Well hello again, all things being equal it’s the end of your working (or studying week) or perhaps you are part of that fraternity of people who work weekends? I’ve been in that boat and the rest of the world just don’t relate to you if you have a week day off cos you have to work a Saturday or Sunday do they? Anyway if you are a weekend worker I hope you enjoyed your day off during the week. Not sure why I brought that up – mostly to welcome in the weekend before we see what’s come over the Clash newswires the last 36 hours.

Quite a lot of activity to be expected in the next week or so as Stummerville makes it way to Austin for the SXSW music festival and hopefully we’ll get to the bottom of a rumour that’s been circulating for the better part of two weeks about Simonon and Mick Jones becoming part of Gorillaz live band. Initially I heard that the two former members of The Clash would be appearing with Gorillaz at Coachella and then that they would actually become a semi-official part of Damon Albarn’s live band for gigs coming up in the UK. Now it seems the rumour is heating up as the NME are joining the speculation I’ve offered above. Two thoughts on this, first I think where there’s smoke you tend to find fire so I do expect it to happen at some level, secondly I don’t care if you fail to enjoy the music of Gorillaz (I realise some Clash fans are more than a bit turned off by it) the fact that Albarn respects his musical heritage enough to include Paul and Mick is good enough for me if that’s what it takes to see them play live on the same stage together. To extend that point, Blur made some of the most interesting music of the 90′s while I’d take all three Gorillaz albums and The Good, The Bad and The Queen as representing some of the more diverse things done during these last ten years. The heritage of a musician who takes chances and constantly evolves is entirely in keeping with the spirit of The Clash and for me has more merit than Simonon and Jones joining a band that attempt to be a modern day Clash circa 1978 (I won’t name names but there are more than a few of those kicking around with a US origin). Let’s see what happens and keep an open mind to new music – in as much as there were Clash fans who disowned the band after the release of London Calling you’ll find Blur fans who can’t find value in what Damon does now. I’m banking on it being made official next week.

This is great (thanks for the heads up Alan Miles) and make sure you make some time to listen. A podcast is up with an special feature about JGD. It kicks off with the reworked version of Jail Guitar Doors with vocals from Billy Bragg and a new verse from Mick Jones. It’s a pretty lengthy podcast which doesn’t

image courtesy Laura Levine

exclusively feature Jail Guitar Doors related material but there’s enough on there to keep you interested. The bulk however features an extensive interview with director Alan Miles (who put the film ‘Breaking Rocks’ together about the charity)  and tracks by some of the artists associated with the project. The link to the site is here and they give you a further outline there especially if you want to skip to your ‘Clash’ bits.

New York City and The Clash is a theme we’ve touched on more than once on the blog, accepted wisdom is that Manhattan gradually became the overseas headquarters of The Clash especially from 1979 onwards. As the British press started to reject the evolution of the band they spent more and more time in the US and Canada, New York becoming the hob for the band. It extended beyond the residency at Bonds and other famed concerts but they also were immersed and inspired by the scene in the city not to mention recording and mixing so much of their music in the town. I only meant to write a sentence there…sorry…I mention the pairing again as PopMatters posted a good article about New York and the band that’s worth a quick read.

I’ll have more over the weekend – Clash Cup and more. Thanks for visiting…..