Nice stormy night heading here and a double rainbow just before sunset, not sure what signifies but it looked pretty special to me. I noticed the delay between bouts of the Clash Cup was a bit longer than planned so lets get one of those in before the weekend arrives in earnest. Before the next pairing are pulled (these are all 100% random) we’ve got the results from the last match up to announce. Regular readers will know we are now in round 2 and the best runners up still might have a chance to make the final 64 Clash songs up for voting. That might be the case from this as it was really close:

Lightning Strikes defeated 48 Hours      27-24

This was a close run thing from the very beginning of the voting and the overall support for 48 hours should see it still perhaps remain though we won’t know until the end of Round 2 of course. Now for the next two, and if you’re new to this its just as easy as it sounds. No need to register just give both songs your serious consideration and cast one vote. This is the round that will sort out most of the legitimate contenders because when we’re done with this round we’ll be down to the some of the best Clash songs recorded. The two picked tonight aren’t too shabby either:

Round 2 Match 9

Radio Clash versus Ghetto Defendant

Not a bad pairing but like a horse at the starting line I can clearly spot an immediate favourite amongst these two. Both songs of course came late in the career of the band with Radio Clash filling in the time just post Sandinista! (and becoming a legitimate club hit) and Ghetto Defendant signaling the new twists the band would make on Combat Rock. Both feature a good amount of Joe while the former tacks on horns and a track that’s really showing Mick’s ability to take the sounds he’s hearing and mesh them into the sound of The Clash. I’ll never forget rushing out to get This is Radio Clash on 12″ single when it came out and thinking the future had just landed on my turntable.

Form book:

Round 1 – Radio Clash defeated Midnight to Stevens                  83% of the vote

Round 1 – Ghetto Defendant lost to Brand New Cadillac            (35% of the vote) but remained in the Cup due to high runner up vote total

Odds:

I don’t often feel a song is essentially a shoe-in for the next round but when I really line these two up against one another I can only see one winner. Radio Clash will make round 3 – it’s a stronger and more adventurous song and a key link between the last two Clash albums. Just my prediction mind you, it has no impact on the voting.

8 D batteries to power this beauty

Stuff:

I’m in the camp that says This is Radio Clash was a really important single, not just in terms of where The Clash were heading but also in the crossover between rap/funk and rock. I don’t know how it sounded if the first time you heard it was 1998 for example and not having the perspective of where music was in 1981/2 on your shoulders and in your ears. It’s a bit like when you now hear Run DMC or Schooly D and it might sound a bit boxed in by the production and sound but once again its looking at what was going on all around at that time. In the US Talking Heads were ahead of the curve in incorporating other styles of music and in England The Clash were picking up as much New York energy as anybody else. For historic benchmarking – 1981 was the year of Antmusic in the UK as Adam and The Ants dominated the charts, Radio Clash is far more lasting (to these ears). In addition the lyrics are a call to action rather than the banality that was order of the day in the charts of 1981. To refresh you, check out the clip on the Tom Snyder show in the States recorded in the summer of ’81 some 5 months before the single got released. Then there is Ghetto Defendant, not for the first time I’ve got more affection for the longer version on the Mick Jones Combat Rock sessions (Rat Patrol). Oh…and for those who say Gorillaz have no correlation to The Clash with the numerous guests on their albums, what do you think of The Clash recruiting radical poet Allen Ginsberg from the shadows in the 1980′s when his forte was poetry that shook society in the 50′s and 60′s. Another testament to the ability of The Clash to not follow the path of the expected. Before you vote here’s the longer version that I mentioned.

Please take time to consider your vote…and don’t give up on a song that’s trailing…that’s how Bush ‘won’ Florida….. Talk to you soon…..(if you get a chance to tweet or facebook the post I’ll be chuffed)

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Good evening and welcome back to the blog. Shaping up to be one of those weeks ~ now the cat of the household is not well which I’ll confess usually has me at sixes and sevens more than if one of the kids isn’t well (harsh but true). Vet bills can rapidly become very difficult decisions and ones I usually side with via giving the cat every treatment possible, hopefully it will be nothing too serious. I’ve got a pretty nasty Clash Blog back log of information to get through and under this scenario I roll out Westway Traffic so we can get at least four of five things covered. So let’s jump into that, as ever for extra information click on the red text:

NME Celebrates The Clash in print and online: As discussed last week this week’s NME has a special pull out section exclusively dedicated to the Clash. Thanks to a kind reader of the blog one is on the way to me here in Phoenix. If you’re in the UK pop out and buy yourself a copy. Online the NME runs through a celebrity playlist of favourite Clash songs, so click the link to find out what Paul Weller, Thurston Moore and Steve Diggle amongst others consider their favourite Clash track. As part of the same feature the NME also interviews various bands about the impact of The Clash on their own music and careers. Worth a read!

“When I was 17, I saw [former Factory Records supremo] Tony Wilson doing this TV show full of footage from his So It Goes programme. It showed some footage of The Clash in Manchester doing ‘What’s My Name’ and ‘Garageland’ and Joe Strummer looked absolutely fucking amazing” James Dean Bradfield – Manic Street Preachers

MP3 Links for Sandinista! era outtakes and demos: Handy to have these all in one place for some of you I’d hope. MP3 links for Midnight To Stevens, Every Little Bit Hurts, Louie Louie, King of The Road and Blonde Rock n Roll.

DVD Review(s) – Don Lett’s Strummerville film: Official review from the usually fair and reasonable people over at Uncut magazine in the UK. Don’t forget you can still purchase the DVD via the Strummerville site.

