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Video Reviews and News : Pop Music : ****Excellent ***Good **Ordinary *Poor : <i> Recent videocassette releases, reviewed by Times critics.</i>

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<i> Compiled by Terry Atkinson</i>

*** 1/2 “Sex Pistols: Buried Alive”

IceWorld. $19.95. VHS only.

It’s only 25 minutes, it’s crude and the sound is hissy, but this slapped-together compendium of early Pistols--mostly derived from staid British TV shows of the time trying to interpret this new phenomenon called punk--conveys the excitement of and need for a truly anti-Establishment band like this in 1976 England. (We could use one in 1988 America.) Here’s the infamous Bill Grundy interview, naughty words and all, similar hilarious attempts by other befuddled talk-show hosts to make sense of it all, two versions (1 1/2 really) of the Glen Matlock-era Pistols doing “Anarchy in the U.K.,” a couple of other live numbers, brief looks at Malcolm MacLaren, then-mere-fan Siouxsie Sioux and much more. It all flashes by very fast and it’s incredibly exciting--just like the Sex Pistols. Information: (215) 887-0510.

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