Clash - The Fire That Burned London

Our music is violent, but we're not. Songs like "Guns On The Roof" and "Last Gang In Town" are actually meant to be against violence. Sometimes you have to put yourself in the shoes of the guy with the gun. I could never do it, but at the same time you can't ignore these things. We're not some fucking band like Boston or Aerosmith

(Joe Strummer)

Joe would usually sit down at a typewriter and I'd sit across from him. Once he'd written something he'd pass me the sheet and I'd come up with a melody. When the first line was done he'd pass me another piece of writing

(Mick Jones)

I think if the Clash have become a legend it's mostly because they're one of the few bands of that era to have always known how to evolve and transform themselves

(Paul Simonon)

Intro – British Patchanka

Dawn of a new decade, 1980 is a year of sad losses and great changes.

President Tito's funeral becomes an unprecedented diplomatic event, while Republican candidate Ronald Reagan ousts Jimmy Carter after the start of the crisis with Iran. On August 2nd, terrorists blow up Bologna's central station, killing more than 80 people. In a New York hospital, in December, John Lennon dies, murdered by obsessed fan Mark David Chapman. The music world mourns the former Beatle, but smiles at the first cry of a band from Athens, R.E.M., and listens to "Boy", the intense debut from U2.

New sonic waves carry forward, shifting directions and paths, the angry, foul-mouthed lesson of punk which, after its initial electric outburst, begins opening up toward an increasingly engaged intellectualism.

It's 1980 when a triple LP is released, Sandinista!, which best expresses the brilliant ideas of a former punk band, the Clash, who have abandoned their violent anthems of street rebellion to embrace lyrics charged with political content and a total, cosmopolitan sound.

Sandinista! is a seminal record, giving birth to every "patchanka" in the world through music that is perhaps utopian and romantic, but certainly powerful and global. The Clash favor a conscious, borderless approach, capable of fusing together musical cultures and social experiences of different origins into a single, cohesive synthesis of real substance.

In the words of Joe Strummer, the meaning of a strong musical voice: "I don't like it when the Clash are made out to be a band that made promises and didn't keep them. We didn't promise anything. We just tried to raise awareness about a number of things that seemed wrong to us. Those wrong things still exist, and the Clash don't. What does that mean? That we lost? I don't know. Certainly, the Clash were a strong voice. If they changed even one person's life, they achieved their purpose".

Is it perhaps this approach that made Joe Strummer's band become "the only band that matters"? Partly, yes. Partly, however, it's the music wrapped around all of this: "I would at least like it if people didn't say the Clash were just a punk band. Punk is a spirit far broader than the raw, simple music usually identified with that word. The Clash were a fusion band, not a genre band. We mixed reggae, soul and rock and roll, all the primitive musics, into something more than the sum of the single elements. Above all, into something more than simple three-chord punk".

Welcome to the Clash Social Forum.

From the Westway…

1974. In a building in Clapham, South London, a young man of nearly twenty is pouring all his energy into a rough-and-ready electric guitar, playing songs by the Rolling Stones.

Young Mick Jones (London, 26/06/1955) didn't have a happy childhood: at just eight years old he had to deal with his parents' divorce, and was left for a long time in the care of a nanny named Stella.

Mick gets decent grades at Strand School in Brixton Hill, but he's well aware of his social and economic circumstances, and so can only hope to chase his great passion: rock and roll.

By the age of twelve, Jones is spending everything he has on records, magazines and gigs, and is hopelessly in love with Johnny Thunders, guitarist of the New York Dolls, picturing himself just like him, treading the stage as a bona fide rock star. It's a lifelong dream, fuelled by his determination to escape the squalor of London's suburban ghettos.

More determined than ever, Mick Jones buys his first electric guitar for sixteen pounds and immediately puts together his own band with bassist Tony James. The Delinquents adopt a raw, thunderous sound very close to that of MC5, and young Mick quickly proves he's developed a solid guitar technique.

His repertoire is, naturally, full of covers (New York Dolls above all), but the fledgling band still manages to record a demo tape under the new name London SS.

1975. At 430 King's Road, a shop called Sex has been open for a few years now, an extreme boutique created by Malcolm McLaren (already manager of the New York Dolls) and designer Vivienne Westwood. There's a strong whiff of change in the London air, and the shop becomes a genuine hotbed of activity where young people in provocative, unconventional clothing gather. Among the boutique's regulars are Steve Jones and Paul Cook, but above all Bernie Rhodes, a collaborator of McLaren's.

Rhodes shrewdly senses an impending musical revolution, aware that rock will soon be overtaken by the American echoes of new bands like Ramones and Television. A revolution that's not just musical but also social and cultural, one that begins its relentless march with the first gig by McLaren's new band, the Sex Pistols, on November 6th at St. Martin's School.

Bernie Rhodes instantly grasps the spirit of the times and, after meeting Mick Jones, becomes the manager of London SS, who are meanwhile rehearsing with a new singer named Paul Simonon.

Paul Simonon (London, 15/12/1955) is born in the Jamaican neighbourhood of Brixton and grows up on the streets, used to urban guerrilla warfare and gang clashes. He attends Effra Primary School only briefly, but quickly shows a real aptitude for painting. After a year-long spell in Italy, the thirteen-year-old Paul abandons any attempt at schooling and starts working at Portobello Market.

