Over the last few years, fans of the Sex Pistols and Sid Vicious were rocked to find out that back in 1977, Sid had been briefly involved with another woman other than his now infamous girlfriend, Nancy Spungen. That woman was Teddie Dhalin, the bands translator on the Scandinavian leg of their 'Never Mind The Bans' tour of 1977. I first became aware of Teddie when I read of her remembrances of the tour in the previous book "Sex Pistols Exiled In Norway", and thought then how fantastic a whole book would be, even though their being together was for such a short time. As well as now writing for www.mudkiss.com, Teddie has gone public, and now penned the book "A Vicious Love Story", which hits all good retailers on 13th July, and promises to be "A Sex Pistols Book with a difference"........Something I cannot wait for.

Teddie has very kindly had a quick chat with me, to tell us more about her story, their story, and more besides, so let's get down to it.

Hello Teddie, and thank you for doing this interview. I am a huge Sex Pistols fanatic and historian, so it is a huge pleasure for me to talk to you. Firstly, can you tell me when you first heard of the Sex Pistols, and what your first thoughts were?

Hi Jonny, my pleasure. I don’t actually have a memory of when I first heard of the Sex Pistols. They were just suddenly there. It wasn’t my kind of music, but as I’d lived in England I knew where they were coming from and why they had become so popular. It was a time of unrest and there were strikes and riots and racial tension. The Sex Pistols were the symbol of a movement of discontent with the way things were at the time. I didn’t like the fact that they disrespected the Queen and I didn’t enjoy their music. I preferred disco Donna Summer , Boney M… music I could dance to.

You became the translator for them on the Scandinavian tour of 1977, when the band had been forced (or pushed) to play out of the UK, On this tour you had a relationship with Sid Vicious, which is what your new book is about. How did the relationship start, and how did you find Sid differing from his image in the press?

The first time I met Sid Vicious, he was asleep. Tore Lande, the Norwegian promoter had asked me to read up on the band so I’d know who was who, but as a typical 16 year old I had a tan to work on and friends to hang out with, so I didn’t put too much effort in to it. I had a quick peek at a photo of them, but it was taken the previous year and featured Glen Matlock as the bass player. I met the band in the hotel reception when Tore and I arrived to check them in. Sid was asleep on a sofa as Steve Jones had brought a girl up to a party in Sids room the previous night and taken his bed. Sid had been sitting in a chair all night and thought he’d sleep in the van on the drive from Oslo to Trondheim, but couldn’t get comfortable. So he’d basically fallen asleep waiting for us. I was sitting at his feet as Tore was sorting out the rooms and there wasn’t anything for me to do. Sid sort of opened his eyes and looked straight at me trying to work out where he was and who I was. We just clicked. I didn’t recognise him from the photo so I thought he was a roadie. He introduced himself to me as ‘John, but you can call me Sid’. I didn’t let him get too close to me to begin with and we spent the whole day flirting basically. Sid was trying to work out how to move things along but I wasn’t cooperating to begin with. We got to know each other and talked a lot. He asked me to look after his beloved leather jacket during the concert and when he came off stage he just walked straight over to me and kissed me. It took me by surprise because Sid was shy, and he just told me how he felt.

Sid was smart. He was streetwise, but also very intelligent. I didn’t reflect on how his real persona differed from his image at the time since I’d never heard of him before. That came later. The press want to make him into this nihilistic caricature of popular myth. They exaggerate everything he did and said, because they wanted him to be outrageous. They hinted that he was drunk and drugged up. No one had any alcohol until after the concert. We drank coke (the fizzy drink). Sid didn’t do any drugs until very late that night and it totally freaked me out when I saw him shoot up some speed. He had to promise me not to use any or I would leave. He promised and kept his promise.

Footage and Audio recordings of this tour show the band in a good spot, playing really tightly, albeit with Sid unplugged for many shows, although in many shots taken, he seems to be happy, and having a good time. Do you think you were the cause of this? and if so, How did you guys spend your time?

