Nearly as important as the sound were the visuals, just as explosive as that distinctive spit-drenched, ear-bleeding wail of pure yet refined rage and inseparable from their brand – Johnny Rotten’s couture by Vivian Westwood, Malcolm McClaren’s surrealist business management – including that performance to the House of Parliament from a boat and the scheduling of the band‘s US tour through bars in the South. And even with all of that, the graphic menace of Jamie Reid was essential.
Reid’s first splash with the Pistols began with his sleeve for the God Save the Queen (1977). His proto-imagiac punk style would rise to become iconic and the ur-image of the DIY punk aesthetic. Years of hastily assembled Xeroxed images for multitudes of garage bands on both sides of the Atlantic would follow. It‘s safe to say Reid’s work owed a heavy debt to the work of Frank Zappa and Carl Schenkel.
More recently, Reid hooked up with mainstream guerrilla art bomber Shepard Fairey - seen in the two pieces at bottom. You’ll also note from the below, Reid’s later work tended toward the self-parody – perhaps intentionally – and his political messaging could be a bit trite and precious, but no matter, the early work still stands as a monster.
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