Just a week after the son of Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren announced that he would burn £5 million of old merch to protest England’s appropriation of punk culture for its Punk London celebration (and to just stick it to the Queen in general), the British government is once again stomping all over punk’s anti-establishment ideals by trying to preserve an important monument in its history. Those dicks. This comes from the BBC, which reports that a townhouse in London that the Sex Pistols used as both a home and a studio in the ‘70s has been granted “Grade II*” historical landmark status, which is “the second highest category that buildings can be listed as.”
The building is on London’s Denmark street, and its walls are covered in pictures and obscenities drawn by Sex Pistols lead singer Johnny Rotten. Also, in a quote that would probably really piss off McLaren’s son, the advisor in charge of selecting this house for Grade II* status says, “punk is a really important part of our cultural history and including it in the listing is a way of recognizing that.” Really, though, is there anything more punk rock than stopping people from damaging a building that someone did something famous in a million years ago?