You have to realize I was only with Sid for a very short time. I didn’t go with him for the rest of the tour to Sweden because my mother had hidden my passport and cut off my allowance and threatened to call the police. Sid had been accused of throwing a glass at the 100 Club and blinding a girl and he had a court case on either 25th or 26 of July and had to go back to England. I didn’t want to risk him being delayed because of my parents. We agreed I sort things out at home and meet up in London the week later. Sadly however I wasn’t given my passport until Christmas 1977. Sid sent me massages via friends wanting to know what the problem was and why I wasn’t coming. McLaren set up a new Scandinavian tour for right after the US Tour that we were excited about, but we all know what happened to that.

We basically just hung out when they had their free time. Went shopping, had lunch. Just normal stuff. The whole band went to a museum, but I didn’t want to go. The Norwegian fans behaved with respect and didn’t bother us at all much really.

Why has it taken so long for you to step out of the shadows and come forward with this incredible story?

Before Sid died I was keeping my eye on him via the media, but I was hurt he’d gotten into drugs so deeply and gone back to Nancy. I know I was very much on his mind until the US tour. But the fact remained that he was still seeing Nancy and he knew there was no way I’d see him if he was. As time passed I could see him spiralling out of control and I avoided reading about him. When Sid died I didn’t handle it well at all. It totally fucked me up and the only way I could deal with it was not to deal with it, if that makes any sense. When he died I felt guilty for not doing more to get to him. I felt I’d let him down. The only way I could handle Sid’s death was to put it away into a place in my heart and not look at it. I couldn’t go near the hotel we’d stayed at and I avoided reading anything about him. I refused to talk to people about it.

In 2010 a Norwegian author contacted me because he’d heard I was involved in the tour and he was writing a book about it. I wasn’t really interested to begin with and I held back the details, but I ended up writing a big chunk of his book. At the same time it forced me to take out the memories and relive them again. It was really hard, but suddenly other friends of Sid contacted me and helped me get through it. Eileen Polk has been amazing. She is DeeDee Ramone’s ex girlfriend and a close friend to Sid’s mother, Anne, in New York. We both had trouble talking about it and we have helped each other. I didn’t know about anything that happened after Sid died. There were so many lies out there. People were suddenly wanting to know more about me and the time I spent with Sid, so I decided I’d write my own book. Eileen filled me in on all the details from New York and has practically written the last chapter of my book for me. I want to try to get some sort of truth about Sid out to people. So many have just bought in to all the hype around him.

You were not a fan of punk music at the time you were involved with Sid and The Pistols, and you said you knew nothing about Nancy (Sid's Girlfriend) at the time. How did you find out about her, and how did that make you feel?

Oh boy, I was so mad I was fuming like an Aberdeen Angus. What happened was that it was late at an after concert party at the hotel. Steve Jones had been trying to chat up Nina my friend, but she wasn’t interested and left. There were plenty of girls around so I found it a bit strange he suddenly came in to John’s suite and sat beside me and Sid on the sofa. He sat for a little while listening to Sid ask me to come to London etc and then he casually asked Sid to get him a packet of cigarettes from his room. Sid refused to begin with. I think there was some sort of issues I didn’t know about but that I picked up on. It ended with Sid doing it, as Steve offered him a packet for himself and said his back was giving him trouble . As soon as Sid had left the room, Steve took his cigarettes from his pocket and smiled slyly at me and showed me there were plenty of cigarettes in the packet. I was a bit dim to begin with and didn’t get it. Then he put his arm on the back of the sofa and leaned closer and kissed me. It caught me by surprise. So I pulled back and asked him not to do that as he knew I was with Sid and he became quite indignant and said I should be careful with Sid as Nancy, his girlfriend wouldn’t like me messing around with her boyfriend. Of course when Sid came back with the cigarettes I confronted him. He didn’t deny it. He told me it wasn’t that sort of a relationship. They could see other people. I told him I wasn’t interested if he had a girlfriend. But he explained that he’d gotten in late to his place just before he was to leave on tour and found a guy in his bathroom. He said he didn’t give a toss about who Nancy slept with, but this guy was his worst enemy and he thought Nancy found some weird satisfaction in bringing him back to Sid’s bed. He was so sick of the whining and nagging and didn’t want to see her any more. Their relationship had only been an on/off sort of thing for a couple of months and he was tired of it. He had to work hard at stopping me from leaving, but I believed him in the end.

