Good evening to you all, thanks for making you way back to the blog (or welcome for the first time if that’s the case). Not a lot of excitement midweek but no complaints either. What I do have is a sprinkle of Clash related stuff for your reading/viewing and listening pleasure.

Let’s start with the visual! If you are in or near Toronto (based on the traffic to the site that’s actually a good number of you) there is a great exhibition of photography of bands that visited the city in years gone by. Including shots of the first appearance by The Clash in Toronto (Rex Danforth Theatre Feb 20, 1979) the exhibition is titled ‘Toronto Calling’ and begins today and runs until April 1. Admission is free, included are  The Clash, The Ramones, Johnny Rotten, U2, The Specials, and many more. All images were taken in Toronto which gives is not only a local feel but also will make it a unique collection. If you can make it along I’d love to know what you think of it. Excellent additional information on the Torontoist site and the Steam Whistle site. If you can’t make it to the exhibition it’s still worth visiting the first site I mentioned for a brilliant photo of Strummer on stage.  This all takes place at Steam Whistle Gallery at the Roundhouse (255 Bremner Boulevard in the middle of the city). More on the photographer here.

Audio next right? Yes yes yes…you can hear the entire Gorillaz album online for free via The Guardian. If you’ve been paying attention you know exactly why, if you don’t either ask someone about The Clash connection or read some earlier posts from the last couple of weeks. Having been a Blur fan since the first album and then followed Damon Albarn ever since I’m not the person to ask if the new Gorillaz disc sounds good. Of course it does…

I better offer you something to read too as I’m a bit knackered and won’t be stretching this out to one of those endless posts where you wonder when I’m going to end. This is really worth a read – if you’re in the UK you are already aware that in keeping with the rest of the planet the BBC is struggling (not to make money as it’s not American TV/Radio) to justify it’s current operations. Essentially it looks as if up to 25% of the BBC’s staff, programming, empire need to be removed – on the chopping block is BBC 6 Music. This would be tragic in the extreme, 6 music is perhaps the most diverse, informative, fun, rewarding and consistently innovative places online or offline to find music. I could write an essay about what I think of the station – but it’s better if I refer you to this post. For new artists there is no better venue for them to be found by joe public than BBC 6 music - new artists are always at the heart of music in my opinion. This story on The Daily Growl does a great job in explaining where things stand at present. I’ll get up to speed in the days ahead – I hope the station (and the BBC Asian Network also!) will be spared from closure.

G-night

Good Morning, I had intended to get this post written and out last night but a combination of factors (Arsenal, Haiti, Ricky Gervais hosting the Golden Globes) stopped me from reaching my goal. Now I really like Gervais but could NBC have toned him down anymore than they did? Apart from early on I don’t think any of his links lasted longer than 30 seconds, why hire someone to host a major awards ceremony and then

Martin Scorcese

limit them? Obviously a sharp sarcastic wit like Gervais is going to offend some people but the broadcast became an exercise in damage control (dull). At least it was nice to see Martin Scorcese receive an award for his career contribution to film…what a great chap. If cinema had some equivalent to Punk or The Clash it would be the films of Scorcese; from Taxi Driver and Raging Bull through to Goodfellas and Gangs of New York. Just an amazing career, and yes there’s more than a touch of Clash activity/connections to be explored therein but I’ll save that for another post. Worth watching for is a project he’s working on this year which is a long awaited biopic about George Harrison.

I’ve written in the past that people today tend to focus on London and New York when looking back at ‘the punk scene’ and as a result the bands associated with those two cities. What is so often overlooked is that over a staggered period from 1977-1982 that punk (or 2nd generation variations) created scenes is major cities all over the world. I’ll never forget visiting Berlin in 1984 and being confronted with a scene that was reminiscent in sound and fashion from 5 years earlier in England. It had a real Berlin twist though as a taste for the avant garde in fashion was perhaps more important than the originality of the music. Much like Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco (and numerous other cities) Toronto developed its own punk scene and this article caught my eye. A local writer reared on The Clash and The Damned has put together a book to capture the scene in Canada’s largest city from 1977-1981 by way of an oral history. Though its taken over 20 years the desire to chronicle the local music scenes is growing as we realise that we had something very special of our own when it came to music and culture. Perhaps growing up and hearing adults tell us ‘there was nothing to match the sixties’ we underestimated the value of punk and post punk music. I still think the pinnacle of writing and film-making about 1976-1981 has yet to be written but the continued and growing awareness of it makes the likelihood all the better.

Someone needs to make sure that Mick Jones, Paul Simonon, Rat Scabies, Debbie Harry, John Lydon, David Byrne and others (the list would be endless) are interviewed first hand and everything possible is compiled. I know its happened in pieces with The Clash, Ramones and Sex Pistols but I think it needs to be done by an author or director with a bigger vision. Perhaps I see the urgency as none of the key players are getting any younger and we lose more of the men and women along with their memories each year. Here’s hoping….

Finally a thank you to those of you who’ve emailed some ideas and links. I’ll cover all of those items get back to the Clash Cup and Part 3 of the feature on The Roxy are due up over the next few days.

Saturday morning (congratulations Spurs on your 0-0 with Hull) and the kind of post you love most as I’ve got little to say but lots of great images to show you. I wrote back on Christmas Eve about The Clash appearing at Acklam Hall for 50p on Christmas Day 1979 which was followed by another gig there on Boxing Day. Wayne, a good friend to the Blog wrote in to say he’d been to the concert on Dec 26th and had kept his ticket for these 30 years since, I think he’s got a collector’s piece on his hands. The Pennie Smith photo was the reverse side of the ticket. I rifled through my old tickets last night and found some treats but nothing that predated 1981 so I feel very trumped. Below is the front and back of what Wayne was kind enough to send in – Enjoy !! (We did the best we could with the image quality as he had to scan them…I’ve offered to take this from Wayne for safe-keeping but been rejected)

I simply love that – especially “DINNER DANCE”

Another piece of ‘donated’ memorabilia for you then, some old old Clash concert flyers from the very early days. These appear in the big pink Clash book (seems I need to get a copy) and I just can’t get enough of the DIY fanzine feel of these. Not sure when we went from homemade to corporate with concert promotions but it must have been 1981-2? I got copies of these from Jeff who’d rather be known as DUBWISE72 (fair enough) and they are as old something rather old. No real explanation needed I assume but such joy to see them…..

Talk to you later…oh…a quick reminder about the concert in San Francisco tomorrow featuring the Beat – all proceeds to Haiti disaster relief. Hopefully someone reading will make it along.