mcveigh. He also tours with Dead Men Walking, a ‘super group’ made up of Kirk Brandon( Spears of Destiny), Slim Jim Phantom (Stray Cats), Mike Peters (The Alarm) and Bruce Watson (Big Country) He lives with his wife Carol and their two sons Sam and Louis.