Hello again and welcome back to the blog. Sorry for the 48 hours of inactivity but I caught some type of bug that left me with sore throat, limited voice, hot and cold spells  and sleeping for more than 90% of the weekend. If it happened to a woman you’d say you caught a cold but as a bloke let me tell you it made for a miserable weekend. I’m about 40% now, coughing and sneezing every few minutes but not needing a nap every 90 minutes as I did over the weekend…well enough for a blog post anyway.

it just won't run without fuel....

I’ll confess I’ve not actually had time for any great research since the last post so it leaves me to share the winner of the Strummer tattoo competition that we had about a week ago – and the winner in a very close event was tattoo number 2 – The black Strummerville logo (Joe on the Diving Board) just edged out one of the most impressive tattoos I’ve ever seen. I’ll try and locate the owner and offer them a lifetime subscription to the blog via RSS feed or something. In another poll we held recently it seems that the fine readers of the blog are well clued up on things other than The Clash as our preseason premier league poll (English soccer for some readers) showed the favourite pick to win the league this season as Chelsea, which I think is wise money. I’ll still stick with my prediction that Arsenal will take 2nd spot with some aplomb – to see the full results and my banal predictions have a look at this link. I warned you at the start of the post that I’ve not got a great deal of news for you this afternoon but on a personal level I wanted to share my newest Clash related pride and joy. You may recall about six weeks ago when my car tags expired I decided to order a new (mystery) Clash themed license plate for the car. Some suggestions I received and considered myself included H8FUL   TRNVAIN  COMROCK  WMiHP  PRTXBLU  CASBAH1 4HRSMEN   JIMJAZZ  MAG 7 and others, I made my decision thinking I’d only need to wait two weeks and not six – but when it arrived last week I must confess it felt like Christmas for a 6 year old for a few hours. The results are below – sorry the photo isn’t too wonderful, I’ll take more when its on the car itself. I’ve just have had an awful time finding a 1975 Ford Cortina.

The new ClashBlog license plate

I’ll definitely be back on a more regular basis in the days ahead, we’ve got Clash Cup, Video Clash, Westway Traffic, Clash Shopping, Gorillaz tour preview part 3, an NME feature, and news from Carbon Silicon and the UK press all coming up this week plus more I’m sure. Thanks for being patient – oh and the ClashBlog cat is doing a bit better (I won’t tempt fate and say she is well yet) it is a proper infirmary around here lately.

Hello again and welcome once more to the blog. After a busy few days it will either come to you as a relief or a shock to find that this post isn’t exclusively about Joe Strummer. Indirectly a decision that Joe made in 1983 led to what I’m about to write about, but that would be splitting hairs. I finally got around to getting a copy of the Legacy edition of the Big Audio Dynamite debut “this is Big Audio Dynamite”. Few things scream louder about the passing of years than these special editions that are getting released to celebrate anniversaries of the initial release. I suppose that only cuts to the quick when you have a clear memory of purchasing the album (on vinyl) at the first time of asking. I don’t feel so bad about that knowing that so many of you are in the same boat.

The album was originally released with great anticipation in October of 1985, although you could argue the official 25th anniversary is not for a few months CBS/Sony/Legacy actually released the special edition in April of this year. I don’t quite know why I didn’t pick up it earlier but that’s neither here nor there. I would’ve been 18 when the album was released and that two year spell between what was essentially the dissolution of The Clash and the release of this album was a spell where I found myself listening to some great music but still lamenting the end of the band. After The Clash split you could rely upon the NME and Melody Maker to provide at least occasional gossip about the future of Mick Jones, what was clear from the very earliest days was that he wouldn’t be rejoining The Clash and that Joe and Paul with some new recruits would keep the band name if not the quality. Late in 1983 or early 84 it was reported that Mick was working with Topper and a new plan was being formed, when the rumour fell quiet the next thing I recall reading was that he would be working with Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger from The Beat as a member of the newly formed General Public. That turned out to be far more than a rumour and Mick did indeed work with them on their new material and featured on their debut album “All The Rage” which I believe was released in the summer of 1984.

I get the impression that Mick’s involvement with them may have been more a case of helping out than his next career move. By all accounts simultaneously in 1984 Mick had continued to sow the seeds which were to become Big Audio Dynamite. He had certainly approached Don Letts very early on and the remaining members of the band were in place that same summer. Leo Williams had been playing with Mick since very soon after he left The Clash whilst drummer Greg Roberts was added later during ‘84, plus Dan Donovan on keyboards in ‘85. Reading the music papers compulsively combined with the fact that I worked in a record shop at that age resulted in me frequently asking our CBS rep if he knew anything about Big Audio Dynamite and when something might be expected. In hindsight it seemed like an awful long time had passed between the rumors of the band working and recording and the actual release late in 1985. Strangely, during that same period of time the new version of The Clash had been equally quiet in terms of recording output but they had played live as a now five piece lineup extensively during 1984. That in itself kept The Clash under the spotlight and while the glare was not on Mick Jones it’s now very clear just who was producing the more worthwhile record.

