Viv Albertine and ‘Instant Hit’: The Slits capture punk’s drug problem
Whether it’s Kurt Cobain or Charlie Parker, the music industry has always had a problem with drug addiction. When punk and new wave kicked off in the mid-1970s, though, the issue became much more pronounced. As a result of its ‘no future’ attitude, drugs, particularly heroin, were rife throughout the early punk scene, and many groups decided to explore the issue through their music. Perhaps the greatest example of this is ‘Instant Hit’, written by Viv Albertine and The Slits.
Rising in notoriety as the guitarist for The Slits, Viv Albertine was no stranger to heroin. Once, during a teenage hitchhike to Amsterdam, the guitarist stayed over at a commune of addicts. Although she steered clear of it at the time, the guitarist later revealed in her book Clothes, Music, Boys that she had once been given heroin by Johnny Thunders of the New York Dolls. Thankfully, Albertine did not end up getting hooked on the narcotic despite being surrounded by it for much of her early music career. However, the same cannot be said for her close friend Keith Levene.
Before she joined The Slits, Albertine had formed a short-lived punk group called Flowers of Romance with Sid Vicious and Keith Levene. Vicious, who had a close relationship with Albertine at the time, famously died of a drug overdose at the age of 21, but during this period, he was not yet dependent on heroin. His mother had a longstanding addiction to the drug during Vicious’ childhood, but reportedly, his own addiction began to spiral after meeting Nancy Sprungen. The tale of Sid and Nancy is well-documented, with many conflicting accounts and theories, but the general consensus is that his dependence on heroin caused his downfall.
Levene, meanwhile, was already using heroin during his time with The Flowers of Romance. The guitarist had a notable impact on the early days of punk as a founding member of The Clash. Though musical differences between him and the rest of the group meant that his time with “the only band that mattered” was short-lived, he later made an impact as a founding member of Public Image Ltd with Sex Pistols frontman Johnny Rotten.
The reign of Flowers of Romance was brief, with the group never releasing any material. Vicious, of course, went on to play bass with Sex Pistols, while Albertine and Palmolive ended up with The Slits. The quintet were an incredibly important band in the development of punk into post-punk. The first all-female band to arise from the punk scene, the group incorporated influences of reggae, ska and dub into their debut album, Cut. The legacy of The Slits is one of the most enduring from the UK punk.
The opening track on Cut sees Albertine draw on her experiences of the early days of punk, particularly her good friend Keith Levene and his struggle with heroin addiction. The simplistic and repetitive lyrics of ‘Instant Hit’ encapsulated the drug problems faced by Levene and, by extension, many other punk musicians at the time. “Took heroin, don’t like himself very much, ‘Cause he has set to self-destruct”, connoting the self-destructive self-loathing that caused heroin to be such a problem for many young punks. The track even ends with a recording of a telephone conversation between Viv and Levene, who can be heard saying, “thanks a lot”.
Drugs continued to be a problem for Levene for much of his life following the punk years. With Public Image Ltd, his growing dependence on heroin can be heard through the lacklustre Flowers of Romance, an album taking its name from Levene’s early band with Albertine. Later, whilst working on production for the third album by Red Hot Chili Peppers, Levene was criticised for using a chunk of the band’s budget to buy drugs. Cleaning up in his later years, the guitarist eventually died of liver cancer last year.
To this day, ‘Instant Hit’ remains an incredibly important cautionary tale about the destructive power of heroin, a problem which continues to plague the music industry.