Living in the Brixton area, Simonon soaks up the rhythms of reggae and ska, and grows passionate about music, which before long becomes a chance at personal redemption when his friend Jones invites him to sing in London SS.

Paul can't sing and, more importantly, knows neither the Stooges nor the New York Dolls, but he impresses Rhodes with his skinhead look and, indeed, is the only member who stays in touch with Jones after the band's early breakup.

While Simonon is learning to play bass along to the Ramones' debut album, Mick Jones recruits a strange, aggressive guitarist named Keith Levene and is urged by Rhodes to complete the new lineup with a singer who has the right attitude. So Mick and Paul go to a gig by a rock-blues band called the 101'ers, whose ranks include a raspy-voiced singer-guitarist with a striking charisma.

John Graham Mellor (Ankara, 21/08/1952), the son of a government diplomat, spends his early years travelling the world and develops an early passion for cinema and, above all, the guitar. After his older brother's tragic suicide, John decides to give up the comforts of his lower-middle-class life and move to London, where, following in the footsteps of his busker idol Woody Guthrie, he starts playing in the Underground stations.

It's these experiences that lead him to adopt the stage name Joe Strummer, literally "Joe the strummer".

In 1974, together with Tymon Dogg and drummer Richard Dudanski, Joe forms the 101'ers, playing a fairly ordinary brand of rhythm'n'blues in the style of Them. Strummer's strong personality, however, drives the band to ramp up its live activity considerably, churning out increasingly short and fast songs, among them "Keys To Your Heart".

It's Joe who, after watching the Sex Pistols in action, immediately grasps what's fermenting in London's seething cauldron: "Two minutes of Johnny Rotten are worth more than two hours of the 101'ers. You see, right now we're talking about a movement of ideas, while you're only seeing a guitar riff on stage. The difference between the 101'ers and the Sex Pistols is that maybe we're just a good band and nothing more, while they have a completely different attitude."

In a word: punk.

Summer 1976. In the early months of 1976, the 101'ers go into the studio to record their debut album, but something entirely (?) unforeseen happens. Bernie Rhodes, having sniffed out Strummer's enthusiasm for the Pistols, gives the guitarist an ultimatum: 24 hours to decide whether to start a brand new musical adventure. In Joe's own words: "Leaving the 101'ers wasn't easy, but I realised I had to move towards the future, not the past." And the future has already got everything sorted: an old British Rail depot in Camden Town is turned into headquarters for the four of them, rounded out by drummer Terry Chimes (London, 5 July 1956). So begin the band's first, electric rehearsals, the group having unanimously settled on their new name in the meantime. It's Simonon who, reading the Evening Standard, proposes a simple word evoking a thunderous sense of clash.

It's 4 June: the Clash make their debut at the Black Swan in Sheffield, supporting the Sex Pistols. The gig turns out to be a disaster and is harshly criticised by the journalists present, despite the band's energy and tight chemistry.

On 29 August, at the Screen on the Green in Islington, the Clash play alongside the Pistols and Buzzcocks, but once the punk rally-gig is over, they read the NME's merciless, scathing verdict: "The Clash are the kind of garage band that should be sent straight back to the garage." Truly prophetic words.

Keith Levene has had enough and, realising he's out of step with the rest of the group, leaves them all to later form Public Image Limited with Johnny Rotten. With one less guitarist, the Clash become tighter, and they prove it with a blistering performance at another punk festival held on 20 and 21 September at the 100 Club in London.

Unlike the Pistols, Strummer and co. don't spew nihilism, but instead side with young working-class kids from the provinces, urging them to channel their anger into a personal and collective revolt that finds a fitting outlet in the anthem "White Riot", inspired by the violence that erupted in August during the Notting Hill Carnival.

It's "the speed of the Westway" that Mick Jones talks about which gives the Clash a halo of credibility (Strummer and Simonon really did take part in the Notting Hill riots), something ultimately highlighted by Mark Perry's famous fanzine "Sniffin' Glue", which writes: "The Clash are a positive role model to look up to, compared with the lack of ideals that characterises the Sex Pistols."

Lacking in ideals or not, it's Rotten and co. who provide the big explosion at the end of the year, bringing chaos to England with the Anarchy Tour. The Clash make do with the support slot, which nevertheless pushes the good middle-class boy Terry Chimes to breaking point, and he quits the band after a volley of bottles gets hurled at his drum kit.

So an ad appears in Melody Maker: the Clash are looking for a new drummer.

London's Burning

1977. While the search for a new drummer continues, Joe Strummer and Mick Jones hit on a lasting songwriting chemistry and turn out new pieces of the sonic puzzle to complete their first album.

Thanks to relentless live activity up and down England, the Clash's fame grows exponentially, and Bernie Rhodes is quick to reap all the rewards. On 29 January the band signs a deal with Cbs worth around one hundred thousand pounds. The move thoroughly rattles the punk underground, to the point that Mark Perry goes so far as to write: "Punk died the day the Clash signed to Cbs."

Punk might be dead, but it's only after signing that the Clash can finally get into a studio to record their first album. Strange as it sounds: it will be an album that, through sheer attitude and simplicity, will do a great deal to help the world understand what punk actually means.

