Good afternoon everybody, thank you very much for coming back to the blog. I had hoped to get together a review of all the Joe Strummer related events from the weekend for you but at present I only have about half of them, so if I don’t get them all today I might split the summary up over two posts. That said, there is some really good video and photographs coming your way soon.

What is it with tattoos and the blog at the moment? I came across this story today which once again combined tattoos and The Clash, I think they must have put something in the water. Anyway, do click your mouse on this link about Josh 86 which appeared in the Honolulu Star. As you can see from the photograph Josh Hancock from the band has a fair amount of ink on his arms. I may be perhaps the world’s least informed person when it comes to tattoos so please don’t use anything I say as any sort of barometer on the subject. Somewhere in that melee of colours is either a Joe Strummer image or the London Calling album cover, I’ve looked but can’t quite see it yet. Seems like the man of ink plays with the 86 List in addition to his own solo venture. It’s also one of the rare times that I get to mention Hawaii on the blog, I’ve wondered before what sort of local music scene they might have. It’s not as if you can go on much of a tour are smallish island. I know, somebody from England really shouldn’t have such an opinion. Almost makes me want to ramble on about New Zealand and some of the great bands that appeared on the flying nun label over the years such as The Chills who are absolutely brilliant in my mind.

Just time for two quick reminders which I’ll delve into in more detail in the next day or two: first of all the Strummerville event at the Inn on the Green in London this weekend to coincide of course with the Notting Hill Carnival. In addition don’t forget if you happen to be in that corner of Australia the Joe Strummer tribute night “Revolution Rock” in Sydney this Saturday. Details will follow.

Finally on the last post I spoke a bit (too much) about Mick Jones and his time immediately after leaving the band, some of his time as we know was spent working with Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger in General Public. As Joani pointed out in the comments it’s one of those periods in Clash history remains a little bit gray, as to exactly how long Mick worked with them and if the intention was to become a fully fledged band member. Some brief research last night was added to the bottom of the post via that newspaper story which interestingly pointed out that all three were sort of commiserating each other about the fallout from the prior bands, which was something they had in common when they worked together. Apart from that and knowing the recording took place in South Wales, I am lacking in much other pertinent information. If that is your area of expertise, feel free to write in – I actually don’t recall him interviewing in the UK press as a member of General Public, so I remain quite sure that it was a very brief period. Don’t forget you still have time until Thursday morning to vote for the best Joe Strummer tattoo on that post from Sunday, it’s quite a close run thing at the moment so your vote could be decisive!

Right then, that’s your lot for now and I’ll be back with something or other later this evening. Cheers-Tim. Oh…also, thanks for your continued votes via the Wikio polling (at the bottom of this and every post) we are just outside the top 100 music blogs already…so thank you!