The Sex Pastichels, they ain't no human beings

Recognise this, at all? No, give up?

Hmm ... I happened upon it tonight, staring out at me from what I think was the sales office of a big half-built residential block in Shoreditch, east London. Yeah, the sales office. It seems that when they're ready for the latterday Sex Pistols fans looking for a place to live, these flats are going to cost a minimum of £710,000 (studio apartment). Most are over £1m (even for one-bed places). And there'll be three-bed flats for £2,570,000. But don't worry, there's free three-year gym membership thrown in. Bargain! It's hard to know where to start with this and, in a way, I won't even bother. This cheap appropriation of "edgy" culture for the purposes of burnishing spectacularly expensive property is not just deadly boring and totally played out, it's even deadly boring to write about! No, the fact they're still turning rebellion into money (or rather, the iconography of "rebellious music") is hardly news. It's maybe surprising they're still recycling Reid four decades on, but hey, who ever said estate agents were imaginative? In a way I almost like what they've come up with. The reworking is so bad (a beyond-terrible, literal-minded make-over of Reid's genuinely arresting blue and silver image) that it sort of signals to the would-be home-buyer what they're potentially letting themselves in for. They're hoping for their dream home, but they're really living the nightmare of London's sky-high property prices. England's dreaming, indeed. So, don't tell me what I want, and don't tell me what I need! I may not be a human being, but I do know a terrible Sex Pistols pastiche when I see one. No sale!

Still number one (or is that Rod Stewart?)