Produced by sound engineer Mickey Foote, The Clash (Cbs, 1977), together with the later and quite different American version from 1979, sets to music the "clash" the band had prophesied. Good old England gets invaded by frantic, barely-there chords and turned completely upside down by a gang of foul-mouthed, rebellious musicians. Rock and roll, having been progressively cleaned up since the Sixties, can thus go back to giving off a new aura of irreverence, fuelled by the whirlwind fury of punk.

The Clash call their generation of urban guerrillas to arms, egging them on with the promise, Ramones-style, of an explosive "White Riot". Strummer favours the slogan, the anthem of "London's Burning", which, riding a thick, sludgy riff, becomes the true manifesto of that blazing London year.

The whole album rests on these fast sonic pillars, free in turn to sprawl out with its wild, incendiary style. The Clash seem to have a ball taking apart and reassembling old rock and roll whenever they launch into songs that resemble ragged, irreverent little marches: the snare of "Janie Jones", the lurching "Remote Control" and, better still, the fireworks-laden choral finale of "Complete Control".

Strummer and Jones manage to craft a watershed sound that binds the lessons of the past indissolubly to the future bearing down on them. The era-defining beat of Who and Kinks, for instance, is reworked with real intelligence in the neurotic riff of "Clash City Rockers", while certain Creedence Clearwater Revival phrasings wink at the thunderous drive of "I'm So Bored With The USA".

The Clash, however, copy absolutely nothing - on the contrary, they hold the shovel ready to bury what has been in order to turn it into what will be. That's the meaning behind the stuttering tribalism of "What's My Name" and, above all, the riff of "Career Opportunities", which dumps an avalanche of earth onto the Spencer Davis Group's "Gimme Some Loving" purely for the pleasure of planting punk's crude cross on top of it. And that cross keeps unleashing bolts of adrenaline, like the pounding drums of "I Fought The Law", a makeover of a Bobby Fuller Four classic.

The epic simplicity of "Garageland", then, is just waiting to bury the "old dinosaurs" of progressive and hard rock once and for all, so it can declaim committed lyrics with Strummer's guttural snarl and Jones's blasting riff. Punk's own Lennon-McCartney, however, isn't just a relentless sonic assault: it even manages to avoid getting trapped in its own three-chord rage. Unlike the Pistols, the Clash have melody in their blood ("Hate And War") and, above all, the urge to explore different paths.

This is where, on The Clash, the smoky Brixton sun meets its pulsing reggae, which beautifully infects "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais" and the Junior Marvin/Lee Perry cover "Police And Thieves", which almost takes on a life of its own thanks to Simonon's bass groove.

A record, then, that defines its era, enthusiastically summed up by Pete Silverton of "Sounds": "I think the Clash deserve, by right, to sit at the table with the Beatles and the Stones. If you don't like 'The Clash', you don't like rock and roll."

In April, after an exhausting selection process involving two hundred drummers, the Clash find their man.

Nicholas Bowen "Topper" Headon (Bromley, 30/05/1955) starts playing drums as a teenager, doing the rounds of black music clubs. His passion is jazz, which he considers "real music", but he answers the ad in Melody Maker to allow himself a "detour" into the world of rock and roll.

And Topper can afford to, because his style is as refined as it is powerful. The ideal man for Joe Strummer, who would say of the new arrival: "Topper had been playing since he was 15 with African-American soul bands touring England's nightclub circuit. With punk, most drummers were only capable of the bare minimum, whereas he had a really refined technique. It was an extraordinary stroke of luck, without which we could never have imagined attempting so many different things and moving forward so fast."

With the drummer question successfully settled, the Clash can finally start getting serious.

In May, in fact, their first European tour kicks off - the "White Riot Tour" - with them as headliners, supported by Buzzcocks, Slits and Jam. The tour is a success and wraps up in triumph at London's Rainbow Theatre, where the Clash finally manage to bring their punk to a huge audience.

The band is living through its first golden moment and, despite Strummer's arrest after spray-painting "The Clash" on a wall in Camden Town, nothing seems able to stop their rise.

Mick Jones and Joe Strummer feel the time has come to deepen their artistic partnership, and set off on a creative journey to Jamaica. United by a shared passion for Rasta culture, the new Glimmer Twins open up their ferocious punk rock to reggae's warm vibrations, writing songs like "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais" (included on the American edition of the first album) and "Safe European Home".

It is, in effect, the beginning of a shift that will lead the Clash away from the scorched earth of Garageland.

Leaving Garageland…

1978. Punk's revolution couldn't be more consistent with its own ideals: it dies before it gets old.

On January 14th, the final date of the Sex Pistols' American tour in San Francisco, a disillusioned Johnny Rotten launches into a half-hearted cover of the Stooges' "No Fun" and yells at the crowd: "This is no fun, no fun at all"! Three days later, England's anarchic band ceases to exist.

Early punk gives way to different musical paths that enrich its lesson with new ingredients and a greater instrumental unpredictability. The "new wave" is once again nurtured in the United States, where bands like the Talking Heads stir things up, alongside brilliant individual voices like Patti Smith.

England, still awaiting the nightmarish thunderbolt of Joy Division, views the old-new punk through the oversized glasses of Elvis Costello.

