Jan. 19 will mark the anniversary of the infamous Merle Haggard show at the Longhorn Ballroom (Kidding).
This week (yesterday to be exact) marked the 45th anniversary of the Sex Pistols performing at the Longhorn Ballroom, Oak Cliff’s legendary live-music venue, and what a bonkers punk-rock night it apparently was.
Beloved Deep Ellum artist Frank Campagna — who was there, and very young — would likely say the word “performing” is generous.
Back on the 40th anniversary I talked to Campagna about his experience that night.
I had known it would be worth hearing about from him because a) Frank Campagna and the Sex Pistols were involved and b) Campagna wrote this poem about that night (salty language warning):
“Some crazy mother-fuckin’ Fascist Britz,” begins the poem…
“Insulting, obnoxious, possessed.
The killers, X-Rock is next, well now.
Johnny Rotten to the core, Eeeeevil,
Cold blooded spastic zombie, a mocker.
A warm bloody hocker from Sid’s mouth
to his, hers, its face.
The Weirdies are here
the Curious too
the Sickies and the Press.
they all show
for the demented show,
Me too!”
Campagna said he liked Sex Pistols music OK, but appreciated the way the Ramones, for example, organized and rehearsed. That’s not how Rotten and his band rolled. (Full show here.)
Now, it’s not as if anyone expected these guys to stand up straight, abstain from illicit drugs while onstage or even remain fully conscious, Campagna clarified when we chatted five years ago. “I saw Steven Tyler out of his mind on drugs, leaning over throughout the show to snort coke. Keith Richards would stumble his way through or blackout during a song, but those guys were hit or miss. The Sex Pistols, though, never seemed to get it together.”
Notoriously belligerent bassist, Sid Vicious, was out of his mind that night, as the story goes. After leaning into the audience, Vicious bolted upright, face bloody. No one quite sure how it happened (it has been heavily debated in certain circles). Campagna said he saw a girl punch Sid. That’s also how it is recorded by others in attendance.
Whatever the case, Vicious — who would be dead of a heroin overdose the next year — reveled in the blood, shaking and bobbing his head until crimson covered and dripped from his whole face and sprayed concertgoers.
Campagna ran into the spiraling Vicious that night. In 2018, he relayed some details of the encounter to his Facebook followers.
“Forty years ago … I had a brief interaction with a guy named Sid Vicious,” Campagna noted. “Just after the show at the Longhorn Ballroom he said ‘Hey man I’ll talk to you for five bucks’ and I said ‘Fuck off!'”
Campagna also recalled that Dallas punk band guitarist Barry Kooda that same night was itching to fight Sid or any of the other Pistols after his razor blade earrings collection went missing from his dressing room.
Rolling Stone photographer Annie Leibowitz’ camera also went missing that night.
Four days after the Dallas show, the Sex Pistols disbanded. Frontman John Rotten, real name John Lydon, is still alive, and he appeared on the reality TV show Masked Singer in 2021.
