Strummer & Jones: The Clash and afterwards

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Koabac, Apr 16, 2014.

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  1. alchemy

    alchemy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Sterling, VA

    Great observation. In the Future Was Unwriiten documentary, it is mentioned that Jor is "Woody" and everyone had to call him that. Then he joins the Clash and it like "Woody" never existed. I remember thinking WOW. But they maybe why Joe is a great artist and I'm just an ordinary average guy.

    Too bad, being in the Clash was such that he felt he had to distance himself from all the pressure.

    But with a name like The Clash, should we have really expected them to last as a band a long long time?
     
  2. vonwegen

    vonwegen Forum Resident

    I have it. Musically nice, lyrically not so great, kind of re-heated soul & blues themes.
     
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  3. Koabac

    Koabac Self-Titled Thread Starter

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    So not exactly an album filled from top to bottom with "Rock The Casbah's?"
     
  4. quicksrt

    quicksrt Senior Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    I'm surprised that anyone had the authority to fire Jones. And when a band is coming off of their biggest commercial success, who in their right mind would want to. An over-controlling manager would not be able to get Joe Perry out of Aerosmith, nor Keith out of the Stones. Joe could have fought back, and said you try this and I will lock you up and hang you out to dry in litigation for a full decade!!!

    I had read only that Joe wanted some time off after a long period of double, triple, and commercial breakthrough albums (and tons of 12" mixes). Just needed some rest. And after they hated his mix on the CR album, maybe time to step back was in order.

    Was the Clash name owned by Strummer lock, stock, and barrel? I really thought it was a team effort at least as far as the two were concerned.
     
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  5. vonwegen

    vonwegen Forum Resident

    No, and Topper only plays drums. No vocals, no keyboards, no bass, which is indicative of the state he was in at the time, since he was more than capable of all three during the recording of Sandinista! and Combat Rock.
     
  6. vonwegen

    vonwegen Forum Resident

    Let us not forget that Sandinista! wasn't the only record Strummer & Jones worked on in 1981 - add to that Short Back & Sides by Ian Hunter (Jones, co-writing, playing, co-production) and Spirit Of St. Louis by Ellen Foley (songwriting, production for Strummer/Jones). Quite a body of work!
     
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  7. dlemaudit

    dlemaudit Forum Resident

    Location:
    France, Paris area
    he is wrong and he probably knows it , weird attitude compared to Mick's more relaxed one about it and he should be the bitter one about it
     
  8. quicksrt

    quicksrt Senior Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    They should have all been completed burnt to a crisp after the US tour, and a full longer break from any band activity was in order.
     
  9. TeddyB

    TeddyB Senior Member

    Location:
    Hollywoodland
    No, of course Joe did not have the right to fire Mick (It greatly confused the likes of Tony James, who wanted to know how Mick could be thrown out of his own band). But it was Joe that carried it out. He would not have "fought back" against management because he came to believe they did not need Mick, who was high maintenance. Mick did want some rest. But they got a new drummer and did some dates and then the U.S. Festival. Bernie wanted to build up some cash, possibly to ease the planned sacking of Mick. Paul and Joe told Mick they felt that he should leave. Mick hired a lawyer and rounded up Topper's support, thus half the Clash. He threatened that he would contest use of the name, and his lawyers contacted promoters, but he didn't go very far with it. After a period of depression, he started work with Topper, Leo Williams and saxophonist John Boy Lennard from Theatre of Hate on a new group called TRAC (Top Rank Action Corps). Mick wrote songs with Topper, with Lennard, and alone. After Topper fell back into serious addiction, Mick and Lennard split. Mick and Leo brought in Don Letts, and built the lineup of what would become B.A.D.

    Joe tried to carry on in somewhat bizarre fashion, with the new troops treated like second class citizens, and Bernie co-writing songs and eventually producing the album. Eventually Joe walked out of the overdub and mixing sessions. I don't know why he didn't call the record company and cancel the release, or threaten an injunction. (Actually I'm not really sure why especially the U.S. record company went for it either, except it was the only follow-up to Combat Rock that was on offer). I can only guess it would have been financially ruinous, or maybe he didn't think it was really that bad. His parents had died. He was depressed. He told Mick that the B.A.D. album was tosh, and he should scrap it and come back to the Clash but Mick didn't want to scrap it. Bernie and Kosmo tried to keep the second lineup together, but after the album was poorly received, Joe packed it in. They actually discussed replacing Joe but Paul nixed the idea.
     
  10. TeddyB

    TeddyB Senior Member

    Location:
    Hollywoodland
    Paul and Mick go back to being 21 together and in a band. There's no mystique. Actually, Mick is still a big fan of Paul's. He's compared Paul's aura to James Dean, and he's become quite a supporter of Paul's playing too. Mick is also still a bit in awe of Joe. He's really about as big a Clash fan as you'll find, and he knows the worst with the best.
     
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  11. vonwegen

    vonwegen Forum Resident

    Oh, and I forgot Topper producing The Bush Tetra's excellent E.P., Rituals, also around the time of Sandinista!

    And Paul acted in a (forgettable) movie, The Fabulous Stains, alongside the then-ubiquitous Steve Jones & Paul Cook.
     
  12. quicksrt

    quicksrt Senior Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    They hired Paul because he looked like a cross between GI Joe and James Dean, the look was perfect, and it turned out he was an excellent bass player as well.

