Sex Pistols Are a Band Hellbent on Rewriting Their Legacy

Sex Pistols

Fortitude Music Hall, Brisbane, QLD

Wednesday, April 9th

In a sweaty, glorious mid-week riot at Fortitude Music Hall, the Sex Pistols roared to life in Brisbane last night – and with Frank Carter out front, they appeared less like a band revisiting their legacy and more like a band hellbent on rewriting it.

It’s been nearly five decades since the Pistols first tore through the UK music scene like a Molotov cocktail, but their spirit – snarling, seething, and anti-everything – has never felt more relevant. With Carter stepping into the role once occupied by John Lydon, they’ve found a frontman not weighed down by history, but fuelled by it. He’s not trying to mimic the past. He’s setting fire to it.

From the moment the band launched into “Holidays in the Sun”, Carter was all in — prowling the stage, diving into the pit, barking challenges at the Brisbane crowd to be louder, wilder, more ungovernable than Sydney the night before. He didn’t just front the Pistols – he embodied them. Charismatic, chaotic, completely unfiltered – the perfect evolution of punk’s eternal middle finger.

Behind him, the original trio of Steve Jones, Paul Cook, and Glen Matlock played with all the rawness and precision you’d hope for. Jones’ guitar still growled with menace, Cook’s drumming was tight and relentless, and Matlock’s basslines anchored the chaos with groove and grit. This wasn’t a legacy act phoning it in – this was a band still in the fight.

The setlist was pure fire: “Pretty Vacant”, “Bodies”, “Liar”, “No Feelings”, “God Save the Queen”, every one of them delivered with the same venom that made them anthems in the first place. A cover of The Stooges’ “No Fun” doubled as a tribute to The Saints’ frontman Chris Bailey, who passed away three years ago to the day. It was a sharp, respectful nod to Brisbane’s own punk roots – one of the night’s few moments of pause before diving straight back into the carnage.

And the crowd? Pure chaos in the best possible way. A multi-generational swarm of punks, fashion anarchists, rock ‘n’ roll lifers, and curious newcomers filled the room, sweating shoulder to shoulder in a sea of spikes, tartan, Doc Martens, and battle vests. Some looked like they’d been there since 1977, others probably knew the Pistols more as the band that inspired the likes of Green Day or Nirvana (or the subject of a Disney-fied TV series), but they all screamed just as loud.

It was a gathering of the outliers, the misfits, the fiercely independent – exactly who the Sex Pistols have always belonged to. And while the Valley never lacks for colourful characters, this crowd brought the heat. For a Wednesday night, it felt like punk Christmas.

But nothing compared to the eruption during the final song, “Anarchy in the UK”. From the first riff, the crowd detonated, arms in the air, bodies surging forward, every voice in the room screaming the lyrics with feral joy. Carter barely had to sing – the crowd did it for him, roaring loud enough to shake the venue’s foundations. It wasn’t just loud – it was liberating. A moment of collective release that proved, without question, that punk’s heartbeat still pounds hard in 2025.

This wasn’t a nostalgia trip. It wasn’t a victory lap. It was a full-scale resurrection.

The Sex Pistols may have started out as a threat to the system. Last night in Brisbane, they reminded everyone that they still are.

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