After the relationship ended, did you follow the Sex Pistols or Sid Vicious story to its very sad and tragic ending, and if so, what were your thoughts?

I think I’ve already answered this above. I can’t really term what Sid and I had as a relationship to be honest. It was a short and very intense time and it never really ended. He went to London and I was stuck in Norway. I felt so cheated but like most 16 year olds, I moved on after Christmas 1977. I always believed I’d see him again. I was desperate to be older and I was furious that as a 16 year old you have absolutely no rights. I couldn’t get a passport myself, nor my birth certificate. I was stuck and there was nothing I could do about it.

As I said earlier I couldn’t deal with it, so no I didn’t follow him at all. He sent me a message that he was coming back. They had set up another Scandinavian tour and for me to meet him in Stockholm for the start of it. I was so excited. I got that message in November 1977. When I learned they had split the band up on the US tour I was so angry with him. I felt he chose drugs and Nancy over me and I had to get on with my life. I have already told you how his death effected me. I was devastated and I still can’t watch the interview he gave after Nancy died.

Did you go see the Sex Pistols on any of their re-union gigs in Scandinavia?

No. I didn’t enjoy their music and at the time of the reunion gigs, I was still not looking back so I didn’t want to go to any of the gigs. I met Glen Matlock a little while ago and interviewed him for the music magazine in the UK that I write for; Mudkiss.com. Then he let me cover a gig for the sexpistols.net site and that is the first time one of the Sex Pistols has performed with me in the audience after 1977. And I think that is also the first time I have actually enjoyed their music. Of course Glen did most of his own stuff too from after he left the band and started his own. But it was all good .

I read you have received some negative comments from the Sex Pistols on your book, one even telling you, "Sod Off!" ( I can guess who that is!"), Do you know why this is? As it seems to me you are only telling your story, and shouldn't be seen in a bad light from them.

That was a year ago and about the other book I was working on. The comment to ‘sod off’ was my interpretation of a 20 minute talk I had with a certain band members manager. He didn’t actually say ‘sod off’. I think the Sex Pistols are fed up of people writing books and cashing in on their name. That was the impression I got anyway. Also people want things to be as outrageous as possible and I was told that a lot of what is out there that has come from other people is basically lies, so I can see why they would question my motivation. I was starting to read the stuff that is out there and it really annoyed me. There was an article in Norway where they wrote Sid was drugged up and unconscious in the hotel lobby when they arrived, when he was just tired and asleep. There was another article that said The Sex Pistols had swastikas tattooed to their foreheads. This was from 1977. But it’s just lies of course. Someone was writing that we had been in a music shop and gotten thrown out for spitting. And so on. So I decided to set the record straight. Sid can’t defend himself and I was there, so hope my book makes people sit up and pay attention and stop buying in to the hype around him. Eileen Polk was there the night he died and sat with his body until the coroner came. She was at the funeral and when Anne, his mother, scattered his ashes We can tell you what happened from experience and not by research. Am I making sense?

Finally, where can we buy this book, and get more information on it?

The book is called A Vicious Love Story and will be released worldwide on Friday the 13th of July 2012. It’s a good day to release, as I was born on Friday the 13th but in January not July, so I thought it apt. You can pre order it from Little Acorns Publishing Ltd in the UK and they will ship it to you.

http://littleacornspublishing.com/coming-soon/pre-order/

It will be available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. We are working on getting bookstores to stock it, but your local bookstore can always order it for you if you ask them since it will be on their list of available publications in the Barnes and Noble catalogue.

And finally, if they want to find out more about what exactly is in the book I think you are going to review it, aren’t you Johnny ? So then they can read about it here in the near future.

The book is indeed going to be reviewed here in Punk Globe magazine very soon. But if this interview is anything to go by, its gonna be a great read. We thank you Teddie, and wish you every success with the Book.