Joe Strummer is forced to watch this changing climate from the windows of the hospital where he's been admitted with a severe case of hepatitis. Meanwhile, Cbs is firmly determined to launch the Clash onto the US market, and starts pressuring the band for a less raw sound, one better suited to radio airplay. Jones and Strummer, naturally, won't have it, and try to mediate through Bernie Rhodes, but the manager gives in to the label's insistence, which for the second album chooses producer Sandy Pearlman (who had worked with Van Halen and Blue Oyster Cult).

Recording begins in April, but the atmosphere is extremely tense, with the Clash pushing to keep things raw and Pearlman smoothing out the sound at the mixing stage. A new UK tour — the "Out on Parole Tour" — helps ease the tension, letting Strummer and co. vent on stage alongside the Specials and Suicide.

The problems, however, are only postponed, reaching a point of no return in October, when mentor Bernie Rhodes is fired over mounting friction and unpaid sums of money.

The fruit of so much tension finally arrives in November, but, as expected, critics and the punk audience don't shed the same tears of joy that had greeted the band's firstborn.

Give 'em Enough Rope (Epic, 1978) is, in fact, the controversial product of a nervous, transitional period. The Clash seem to struggle to find a sonic framework that best synthesizes all their old and new influences, and end up making an album where the pieces of the puzzle don't quite fit together. It's essentially a record that documents the ideas of a band trying to walk the delicate tightrope between past and future. Strummer and Jones know that the Clash's music needs to push beyond punk's boundaries, but they can't quite find their own magic formula.

Give 'em Enough Rope thus suffers from a general lack of coherence and artistic force, certainly not helped by Pearlman himself, who in places ruins potential gems with a radio-friendly mood. The formulaic rock so beloved by American audiences bends The Clash's subversive charge into the most classic Rolling Stones-style sound on "Drugstabbing Time".

This time, it's not enough that "everybody's looking for the last gang in town": the obsession with commercial catchiness strips "Last Gang in Town" of its hooligan rock and roll nature.

It's true, however, that the Clash are guilty of a touch of self-satisfaction when the blazing riff of "Guns On The Roof" kicks in, recycling yet again the Kinks-Who beat, and even the same defiant manifesto of "Clash City Rockers".

So there's reason to turn up one's nose, because, deep down, the magnetic, splendid roughness of garage seems to have vanished, buried under a blanket of clean, polished guitars.

This, however, would seriously underrate the vein of Strummer and co., who are by no means a punk sideshow act but bold musicians with fascinating ideas. The hidden secret of the record lies, first and foremost, in Mick Jones's melodic gift, now nostalgic and romantic (the touching rock and roll of “Stay Free”), now cheeky and furious (the drunken barrelhouse pop of “Julie's Been Working For The Drug Squad” and the provocative anthem “All The Young Punks”).

The Clash's epic rock and roll may be given a glossier sheen by a Springsteen-esque patina, but it finds its finest hours in a handful of songs that know how to roar with just the right, thrilling clamour. The parable of the terrorist in “Tommy Gun” assaults the listener with its machine-gun drumming in a splendid, relentless crescendo of electric guitars. The “white riot” returns in the ungainly rock and roll march of “English Civil War”, opened by a riff in the style of Chuck Berry.

The Clash, in short, haven't lost the heart and grit of their debut, and they prove themselves a sharp-witted band when they detonate the tough “Safe European Home”, which gracefully and aggressively fuses Headon's hard-hitting drum rolls with the reggae vibrations of Jones's rubbery guitar.

It may not be the “album of the year” that “Time” magazine called it, but Give 'em Enough Rope is the Clash's first, courageous step outside the former promised land of Garageland.

Give 'em Enough Rope, despite criticism from the British press, reaches number two on the charts and sells half a million copies in the United States, where, just as Cbs had hoped, listeners seem to appreciate Strummer and co.'s second effort far more. The Clash ride the favourable wave and try to cement their image as an English rock band through the film “Rude Boy”, a brutal mirror of the England bracing itself to welcome Thatcher in May 1979.

The band actively takes part in the filming by Hazan and Mingay, who choose the blistering performance at Victoria Park (a concert organised by the Anti Nazi League), where the “Brigade Rosse”, led by an increasingly commanding Strummer, launch into two incendiary versions of “London's Burning” and “White Riot”.

“Rude Boy”, however, fuels the sense that the punk chapter is now over, virtually handing the baton to the two roadies Green and Baker, who move the Clash's base from Camden to Pimlico, into a new creative space called Vanilla.

It's here that Strummer and Jones will manage to shed their skin and step definitively into legend.

Best profile

1979. Punk, after the breakup of the Sex Pistols, is stabbed through the heart once again: on 2 February, bad boy Sid Vicious is found dead after a fatal heroin overdose. The suicide shakes the world of British punk, which looks in the mirror and sees an ending marked by the simple yet inescapable label “historic”.

There is already talk, in fact, of a new movement called “post-punk”, which will find, in June, its grim-faced standard-bearers in the Joy Division of “Unknown Pleasures”, a record that catches punk in a claustrophobic web of synthesizers and feedback-drenched guitars.

Punk purists tremble, and Strummer knows he can't keep appeasing them: “I've never cared about labels. I'm on the side of the weird ones, I'm on the side of those standing behind a wall, I'm on the side of whoever truly embodies their own individuality. Punks want security, and with us they won't find it”.