It’s also interesting that while The Clash with a revamped lineup hit the road in earnest in 1984 some of the tracks that eventually made up the final Clash album were in existence very soon after Mick got the sack. I remember thinking that the delay between Combat Rock and that album seemed almost endless, especially for a band who had released so much material between 77 and 82. If anything the feeling was that the new Clash would get a head start on Mick by releasing some new material first but in a strange twist of fate it was actually Big Audio Dynamite that released their first album about three weeks prior to The Clash. Working in a record shop at the time and knowing a lot of Clash fans it is hard to believe that we used to debate whether the Big Audio Dynamite album could possibly be as good as whatever The Clash did next. I also recall still being pissed off about the way Mick was ousted and had a quiet suspicion that his project would actually turn out to be better. Probably the only time I was ever 100% correct when forecasting events connected to The Clash. It’s a bit hard to relate just how different things were in 1985 perhaps Mick Jones sums it up best in the sleeve notes for the newly released Legacy edition: “What do I remember?… Reagan was president, Thatcher was Prime Minister and we were Big Audio Dynamite”

I will scribble up my review of the Legacy edition later this week focusing on the bonus artwork, the special packaging, the fully remastered first album and the bonus disc which probably drew the most attention. That’s all for now-Tim.

July 20, 1984 story from the 'Ottawa Citizen'

Hello again everyone and welcome back to the blog on this fine Thursday afternoon. All is well here in P-Town and as the recipient of your visit to the site I’m very grateful. I’m going to have to open up the garage and take a trip down the Westway this evening as I’ve got more odds and sods than I know what to do with and I doubt you want to read a new post every six hours over the next few days – unless of course you do. August has been a great month so far for the blog with some repainting and cleaning and we’ll be adding much more in September – and you keep coming back for more which is great. The month isn’t over yet but we look set to eclipse the total visits for June and July which will make this the busiest month of the year so please keep telling friends and coming back yourself when you have a few minutes to spend. Tomorrow I’ll be putting together a preview of events for Saturday which mark the birthday of Joe Strummer and I hope some small percentage of you will be able to attend one of the concerts and other events around the world. If you’re in Australia by the time you read that it might already be Saturday in which case you don’t need reminding that Sydney looks to be the place to be with the continued annual celebration of Joe.

Speaking of Joe – I wrote a few weeks ago about the Clash/Joe Strummer pop art that has been created by Simon Dixon back in the UK and this afternoon I received my truly awesome Strummer/RAF piece and its just beautiful. Thanks so much Simon I’ll be getting a frame at the weekend as this merits pride of place and I can have it in place in time for his Birthday – better still!! (gallery 4 on his website if you are looking) With that said let me pull of these side streets and see how much traffic is on the Westway tonight. If you are new to the site its our analogy for multiple Clash related stories all in one post, so get your seatbelt on. Links to article are the headlines.

If I were in London I’d be here: How often do you get to see one of the most important English bands of the entire punk/post punk scene in a venue that holds just 200 people? On November 8th and 9th if you act quickly you can do just that and see Wire at the Lexington. I rank Wire as one of the most important bands to evolve from the first wave of punk and they then did what so many failed to do and evolved into something that continued to be both fresh but resolutely unique to them. Record sales might say otherwise but Wire were one of the most influential bands from that era and beyond. Act fast as hopefully you can get tickets (via the link provided) – besides which its in the republic of Islington so you’ll enjoy the entire evening.

Join a Paul Simonon debate: The age old debate about the relative merits of Paul Simonon as a bass player are going on over at Amazon so free to join in. I fall under the raw musician at the beginning who worked hard to improve but huge amounts during his time with The Clash. Paul would be the first to admit that he wasn’t born with desire (or a habit) to play an instrument from his earliest years (that would be Mick) but the foolish jibes that suggest Simonon remained with The Clash because he looked good are complete nonsense. As far as I know Paul never plugged in a guitar until he was 20 years old and later that same year he was playing live on stage. Yes Mick had to teach him the basics of playing the bass but through years of application and effort he became a good musician and certainly a creative one who took pride in his contribution to the sound of the band. Joe Strummer was never a lead guitarist but that didn’t stop him working to become one of the best rhythm guitarists I’ve ever seen. You’re also a tit if you ignore his reggae influences on his playing and the overall direction of the band.

Still one of my favourite video clips: The Joe Strummer Mural in New York has been visited, photographed and been a site of pilgrimage for Clash fans now for a good number of years. Overall I love that its there but can’t deny it makes me sad, this video clip of two little lads aged around 8 or 9 I’d guess playing a guitar and snare in front of Joe’s image never fails to lift me up a bit. (you’ve not gone mad, I did mention this once before but its Joe’s week)

Links to the NME online Clash tribute(s): I’ll be writing about that special NME edition in the days ahead as it was really lovely to get a copy sent over from England (thanks again). In the meantime wanted to be sure you had a chance to see the the features the NME added to their website via the original link which has memories and some video and also this series of rather brilliant photos.

Attila The Stockbroker – too old to rap? Nah…: I need to write some tales about Attila one of these nights, he’s been playing live for decades now and a more genuine and committed man you would be hard pressed to meet. I first saw him in the mid 80’s with Billy Bragg and he never stops working – his rap (via the link) sums up his love for being an old punk and Brighton supporter and naturally name checks Joe Strummer. Great bloke – find out more via his site or facebook page. He’s a 21st century bard and comes highly endorsed.

Attila the Stockbroker’s tribute to Joe Strummer

That about me done for now but hopefully enough to keep you going, for no obvious reasons this took me ages to prepare and link etc this evening (age??). Probably need another Westway tomorrow or Sunday – and Saturday is reserved for Joe who should be turning 58 instead of leaving us to struggle along without him. Cheers ~ Tim