Hello hello and welcome back to The Clash Blog. Sorry for the interruption in services, I took a few days away from the dusty desert of Phoenix to celebrate my Birthday out of town and am just getting my feet back under the desk so I’ve no clue what I’ve missed. Beyond the fact that Obama has just become a careerist which is sickening to say the least. The lack of nerves in the halls of power to upset the richest 1% (not just in America mind you) is more than bewildering at this point, it’s a fucking outrage – and in the meantime those with the least are assured to stay exactly that way.

Do we need a new sort of punk rock? Yes….perhaps now more than ever or at the very least musicians who want to switch people on to the things around them. Make an audience ask questions and encourage involvement or participation. When the underdog makes it all the way to the White House and then realises that you have to sell out to survive it’s a bloody good indicator that the voices of the people aren’t being heard. This has such a feeling of 1980′s deja vu with Europe shaking in the wind, Cameron not knowing which way is up and a global recession (sans Asia) looking like a permanent state of affairs that something’s got to give soon. Or perhaps it won’t. Meanwhile your average 16 year old is going to mortgage their future for a degree they’ll probably not be able to use because they were too busy watching American Idol and drinking bad beer to realise the direction things were heading in. If I sound pissed off it’s because I am. I’m not working for the Clampdown. I know you may not come here for politics but I can’t ignore the events of the year to date when governments can only make decidedly shit decisions when looking down the barrel of a gun. In Europe it’s the same – the panic sets in when things are too far gone. I think nine-year-olds would find a better path than these old bastards in power.

image courtesy GMDOK on flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/64683846@N06/

So what’s been going on in the world of The Clash? I’ll try and find out first hand and relay it here. I saw Billy Bragg give an extended interview on Democracy Now during his recent stint in New York. It’s full of interesting stuff and a fair few songs while The Clash, Joe Strummer and Woody Guthrie each get more than a little mention including some live footage from 1978. I also found it worth hearing his point of view about the music industry as it currently stands in as much as touring/playing live is the only way forward for the vast majority of artists now. In essence a good thing but still a shame that nobody (in relative terms) purchases music anymore. Here’s a link to the whole interview with Bragg, Clash references occur near the middle.

I’ve been looking for clips of B.A.D. in Japan to no avail – if you’ve seen some let me know. In the meantime this is less than 2 hours old (well it was when I wrote some of this post last night) – the band playing Rush in Boston this evening. (Aug 2nd). Camera from side of stage (?) and audio is alright.

B.A.D. – ‘Rush’ House of Blues, Boston

Speaking of B.A.D. thanks to the chap who posted this link to a review of their concert in Manchester earlier in the year. Yes it’s a few months old but captures some of the concerns I think many shared when the reunion was announced – for the most part those fears have been unfounded as I’m finding it hard to recall anyone saying that they saw the gigs as a major let down and I’ve read a lot of reviews and comments. Some people were annoyed about ticket prices which I can understand, others that the news surrounding Dan Donovan was never really clarified but I’ve yet to see people write that the shows have failed to reach expectations. In fact quite the opposite as many are amazed that the sound is so good and the performances as tight as they’ve been with the added probable advantages offered by 2011 technology. Anyway there are still a good number of dates to see them this summer and I don’t know where my money would be on them playing beyond then. Will Mick Jones want to put the band into a studio and write new material, indeed has all the time together this year provided the impetus to write new songs beyond one or two. Does B.A.D. have a future after this summer ends or was the reunion something Mick felt he had to do. All this will probably be answered in the months ahead, I think it would be interesting to see what they would record in 2011 especially as in my opinion Mick’s songwriting with Carbon Silicon has remained really strong and socially aware. If you bump into Mick this week or next ask these questions! Incidentally check out that entire site it has a few things well worth a look.

Hope you have fun at the New York, Philadelphia and Chicago concerts in the days ahead. Please send in reviews if you have time. I’ll be back soon. Tim

Good morning and thanks for stopping in at the blog, now rapidly heading towards the 800th ever post. Blimey! You find me on a Thursday morning with a full mug of coffee and listening to Diamond Dogs by David Bowie, I’m not quite sure why. That midlife crisis thing may actually be sneaking up on me. I have to pack for a few nights away today so I thought a short update prior to a day’s travel through the desert would be in order.

Not much news comes immediately to mind, I image that Big Audio Dynamite must have flown from Heathrow today or yesterday to Tokyo for their Friday night appearance at the Fuji Rock Festival. I know we get an awful lot of readers on the blog from Japan so I’m quietly optimistic that we may receive photos or some notes about the gig from a few of them. Speaking of the festival they have a rather brilliant lineup of bands appearing over the three days although of course I’m not including Coldplay in that description. Arctic Monkeys are also there and I happened to purchase their new album a few weeks ago, yesterday was my first chance to listen to it in full. Let’s just say I’ve heard better lyrics coming from a random search of the dictionary, which based on the album may have been exactly what he did when writing these songs. Does the music make up for the lyrics? No…sorry. As for B.A.D. I’m pleased to see not only will the band not be playing in broad daylight but they will be headlining on the smaller ‘white’ stage. They are also scheduled to play a long set (22:20-23:40) and I’m not even sure that they’ve rehearsed enough songs to fill an 80 minute slot. Expect a lot of asides from Mick Jones on the night.

