Bloody Hell….where does the time go? I had the best intentions of getting to this last night but it wasn’t to be, however I’m a believer that good things are worth waiting for and what could be better on a Monday than the latest installment of The Clash Cup. You can find out all about the premise on many earlier posts (It’s a knock-out cup competition with democracy mixed in and you help vote for the best Clash songs of all time). It’s a fun and simple process but as we’re now in round two I’m seeing decisions that are far more difficult and the voting reflects that. How do you oust a song when you love both? That’s a problem we need to overcome I fear.

Before we find out the next two random songs to ponder I do have results from our last pairing.

Round 2 – Match 3:

Clash City Rockers defeated The Card Cheat    35-23   (60.3% vs 39.7%)

So that’s twice that The Card Cheat has lost in the popular vote and the 39.7% share probably won’t be enough to keep it floating into round three. The timing on Clash City Rockers is funny as I just read in the Strummer biography about how Mickey Foote sped up the original master tapes ‘by about 1.5%’ at the insistence of Bernard Rhodes but without the knowledge of Strummer/Jones. Needless to say it was the last time he produced a Clash record. Still a great single if just a bit too fast….

So the random number machines has been wheeled out for our next two songs and the dynamic duo are:

Round 2 – Match 4:

The Leader    versus   Every Little Bit Hurts

Blimey!! Well if this was the FA Cup the equivalent would be Gillingham pulling Chesterfield out of the magic bag and avoiding Liverpool or Manchester United wouldn’t it? Still all songs got to round two on merit and one of these is guaranteed a place in round three, so are you loyal enough to back the same horse. Let’s see how they progressed to this stage.

Form:

Round 1 – The Leader defeated Junkie Slip  19-5 (79% of the vote)

Round 1 – Every Little Bit Hurts defeated Cool Confusion 20-14 (59% of the vote)

Odds:

Well at least we can see how both songs got through round one can’t we? I wouldn’t make a good bookmaker as I’ve missed 2 of 3 predictions so far, but I’d bet my Clash coins on The Leader for this pairing. It’s a good song, good support in the first round and is taking on a track that never got an official release. How can you not back The Leader? (prove me wrong).

Lyrics:

So the girl let the thin man touch her
Mixing questions, drunken laughter
The ministry car was waiting there
A minister knows his own affair

Come back to me
Darling you’ll see
I can give you all the things
That you wanted before

As ever you can spend some time listening before voting (always encouraged) by clicking the respective links The Leader (live!!) or Every Little Bit Hurts.

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Thanks for voting and for visiting the blog, polls close Saturday evening. Til next time…and don’t forget to submit your questions for Strummerville.

Welcome back to the blog as we leap into a new week and a new month all at the same time. I’ve got just a few minutes so I thought I’d continue with our collective quest to determine the best Clash songs ever recorded. If you are new to the blog it’s a simple process one vote per person, the song with the most votes progresses to round 3. The simple part ends there – some songs were seeded (and will enter the competition in round 3) and some of the runner ups with the best vote percentage will also stay in the hunt. Before I find out the random songs for match 3 we need to review match 2 from February 19th. It wasn’t as close as I expected – and if you want a song to lose just ask me to handicap it by suggesting I think it will win! Hence the result was:

1977   defeats   Koka Kola      33-15

A rather convincing win and we’ll say goodbye to the track from London Calling as a result. Match 3 then and these (don’t forget) are pulled at random. The pitted pair are:

Clash City Rockers   vs   The Card Cheat

That’s an interesting pairing as I know both are loved by a lot of fans. Could you pick more extremely different Clash songs if you tried? One is a straight ahead rocker which heavily ‘borrows’ from the past while the other is as close to the ‘wall of sound’ as The Clash ever got due to the recording process for The Card Cheat. I like both so can’t see an easy way to make my selection so please don’t rush your decision!

Form:

Round 1 – Clash City Rockers defeated Remote Control  29-14       (67.4% of the vote)

Round 1 – The Card Cheat lost to The Prisoner 29-18      *stayed alive due to runner up support in round one.

Odds:

Clash City Rockers has got to be favoured, I’d forgotten that The Card Cheat only remains due to the best runner up support and thus I can’t see it beating the odds a second time. I’ve got to back Clash City Rockers as an odds-on favourite at 7-4 on. Then again I’m not you and I’ve only got the one vote.

Best Lyrics:

So don’t complain about your useless employment, jack it in, forever tonight

He only wanted more time, Away from the darkest door
But his luck it gave in, As the dawn light crept in
And he lay on the floor

Listen and watch here if you need any refreshing Clash City Rockers and The Card Cheat

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Polls are open for a week – please be responsible. Thanks for taking part.

Hello again – what a day that was…..hope yours was decent, mine started with watching my Arsenal lose (again) and then a cold chilly spot of football myself and I felt like heaping revenge on the ball for this morning. Let’s just say the day continued as it started. So back to something a bit more fun. The Clash Cup Round Two – before I explain the format we have one result to share from round one -

Protex Blue defeated The Magnificent Dance 34 – 20

Credit: Photo by Ray Stevenson / Rex Features ( 565076C )

So we are all set with the contenders for round two. (You might want to skip this paragraph) Don’t forget we have 25 songs ’seeded’ due to the initial voting which will be introduced in round three – let’s call them the heavyweights, the final 25 you all selected would make for the ultimate Clash CD but those votes were cast months ago so nothing is written in stone. From round one 64 songs make it through, 54 outright winners plus the 10 runners up that compiled the most most votes. From these 64 we’ll carry forward 32 winners + the 7 best runners up (percentage of all votes cast) = 39 songs + the 25 seeded songs for our final 64! It’s not as complex as it sounds but we’ll end up with 64 brilliant songs to match up head to head.

Voting I’ll leave open for a week – and the sincere goal is to run at least two matches per week. In a perfect world round two will run over the next 16 weeks (at the most) and will try and get through it a bit quicker as round three will be something else. You don’t need to register – just click to vote – one vote per match up.

I’ll mention how the song did in the prior round, you can click on the song to hear it before you vote and I’ll share an opinion if it might help the propaganda of getting the songs I want to see through (I’m kidding). Songs are selected via a random number generator which has the approval of Bernard Rhodes.

Round Two Match One

Cheapskates versus Kingston Advice

Blimey that’s a tough one to start things off I am going to hold off on voting til tomorrow but probably leaning towards one of them. Cheapskates strangely enough also featured in our first week of match ups back on August 16! Kingston Advice came out of the hat the next week.

Form -

Cheapskates won round one 27-4 over Idle in The Kangaroo Court  87.1%

Kingston Advice won in round one 27-10 over Look Here 73.0%

Odds (pure supposition) I’d say Cheapskates is a slim favourite but you may see the Sandinista! track go through as a best runner up. So every vote matters even if your preference is trailing.

Best Lyrics?

Don’t give me the benefit
Of your doubt
‘Cos I’ll bite it off and spit it out

In these days the beat is militant
Must be a clash there’s no alternative
In these days nations are militant
We have slavery under government

Listen here – Cheapskates or Kingston Advice

Thanks for voting !!!

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