The Rich Kids - Biography
By Oliver Hall
After his ejection from the Sex Pistols in 1977, bassist and songwriter Glen Matlock formed the far cuddlier Rich Kids with vocalist Midge Ure (formerly of the Bay City Rollers-related teen pop group Slik), guitarist Steve New and drummer Rusty Egan. In the years since the Sex Pistols’ 1978 breakup, it has come out that Matlock wrote the music for nearly every one of the Pistols’ original songs, but in his Rich Kids songs Matlock abandoned punk in favor of Small Faces-inspired pop-rock tunefulness. David Bowie’s former guitarist Mick Ronson produced The Rich Kids’ sole LP, gHOSTS oF pRINCES iN tOWERS (EMI 1978), a thoroughly enjoyable power-pop album that is devoid of both filth and fury, though the title track is one of Matlock’s strongest compositions. The album produced three singles, of which the typographically improved “Ghosts of Princes in Towers” (EMI 1978) was the last. The group recorded a Peel session and performed on UK television, but broke up before the end of 1978.
Asked by Pennyblackmusic in 2004 why the Rich Kids split up, Matlock replied: “Well, for what it was, I still wanted it to be a bit tougher in attitude than what it was, and I wanted to give Midge a chance to be a bit tougher, but he didn’t quite rise to that, although I think his voice is fantastic.” Also contributing to the split, Ure and Egan had begun collaborating on the early New Romantic, synth-driven outfit Visage, and Matlock says he was infuriated when a synthesizer appeared in the Rich Kids’ practice space. Matlock played with and wrote for Iggy Pop on his Soldier album (Arista 1980), on which Steve New also appears, while Ure left Visage to join Ultravox on Vienna (Chrysalis 1980).