Remarkably it’s only 6 months short of being thirty years since The Clash first played in Japan at the beginning of 1982 – a period of time that is really well chronicled in the Chris Salewicz biography of Joe Strummer. The response to The Clash from Japanese fans bordered on the obsessive which I can do nothing but applaud and I hope a handful of those same fans will be at the Fuji Rock Festival over the weekend. Just to get some of you in the mood here is a link to an entire Clash concert recorded at the Sun Plaza, Tokyo back on Feb 1, 1982. Thanks to the original KombatBlog - ‘Nuzz Prowlin Wolf’ for the upload.

On a local level I’m cautiously optimistic about this dusty desert town as not one, not two but three new live music venues have opened here in Phoenix over the last few months. I’m going to need to campaign hard to try and get the owners/promoters of said venues to get in some of the British/European bands to add this town to the itinerary as they have all too often skipped it. On the plus side though after a few years of various closures it is a good sign that perhaps live music is making some inroads – especially in venues that hold between 300-900 people that we are painfully lacking in. So good luck to ‘The Foundry on 1st‘ – ‘The Crescent Ballroom‘ and another whose name escapes me.

Do you ever use/listen to last.fm? The online streaming music software that does offer a wide selection whilst simultaneously performing an appalling job of ‘predicting’ the bands you might like? As a lazy resort I sometimes use it and just found that you can look up the most listened to songs by any artists. So of course I plugged in ‘The Clash’. You should too as the results will surprise and then fill you with dismay, above all else it shows you what we’re up against. Tracks 1 & 2 (SISoSIG and Rock the Casbah) are exactly as you might fear but tracks 3 & 4 might cheer you up. An alarming lack of ‘listening’ on last.fm to earlier material it would seem. They are close to being banned as a result due to this and the fact that I’ve finally got Spotify but I’ll make a decision next week. When you work from home and spend 6-12 hours a day writing, blogging, building blogs and websites the companionship and rhythm of music is crucial so I take this far too seriously.

Have a splendid Thursday, please share/tweet/comment as you wish. Best -Tim

Hello, how are you? Thanks for dropping in to the blog, all of a sudden Monday arrived and sort of knocked me over I must confess. A very weird weekend and the distraction/emotions from horrific events in Norway and a sad end to another person fully consumed by addiction gave the weekend some surreal aspects which I didn’t really navigate. Most importantly I hope any blog readers or your families in Norway were not impacted by the tragic events on Friday, although of course the whole country is at some level. As for Amy Winehouse, it’s very sad but I simultaneously saw a lot of people forget any sense of humanity and suggest/comment it was somehow fair game. In which case I suggest you’ve never known an addict and/or forget just how bloody hard Topper Headon had to work to overcome his troubles. I thought this piece by Russell Brand (love him or hate him) about Amy Winehouse was one of the better things I read at the weekend. I’ve no words for what happened in Norway, extremely troubled people fueled by fury, fear and hatred are a constant risk and we remain in a world where intolerance will lead to such events. Terrorism comes in all shapes and colours.

Mick Jones at the Royal Festival Hall, image courtesy Peter Stevens

We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care. We need to look at the way our government funds rehabilitation. It is cheaper to rehabilitate an addict than to send them to prison, so criminalisation doesn’t even make economic sense.   – Russell Brand

On to brighter thoughts then, by all accounts the performance by Big Audio Dynamite at the Royal Festival Hall at the weekend was quite something. Apparently many are saying their best live gig yet since the reunion (being indoors after festivals perhaps!?) or the venue and the charge from the audience in London? I don’t know the facts but the positive words I’m reading everywhere are very encouraging. I’ll hopefully have a series of photos from Pete to share with you soon, in the meantime I wanted to try a new toy on the blog and share some of the videos taken during the gig. Apart from looking like everyone was having a brilliant time the quality of the audio and video is really good as well. My thanks to ’00liadon’ (and one from ‘fergaiq’ for his youtube uploads. Hope you enjoy these as it looked like a great gig, even greater photographs to follow.

B.A.D. “Medicine Show”

B.A.D. “The Bottom Line”

B.A.D. “E=MC2″

B.A.D. “Just Play Music”

B.A.D. “Rush”

I realise the above would look nicer if I had a sixth video but I’ll sacrifice aesthetics for some good videos. Looks like a really good night and if I’m not being unfair (and certainly don’t intend to be) the sound is bigger and better with the change in personnel? I’ll be back soon, hoping you have a good Tuesday. More to follow, please do all you can to share the blog via Twitter, Facebook shares or word of mouth. Thanks – Tim