Joe Strummer Mural in Peru: Been a long time since I posted this so its back by popular demand if you’ve joined the blog in the last six months or so. This video clip shows the making of another Joe Strummer mural on the roof of a building in Peru. Buen trabajo!!

Another point for Texas! Strummer Birthday event in Austin: Brick by brick, ranch by ranch I’m beginning to see that Texas still has a good hardcore of people that appreciate The Clash and in turn good people of course. I love having my opinion changed so (10 gallon) hats off to the lonestar state for continuing to prove me wrong (and thanks for visiting the blog). The great city of Austin will celebrate the anniversary of Joe’s birth on Aug 21 at a club/bar called Red 7, entry just $5. If you happen to be local I hope you can attend, info via the link and image to the right.

Reminder – Early Joe Strummer Tribute night Aug 7th, Ann Arbor Michigan: A couple of weeks early but mentioned on a prior post somewhere. If you live in the Detroit area please try and make a trip out to The Blind Pig, 208 S First St. Ann Arbor, MI. If you go take some pictures and get in touch.

Right that should keep you busy, I’m tired tonight but will try and get another post in the morning compiled. Any questions or ideas or particular worries – Get in touch. Cheers for coming by.

Well…the Birthday lark is well and truly done with now and thus the task to be a more mature and responsible adult becomes more pressing, it struck me this morning that its 21 years plus since I was 21 – what a strange concept. It also struck me that you sometimes pass by historic events in life without knowing the ripples from them will last a lifetime. Bad things on a grand scale like Hillsborough and 9/11, wonderful moments like the Berlin Wall coming down and South Africa turning over apartheid. Then of course there are each of our private moments, falling in love, breaking up – losing relatives and friends or achieving something you’ve worked for years at. In our world (The Clash) there were a number of pivotal moments not least of all the sequence of events that led to Joe Strummer being part of the band in the first place, the perfect foil for the songwriting skills and arrangements of Mick Jones. If the stars weren’t lined up properly in 1976 who knows what might have been. Then there was the opposite end of the lens, when the band let first Topper and then Mick fall from the lineup.

I thought today of that preposterous TV series from the early 90′s “Quantum Leap”, if you don’t remember it bear with me as this won’t take long. (I know I saw it a few times, which worries me that I spent some of my 20′s watching television when now its little more than a big thing to dust now and then in my office). Anyway in the show the main character (Biff, Steve?) was shot back into the far or recent past to an event of historical importance, his task seemed to be to change history for the good as a time traveler with a purpose. He was aided by some other chap who used to send him messages via (phone? fax? I don’t know…it was a long time ago) as to just what he should or shouldn’t do to best allow the world at large to be a better place. I only remember two episodes; one involved Lee Harvey Oswald though I can’t remember the outcome – and another bumping into the young Buddy Holly and convincing him he should write about ‘Peggy Sue’. Just think, people were paid money to write this stuff up. Why did they never send Steve/Biff back to 1983 to be a fly on the wall in The Clash camp?

Only Mick looks pleased with this interview....

If he did imagine what he would have seen. A band whose hard work and brilliant music was bringing recognition they had always dreamed of. At the dawn of MTV the best British band were poised to do whatever they wanted after Combat Rock and a global audience had found out about The Clash and were taking them very seriously indeed. Biff/Steve would have seen the hardest working front man imaginable insisting that the band work, record, tour at all costs and a songwriter who not only embraced diverse influences but wanted to mold them into The Clash being the hardest band to tag imaginable. He’d also have seen a drummer who was lost to serious drug addiction and a growing lack of stability amongst the remaining members. More than I wonder what Biff/Steve would have done I wonder what I myself would have done?

Would I have taken the band and Bernard Rhodes to one side and said you really need and deserve a long break to recharge the batteries and decide what to do next. Would I have insisted Joe keep his faith with Mick because Mick had never failed the band before and surely never would. Would I have asked that they insist Topper gets the help he needs and when he is well The Clash will be all set to finish what they started. When the band kicked Mick Jones out in 1983 I thought my world had fallen apart, I thought in a few weeks or months the rift would heal and The Clash would get back to business. As the months rolled on and it looked like a lost cause and there was no sign whatsoever of progress I felt lost for a while. My band were done…I was supposed to have them to get me through the rest of my teens and beyond.

What would you do if you went back to 1983? Is the legend just as it should have been? Would another 5 years of The Clash resulted in more amazing output or perhaps a tattered dream where the inner turmoil of the band just transferred itself to the records they made? I know you can’t change history but isn’t it tempting to wonder about it – to see what you’d do if you could do it all over again . I don’t know what I’d have told the 1983 version of The Clash to do, probably take 18 months off, let Culture Club have their moment in the sun and come back and be the main act at an alternative Live Aid at Loftus Road. Instead….we got U2 and Queen (no disrespect) and a music industry that was right back to feeling very pleased with itself. What would you have done? I know we’ve talked about this before but I’m sure to do it again…….

I wrote this tonight as I’m feeling sad at the loss of a friend at a dreadfully young age which I just learned of today and hoping I said the right things to him the last time I spoke to him. I think I did, he was worried about me at the time and I said don’t worry I’ll be fine but thanks for caring. It also brought into sharp relief just what I do with all relationships on a daily basis, not to live a life full of regrets and do or not do things you then need a time machine to fix.

John – you’ll be missed, we needed more gentle and joyful people on this planet.

Back soon – Tim