Joined Chelsea as guitarist

In late 1976, Idol joined the newly formed West London 1960s retro-rock band Chelsea as a guitarist. The act’s singer/frontman Gene October styled Idol’s image, advising him to use contact lenses instead of eyeglasses for his short sight, and dye his hair blonde with a crew cut for a retro-1950s rocker look. After a few weeks performing with Chelsea, Idol and Tony James , the band’s bass guitarist, quit and co-founded Generation X , with Idol switching from guitarist to the role of singer/frontman. Generation X was one of the first punk bands to appear on the BBC Television music programme Top of the Pops . Although a punk rock band, they were inspired by mid-1960s British pop, in sharp contrast to their more militant peers, with Idol stating, “We were saying the opposite to the Clash and the Pistols. They were singing ‘No Elvis , Beatles or the Rolling Stones ‘, but we were honest about what we liked. The truth was we were all building our music on the Beatles and the Stones.”