It's precisely to escape this limiting sense of security that the Clash decide to set off and discover America. Buoyed by the solid success of Give 'em, the band embarks on a US tour, provocatively dubbed the “Pearl Harbour Tour”. Strummer and Jones's goal, in fact, is not to turn the Clash into an American rock and roll band, but to immerse themselves in the creative ocean of old-school American musical styles. It's no coincidence that every date on the tour opens with “I'm So Bored With The Usa”.

Creative aims aside, the tour proves to be a great success, with many shows selling out completely — clear proof of a powerful love affair just beginning to blossom.

In May, the EP The Cost Of Living (Cbs, 1979) is released, a small taste of the new sonic direction the Clash are taking to move beyond punk and become a rock band with a broader scope.

On "Capital Radio", the furious drive is slowed down (and enriched) by a refined melodic sense that finds even more harmonious expression on the acoustic, harmonica-driven, Dylanesque ballad "Groovy Times".

The raw, driving rock and roll of the cover of "I Fought The Law" (featured on the American edition of The Clash, released that very year, 1979) gives way to the more complex, airy sound of "Gates Of The West".

The Clash, in short, keep pushing the accelerator, but with an ever-growing sonic and lyrical awareness. The magic formula is, by now, almost ready.

Once the American tour wraps up, the Clash prepare to head back into the studio to make their third album.

In Strummer's words: "We think it's time now to sit down and write some new songs, throwing all the balls buzzing around in our heads out the window. We'll hole up in the Plimco rehearsal room and stay there for a couple of months, writing and recording tracks every day." Cbs, meanwhile, is pushing for a new release, but this time it's the Clash who choose the man who'll take the producer's chair and run the show.

Guy Stevens has the right feel for American roots music and, above all, boasts serious credentials as a former producer for the Who and Mott The Hoople. His arrival proves valuable right away, bringing the kind of excitement that had been completely missing during the sessions for the previous album. Stevens, however, is in the grip of serious alcohol and drug problems, which force him to leave the Clash midway through recording; engineer Bill Price takes over the reins from there.

The hard work is almost done, but the band decides to head back out on tour in September before putting the final, decisive touches on the new material. The "Take The Fifth Tour" is another 42-date run across the United States, and it succeeds in fully cementing the Clash's image as a great rock and roll band.

Alongside this musical opening-up, the band expands with keyboardist Mickey Gallagher (already a member of Ian Dury's Blockheads) and photographer Pennie Smith, who captures the iconic shot of Paul Simonon smashing his bass on the Palladium stage in New York. Backed up by pieces of American history like Bo Diddley and Sam and Dave, night after night the Clash assert their new, splendid "profile", which in effect brings to light what many will come to call the "Clash sound".

Named by Rolling Stone the "most important album of the '80s", London Calling (Cbs, 1979) is the album that most fittingly cements the Clash's rebellious music.

Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives are still celebrating their election victory when, in December, an album is released that is a genuine hand grenade lobbed at straight-laced, bigoted England. Strummer, a modern-day Garcia Lorca, has no intention of sparing anyone or anything: from nuclear catastrophe to international fascism, from criminal violence to urban decay. The punk that razed whole cities with its nihilist message now has to step aside, because the time has come to rebuild. London, scorched by fire, now sounds its call: "London is calling, the war has been declared. The ice age is coming, the sun is zooming in." The apocalyptic lights shining over the new metropolis are meant to awaken the conscience of rock's youth, and Strummer's voice could not be more charged with fervor and passion as it leads the looming, ominous pounding of the title track that opens the album.

This is the thread connecting it to their revolutionary debut, whose fierce anger is carried into a deeper, more visceral and musically more innovative dimension. There's no other way to explain the seamless blending of nineteen songs so different from one another, each an independent piece of a sonic picture painted with the touch of a true master.

The punk band drops the three-chord velocity in favor of a stylistic abundance spread across two LPs that, according to the alternative paper "Village Voice", hadn't been heard since the days of "Exile On Main Street". And yet the drive of "Hateful" is pure punk, and indeed it brings to mind the death of punk's own negative hero, Sid Vicious.

But it's like some devolutionary process in reverse gear: the Clash, in the middle of their punk sprint, suddenly slam on the handbrake and start wildly retracing the entire path of rock and roll in reverse. And it's strange that the punks themselves act just like the hated traffic cops, treating this breach of the code as blasphemy. Punk gets mixed with old, prehistoric American rockabilly, as in the fierce reworking of Vince Taylor's classic "Brand New Cadillac".

The Clash don't seem too worried about losing their license; if anything, they relish it, mocking any purist with the swinging horns of "Jimmy Jazz", which might sound out of place on any other album, but not this one. It's the magic formula that Give 'em Enough Rope had searched for in vain, achieved by picking the lock on the Sex Pistols' no-future cage and stepping out into the open to create a kind of "miscellany" of modern music.

The funk-ska marches of “Rudie Can't Fail” and “Wrong 'em Boyo” trade off at a distance in a call-and-response of unleashed horns, as if to say that beyond the smoke of London there's a whole world to discover. A world of countries and sounds that starts in anti-fascist Spain with the soul-rock ballad “Spanish Bombs”, only to return to the mythical homeland of Kingston, led by the pied piper Strummer as he strikes up the sparkling reggae of “Revolution Rock”, or by Simonon's pulsing bass marking out the dub stride of “Guns Of Brixton”.