    The whole thing was the moon, stars, and the tides all lining up. The band was running on chemistry.

    I've been humming Lose this Skin and the Sandinista version of Career Opportunities lately. I love those two tracks, and yet you never hear anyone else like them. But the melody brought out on that version of Career is just lovely. Punk band matures and shows us delicacy and nuance. And when I hear Somebody Got Murdered, I think of Punk band bashes away in expensive studio! LOL!!! I'm doing that album needle dropped to 24/96 from mint UK pressing. So beautiful.
     
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  13. vonwegen

    vonwegen Forum Resident

    Paul turned into an excellent bassist (though he said, "Well, I'm not sure about that!" when I complemented him on it in 1984), but he didn't start out as one, and that (methinks) was the source of lots of musical tension between him and Mick over the years. You can tell the bass lines that Mick composed from their incredible moving around (try playing the ones for "Garageland" or "Police & Thieves" and you'll see what I mean). Paul's are more grounded, as evidenced by what he plays on London Calling onward.

    I've had the good fortune to hear some isolated Clash tracks, and there were a lot of bass clams that got buried in the mix on the early tunes (go to YouToob and search for "Complete Control bass"), for example. By London Calling (again, do a search on YouToob), his playing was a lot crisper and cleaner in the studio.

    Paul also had to contend with being in a band where everyone else also played bass (Strummer on the live "Guns Of Brixton", Mick (the studio version of "Police On My Back", and Topper (the studio version of "Rock The Casbah"), plus coming in to find Norman Watt-Roy had already recorded a fair chunk of Sandinista! in his place. So, it's not surprising that he's still a tad defensive at times.

    Switching topics: The new Mick Jones mastered Music On Vinyl version of Sandinista! is even better sounding than my original UK pressing, if you can believe that. When I play "Lose This Skin" (which I consider an essential album cut, wouldn't be the same without it), I think, "punk band brings in the fiddles and bagpipes!" I bet an all-instrumental orchestral version would be quite moving, like that rendition of "White Riot" on Symphony Of Destruction.
     
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  14. Sandinista

    Sandinista Forum Resident

    I like Lose This Skin. Always have. Was surprised as I got older to find out how universally disliked it was.
     
  15. alchemy

    alchemy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Sterling, VA

    This would have been an excellent time for them to have took a break from recording and touring. They could have released a compilation LP sort of liked Neil Youmg's Journey Through The Past, mopping up all the different mixes, b-sides singles, select outtakes etc. Would have been great.

    But, didn't their recording contract put pressure on them to keep cranking it ou, just put to much pressure on them?
     
  16. Steve Douglas

    Steve Douglas Forum Resident

    Location:
    London, England
    Surprised to see so little love for Eathquake Weather, I really liked it, and this is one of my favourite songs, still.

    [video]
     
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  17. levi

    levi Can't Stand Up For Falling Down In Memoriam

    Location:
    North Carolina
    Island Hopping is one of my favorites too, Steve. When I think about it, there aren't that many songs that show the more introspective side of Joe ... at least from a first-person POV. I'm not sure I could have imagined him trying something like that with the Clash.

    Jeff
     
  18. AlienRendel

    AlienRendel Senior Member

    Location:
    Chicago, il
    I really like "Earthquake Weather", but can see why it's appeal is limited. The mix is just plain awful and makes it hard to hear how good most of the song are. A couple of the the songs are not very good ("Boogie With Your Children"?). There are a ton of great lyrics on the album, but they are much wordier and harder to decipher than most of Joe's work. It sounds like he had been reading a lot.
     
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  19. JimC

    JimC Senior Member

    Location:
    Illinois
    :righton: Love those tracks.
     
  20. Koabac

    Koabac Self-Titled Thread Starter

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    I was surprised to read (I think it was in Wikipedia, so it may not be true) that in 1983, right after leaving the Clash, Mick Jones co-founded General Public with Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger and even plays guitar on "Tenderness" and other songs on "All the Rage," before leaving, mid-recording in 1984. I assume TRAC was between General Public and BAD. I wonder what the story was with starting General Public. Was Mick was planning on it being a one-off, "supergroup" thing and was going to be contributing songs and singing some of them, himself, too, or was he just going to be a guitarist for the band (an odd move, considering he was coming off the commercial peak of the Clash as a singer/songwriter)?
     
  21. JimC

    JimC Senior Member

    Location:
    Illinois
    I remember reading at the time he had something to do with "Tenderness."
     
  22. Purple Jim

    Purple Jim Senior Member

    Location:
    Bretagne
    About time it was remixed and remastered! Hey, maybe Mick & Paul could be called in to do it. That would be a good marketing angle.
     
  23. AlienRendel

    AlienRendel Senior Member

    Location:
    Chicago, il
    My secret fantasy actually involves Mick, Paul and Topper re-arranging and recording "Cut the Crap" with Joe's original vocals. But I know that it still probably would not be very good.
     
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  24. Guy E

    Guy E Senior Member

    Location:
    Antalya, Turkey
    Yeah, he did seem to cut people out of his life in a brutal fashion, barely giving a "nod" to old squat-mates after he'd stopped being crusty and became a punk. He also talked about how he'd screw a mate's girlfriend without regret... friendship didn't seem to be a top priority.
     
  25. Purple Jim

    Purple Jim Senior Member

    Location:
    Bretagne
    [​IMG]

    Woody.
     
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