Musings —12.22.2012 01:00 AM
—Ten years ago today: Joe Strummer
Ten years! My God, has it been that long?
Last week, we headlined Strummerfest, a musical festival in K-W put together to remember him. And, before we got going, I read part of the piece below. It ran on the front page of the Star a day or so after his passing – something I was later told doesn’t happen very often with freelancers like me.
Anyway, I miss him a lot, still. He changed my life. God bless you, Strummer.
The sticker affixed to the London Calling album shrink-wrap, 23 years ago this month, boldly declared that the Clash were “the only band that matters.” If that is true – if it was more than record company hyperbole – then Joe Strummer’s death on Sunday, of a heart attack at age 50, was a very big deal indeed.
It wasn’t as big as John Lennon’s murder, of course, which came one year after London Calling was released, and shook an entire generation. Nor as newsworthy, likely, as the suicide of Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain in 1994. No, the impact of the sudden death of Joe Strummer – the front man for the Clash, the spokesman for what the Voidoid’s Richard Hell called, at the time, “the blank generation” – will be seen in more subtle ways.
For starters, you won’t see any maudlin Joe Strummer retrospectives on CNN, or hordes of hysterical fans wailing in a park somewhere, clutching candles whilst someone plays ‘White Riot’ on acoustic guitar. Nor will there be a rush by his estate to cash in with grubby compilation and tribute discs. Punk rock, you see, wasn’t merely apart from all that – it was against of all that.
Punk rock was a specific rejection of everything rock’n’roll had become in the 1970s – namely, a business: an arena-sized, coke-addicted, utterly-disconnected-from-reality corporate game played by millionaires at Studio 54. Punk rock, and Joe Strummer, changed all of that. They were loud, loutish, pissed off. They were of the streets, and for the streets. They wanted rock’n’roll to matter again.
I met Joe Strummer for the first time on the night of October 16, 1979, in East Vancouver. Two of my Calgary punk rock buddies, plus my girlfriend and I, were loitering on the main floor at the Pacific National Exhibition (PNE). We were exhilarated and exhausted. We had pooled our meager resources to buy four train tickets to Vancouver, to see Joe Strummer and the Clash in concert. Their performance had been extraordinary (and even featured a mini-riot, midway through). But after the show, we had no money left, and nowhere to stay.
The four of us were discussing this state of affairs when a little boy appeared out of nowhere. It was near midnight, and the Clash, DOA and Ray Campi’s Rockabilly Rebels had long since finished their respective performances. Roadies were up on stage, packing up the Clash’s gear. The little boy looked to be about seven or eight. He was picking up flashcubes left behind by the departed fans.
We started talking to the boy. It turned out he was the son of Mickey Gallagher, the keyboardist the Clash had signed on for the band’s London Calling tour of North America. His father appeared, looking for him. And then, within a matter of minutes, Topper Headon appeared, looking for the Gallaghers.
Topper Headon was admittedly not much to look at: he was stooped, slight and pale, with spiky hair and a quiet manner. But he was The Drummer For The Clash, and had supplied beats for them going back almost to their raw eponymous first album, the one that had changed our lives forever. We were in awe.
Topper asked us where we were from and what we thought of the show. When he heard that we had no place to stay, he said: “Well, you’d better come backstage with me, then.”
Sprawled out in a spartan PNE locker room, Strummer was chatting with lead guitarist Mick Jones and bassist Paul Simonon, along with some Rastafarians and a few of the Rockabilly Rebels. They were all stoned, and grousing about an unnamed promoter of the Vancouver show, who had refused to let them play until he was paid his costs. The Clash, like us, had no money. That made us love them even more.
Joe Strummer, with his squared jaw and Elvis-style hairdo, didn’t seem to care about the band’s money woes. While Mick Jones flirted with my girlfriend, Strummer started questioning me about my Clash T-shirt. It was homemade, and Strummer was seemingly impressed by it. I could barely speak. There I was, speaking with one of the most important rock’n’rollers ever to walk the Earth – and he was acting just like a regular guy. Like he wasn’t anything special.
But he was, he was. From their first incendiary album in 1977 (wherein they raged against racism, and youth unemployment, and hippies), to their final waxing as the real Clash in 1982 (the cartoonish Combat Rock, which signaled the end was near, and appropriately so), Strummer was the actual personification of everything that was the Clash. They were avowedly political and idealistic; they were unrelentingly angry and loud; most of all, they were smarter and more hopeful than the other punk groups, the cynical, nihilistic ones like the Sex Pistols. They believed that the future was worth fighting for.