Passion is the extra weapon of London Calling, which thus stands worlds apart from the colder, more middle-class approach to reggae taken by The Police and Sting. “He who fucks nuns will later join the church”: the epic rock and roll of “Death Or Glory” couldn't put it any more bluntly. The Clash's voice comes across immediate and irreverent, and above all sounds like a unique melting-pot within rock's colourful world. Their encyclopedic approach sheds any pedantic, textbook quality and takes on a fun tone, a splendid fusion of old and new. Montgomery Clift thus gets his ironic epitaph in the unleashed r&b of “The Right Profile”, while Mick Jones toys with the amphetamine-fuelled new wave of “Lost In The Supermarket”.

It's impossible to resist the urge to start a classic game of spot-the-reference when the liturgical piano of “The Card Cheat” kicks in, gradually turning into an imposing gospel ballad reminiscent of the Spectorian “wall of sound”. Such references, however, vanish completely once the extraordinary pop-shuffle of “Train In Vain” kicks off (blending the legend of Robert Johnson with Ben E. King's “Stand By Me”), spinning on itself to a calypso harmonica and sweeping everything and everyone toward the album's close. The track fades out slowly, and in this it's completely unlike the record it belongs to: London Calling is, in fact, the work that turned the Clash into legend and gave rock music an experience that, at moments, has never been equalled.

After the release of London Calling, the Clash's old fans mobilize in fierce protest. While Crass accuse them of “ideological betrayal”, one punk, after a show in Sweden, stops Strummer and screams in his face that “even his grandmother likes the new record”.

Nobody, in truth, seems willing to grasp the real point of London Calling: the rock and roll of “Koka Kola” isn't an ode to capitalism, the double album costs the same as a single, and above all the Clash have absolutely no intention of becoming an American band.

As proof of this, the band takes part in the charity initiative “Concert for the People of Kampuchea” and puts on a secret gig at the Acklam Hall in London on Christmas Day to pay tribute to the old Westway community.

It's true that the single “London Calling” reaches number eleven on the British charts and that the “Times” calls the Clash “one of the five greatest rock bands of all time”, but Strummer and co. never lose sight of the heart of their art: playing for the fun of it and sending an important message to every single human being.

Clash Social Forum

1980. In January a new American tour kicks off – the “16 Tons Tour” – carrying around the “weight” of their latest album.

Opening for the Clash's shows is, among others, Jamaican musician Mikey Dread, who greatly admires the band's original approach to reggae and encourages them to dig deeper into other sounds, such as dub.

The tour is a genuine success, racking up numerous sold-out shows and drawing ever more enthusiastic praise from critics and fans alike. Strummer and company are enjoying a golden moment of fame and creativity, and so they decide to record more tracks at Electric Lady Studios in New York. Fans of the metropolitan underbelly, the Clash grow comfortable with rap and, led by their new mentor Mikey Dread, sink ever deeper into dub's profound sounds. It's time for another creative dip in Jamaica, where the band lays down bits of new material at Channel One Studios and, above all, at Black Ark Studios, Lee Perry's famed temple that no white band had ever set foot in before.

In May the Clash return home to continue the tour in Europe and find their old fans still spoiling for a fight. Punk, ever more rigid and strained, has gradually morphed into hardcore, and Strummer reaches a violent breaking point in Hamburg, smashing his guitar over a skinhead's head.

Despite their excellent creative streak, the band starts sensing a storm brewing as Topper Headon's drug problems turn serious for the first time. Live activity is thus put on hold, and rumours start to spread about the group's possible break-up.

The Clash, however, are alive and well, and in October they release a new EP, Black Market Clash (Cbs, 1980).

The ten-inch is a small, ideal bridge linking the band's past and future, caught between guitar-driven roar and new experimentation.

On one hand, you can hear once again the dirty, aggressive Clash so sorely missed by fans of the old era. The punk (only vaguely tinged with ska) of “The City Of The Dead” and the rock and roll of “The Prisoner” are keepsake snapshots of an album that, nonetheless, is about to be definitively closed off. In truth, the Clash were never pure, hardcore punks, otherwise there would be no room for the melodic shout of “Capital Radio” or the instrumental fluency of the soul-blues rendition of “Time Is Tight”.

The other face of the Ep is, however, decidedly more interesting, since it's a kind of premonitory dream of the new record event that would materialize within a few months. Strummer and Jones show they've quickly absorbed the lessons of Mickey Dread, unspooling a reggae far more layered and mature than the fun, rollicking kind found on London Calling.

“Bankrobber” and “Pressure Drop” draw the Clash ever closer to the Caribbean island, and this time they really seem to be in command of their own means. “Justice Tonight/Kick It Over” is, in fact, their first true encounter with dub, and its enveloping, mantra-like atmosphere seems to tell us it went very well indeed.

Black Market Clash is, in short, an important Ep, the expression of a band on the verge of upending itself once again.

Meanwhile, remixing sessions for the new tracks recorded between New York and Kingston begin in London, once again alongside Mickey Dread and with Bill Price, the engineer behind London Calling. The studio work is grueling and, for about a month, it absorbs all the creative energy of a band that is wringing out its artistic anarchy to the very last drop. Strummer himself explains the reasoning behind such a monumental undertaking: “We probably set off in 36 different directions on the new album. We weren't sure where we wanted to go with all those songs. In fact, at first it was meant to be a classic double album; then, once all the material was settled, we decided to make it a triple, without giving up anything we'd recorded”.

This stylistic abundance stemming from “36 different directions” turns into the delightful burden of Sandinista! (Cbs, 1980), released in December as a full triple Lp. The Clash push the irreverent variety of London Calling to its extreme, building a sprawling, open-ended, restless sonic construction site. It's the most ambitious idea Strummer and co. ever had: gathering together, with no selection criteria whatsoever, every song-idea produced during their most fertile creative period. A sort of enormous attic in which to carefully lay down every sonic memory, every life experience, every message meant for the world. An attic-as-“white album” that, nevertheless, doesn't come across as a disjointed set of Beatles-style individualities, but as the complete work of a true, united rock and roll band.

Sandinista!, then, is the Clash's red album, a guerrilla, revolutionary record born out of the rage of Nicaragua's oppressed people and growing into a new cauldron of music speaking the most varied languages imaginable. It's the most wide-open approach possible, one that lets the baroque waltz of “Rebel Waltz” coexist with the warm, politicized reggae of “One More Time”. This is the birth of patchanka, an identity-less territory basking in the cosmopolitan, all-encompassing sunshine of music that wants nothing to do with labels or preset rules. And, after all, you only need to drop the first record onto the turntable and listen through in order to grasp it immediately.

“The Magnificent Seven” literally kicks off the party with a deep plunge into funk and the rap of the outer boroughs, but it's immediately followed by the irresistible ode to old Motown that is “Hitsville Uk”.

The listener is already slightly disoriented, but the Clash press on, mocking and relentless, moving ahead with the reggae of “Junco Partner”, the frantic electronic r&b of “Ivan Meets G.I. Joe”, and the galloping rockabilly of “The Leader”. The challenge laid down by London Calling is, in short, pushed even further here, and, above all, it's backed by a greater artistic self-awareness.

The pop melody grows more refined in the classically-styled fanfare of “Something About England”, while the jazzy flavor is executed even better in the rousing a cappella swing of “Look Here”. Strummer attains the status of a sophisticated songwriter when he sets the jazzy tempo of the gorgeous nocturnal crescendo that is “Broadway”.

The ugly, dirty, nasty Clash are by now a memory, evoked only occasionally through the sparkling rock and roll of “Somebody Got Murdered” and “Police On My Back”.

The new Clash, on the other hand, are the engaged, experimental musicians behind the violin-dub of “The Equaliser”, the calypso melody of “Washington Bullets”, or the ominous march of “Charlie Don't Surf”.

“All those young men down through the centuries marched cheerfully off to their deaths, politicians looking on proudly, tears in their eyes”: once the ska-reggae of “The Call Up” kicks in, there's no way you can still think of the Clash as merely a rock and roll band.

Sandinista!, however, doesn't only have fragrant (red) flowers in its heart. Such excessive abundance comes at a price, namely a certain underlying unevenness that London Calling was free of. Much like talking on and on for hours, it has its downside: in the end, some rubbish inevitably slips through. The album suffers whenever it's overstuffed with studio tinkering (“Mensforth Hill” and “Shepherds Delight”) and dub remakes (“One More Dub” and “Version Pardner”), not to mention the sheer silliness of the kids redoing “Career Opportunities”.

If London Calling favors a sinister, apocalyptic hammering, Sandinista! veers toward third-worldism for giggles with “Lose This Skin”. These are just differences, and it's a good thing we're forced to discuss them, because it means the Clash have once again pulled off something new and utterly electrifying.

The triple album Sandinista! seriously wrong-foots the British music press, hardly accustomed to reviewing sonic grandiosity of this caliber. The thirty-six tracks' resistance to easy classification draws savage criticism from magazines like the NME (Nick Kent speaks of "ridiculous self-indulgence"), but there's no shortage of open applause either, as in the case of the American alternative paper Village Voice. It's actually the United States that takes most warmly to the album, driving its sales, despite CBS's lack of interest in promoting it properly.

The Clash's state of grace, however, is spotting ever-darker clouds on the horizon. The two unshakeable twins, Mick and Joe, begin to clash over Jones's increasingly finicky "rockstar" attitude.

It's only the beginning... of the end.

Death or glory?

1981-1982. The Clash have by now won over the hearts of American youth and sales keep climbing steadily. The band's finances, however, are in poor shape, and Joe Strummer feels the time has come to tend to them more carefully. The guitarist aspires to the role of undisputed leader and so recalls old mentor Bernie Rhodes, clashing with Mick Jones's wishes, since Jones had pushed Rhodes out of the Clash camp three years earlier.

The group's perfect internal balance thus begins to crack, but the issue doesn't stop the four from going back on tour with their usual incendiary verve. The Clash, staying at the Iroquois Hotel, plunge into the vital frenzy of New York, playing two weeks of shows at Bond's in Times Square with Grandmaster Flash as support. Tickets sell at the speed of light, and when police declare the venue unsafe due to excessive demand, violent clashes break out between them and dozens of furious fans.