The Clash were the ones who actually read books – and encouraged their fans to read them, too. They wrote songs that emphasized that politics were important (and, in my own case, taught me that fighting intolerance, and maintaining a capacity for outrage, was always worthwhile). They were the first punk band to attempt to unify disparate cultures – for example, introducing choppy reggae and Blue Beat rhythms to their music.
They weren’t perfect, naturally. Their dalliances with rebel movements like the Sandinistas, circa 1980, smacked of showy dilettante politics. But they weren’t afraid to take risks, and make mistakes.
Born John Graham Mellor in 1952 in Turkey to the son of a diplomat, Strummer started off as a busker in London, and then formed the 101ers, a pub rock outfit, in 1974. Two years later, he saw the Pistols play one of their first gigs. Strummer, Jones and Simonon immediately formed the Clash, and set about rewriting the rules.
While political, they also knew how to put together good old rock’n’roll. Strummer and Jones effectively became the punk world’s Lennon and McCartney, churning out big hits in Britain, and attracting a lot of favourable critical acclaim in North America. Some of their singles, ‘White Man in Hammersmith Palais’ and ‘Complete Control,’ are among the best rock’n’roll 45s – ever. Their double London Calling LP is regularly cited as one of history’s best rock albums.
After the Clash broke up, Strummer played with the Pogues, wrote soundtrack music and formed a new group, the world beat-sounding Mescaleros. He married, and became a father. But he never again achieved the adulation that greeted the Clash wherever they went.
Strummer didn’t seem to care. When I saw him for the last time – at a show in one of HMV’s stores on Yonge Street in July 2001, which (typically) he agreed to give at no cost – Strummer and his Mescaleros stomped around on the tiny stage, having the time of their lives. They didn’t play any Clash songs, but that was okay by us. Joe Strummer’s joy was infectious, that night.
As the gig ended, Strummer squatted at the edge of the stage – sweaty, resplendent, grinning – to speak with the fans gathered there. They looked about as old as I was, when I first met him back in October 1979. As corny as it sounds, it was a magical moment, for me: I just watched him for a while, the voice of my generation, speaking to the next one.
I hope they heard what he had to say.
I remember when a friend dragged me to his house to listen to the first Clash album. It was a huge leap past the metal and disco that I had little time for and it all just grabbed me by the throat and has never let go.
‘London Calling’ is punks retort to ‘Exile on Main Street’ and ‘Blonde on Blonde’. Perhaps the only records I’d want if I was stranded on a desert island.
Oh, yeah and also “The White Album’. Can’t forget that.
Beautifully written.
Thanks for this. Saw him in Philadelphia with the Clash, then again years later in Denver with the Mescaleros. I used to get off work from my 3rd shift job (when I was a young punk) Put on the Clash, Selecter, and Specials and fall asleep. I will always love this man, his music and how important they were and are to me.
I’ve seen a lot of great bands over the years but never had the pleasure of seeing the Clash. I’ve always loved their music and I can’t see it ever disappearing from any of my playlists.
Joe is one of those guys I’d love to sit down and chat with… along with John Lennon and Winston Churchill.
Merry Christmas Warren
Nice write up Warren, I too still miss Joe though I hadn’t spoken with him in close to 20 years when he died. First met him on the streets of london in 76 my squat was pretty close to his. used to see him occasionally and had the great good fortune to see the clash a couple of times over that winter of 76-77.
Saw them almost every time they made it to toronto (though I skipped the Ex show I did meet up with joe over a few pints before the show just by fluke.) that was the last time we talked (pre internet it was a damn site harder to keep in contact with people)
One of the nicest men I’ve ever met, and his music and attitude to life had a lasting impact on me. I still think of him often
As a kid I remember hearing Should I Stay or Should I Go, Rock the Casbah etc. on the radio but not aware, nor would have understood or appreciated their earlier and far better work so The Clash came kind of late for me.
After all “White Man in Hammersmith Palais” was not something you heard on commercial rock radio in the early 80’s.
First it was Give ‘Em Enough Rope produced by Sandy Pearlman IIRC, London Calling and the rest fell into place, notwithstanding Combat Rock or (shudder) Cut the Crap which are far below standard IMHO.
No doubt one of the all-time greats, their ending wasn’t so hot but that should not take away from their importance, not just to punk but rock and roll in general.
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