The "phony Beatlemania" has given way to Strummer and co., who in the United States cement their public image even further thanks to numerous TV appearances and Don Letts's documentary, "Clash On Broadway". It's a level of fame no historic punk band has reached so far, one that extends the band's reach across the whole world.

In April the "Impossible Mission Tour" kicks off, a new European run that also takes in Italy with three historic shows in Sanremo, Milan and Florence.

The Clash's success, however, is seriously undermined by Headon's hospitalization, which causes numerous interruptions to the recording, between London and New York, of the album due to follow Sandinista!. An album that, in the meantime, struggles to emerge from its creative womb amid difficulty and pain.

Joe Strummer, after the stylistic binge, wants a decisive sonic return to the band's roots, trying to resurface its old, rough-edged, visceral soul. Mick Jones, on the contrary, is firmly intent on continuing down the experimental path of the previous album. The old punk twins are by now divided, seeing the reality around the Clash in completely different ways. The more Mick tries to give the group a musical identity unique unto itself, the greater Joe's philosophical ambitions grow, oriented toward a strong, utopian politics paired with a newly raw and direct sound. By the end of the year the two are idle and sullen, drawing the irritation of the British press, who will "happily" slam the door in their faces.

These Clash, locked within themselves, nevertheless carry on recording the new album at Electric Lady Studios, together with beat poet Allen Ginsberg, but must once again contend with the heroin time-bomb that is Topper Headon, who is arrested at Heathrow Airport in December. They need to move fast... the ice age is coming.

The Clash, by now, cannot halt the inevitability of their fate. Topper Headon, unable to keep up with live activity, is forced to leave the band halfway through the new year. The drummer recalls: "I'd lost myself, I was a huge Keith Moon fan and I'd taken it literally: live fast, die young". It's Strummer who makes the painful decision to fire Topper, later stating: "It was impossible to carry on in that situation. How could I write lyrics against drugs when he was right behind me, completely out of it?". Headon's talent, however, manages one last effort, answering the final call of the new studio recordings and completing his work before bidding farewell to his old comrades in arms.

Produced by veteran Glyn Johns, Combat Rock (CBS, 1982) is the Clash's swan song, as they decide to return to a single LP without risking any further sonic grandiosity. The reality, in fact, is quite different: Strummer and Jones are at loggerheads and can no longer chase the inventiveness of the past together. Inventiveness that, however, doesn't seem to have vanished entirely.

Combat Rock is, in many ways, the band's most "American" record, if only because it's certainly their most polished, professional, and glossy. The new path of "combat rock" can no longer turn back to the rawness of their early punk days, and so a kind of rock and roll "maturity" becomes necessary, one that calls for a brighter, more commercial sound.

It's the new "Radio Clash" shining through the darkness of the band's internal tension, broadcasting new hits and intense ballads round the clock. Just tune in and answer the call: "This is a public service announcement, with guitars". Strummer is still there, a latter-day Adrian Cronauer, drunkenly bellowing his "good morning, world" through the pounding fury of "Know Your Rights".

And you end up snapping to attention, like true rock militants, when Mick Jones remembers he's a Keith Richards and kicks off the accelerating riff of "Should I Stay Or Should I Go". Never mind, of course, that he'll end up opting for the second.

It might look like blasphemous musical betrayal, but the Clash seem truly determined to exaggerate the ballroom verve of "Magnificent Seven", searching for (and finding) the bombproof hook of "Rock The Casbah". It's basic funk rules that hypnotize "Red Angel Dragnet", but which instead overload "Overpowered By Funk", turning it into a ridiculous anticipation of Prince.

"Combat rock", in fact, seems almost split in two, internally torn by a struggle between "strength" and "dark side". The timid choral rock and roll of "Atom Tan" and "Inoculated City" are fairly obvious signs of fatigue. Yet when the Clash rediscover experimentation, it's equally clear that we're dealing with a band that carries weight and doesn't speak unless it has something relevant to say. The strength flows, then, through the dub embrace of "Straight To Hell" and the jazzy unease of "Death Is A Star", where Joe Strummer chases his ghosts of death and apocalypse one last time.

The crowbars and clubs of white riot have, by now, given way to words and voice. Just in time to let them into everyone's heart.

The cleaner sound of Combat Rock immediately wins over the American audience, pushing the album to number seven on the charts, buoyed by the two killer singles "Rock The Casbah" and "Should I Stay Or Should I Go".

The worrying financial troubles are soon resolved, and Bernie Rhodes pushes the Clash into a new tour of the hungry United States. In June, the "Casbah Club Tour" kicks off (with Terry Chimes back on drums), and in front of twenty thousand people at the Palladium in Los Angeles, it seems to exorcise the irreparable tensions between Strummer and Jones.

Popularity is through the roof, and the Clash now need giant venues like JFK Stadium in Philadelphia and Shea Stadium in New York, where they play alongside Santana and The Who.

It's rock's kingdom of heaven, but everyone can sense the band is heading straight for hell.

Straight to Hell, Boys

Once the long tour is over, the Clash decide to take a break to catch their breath.

The frantic live schedule had pushed Strummer and Jones to temporarily bury the hatchet, but now the relationship between the two seems definitively gone. With Mick and Joe even avoiding speaking to each other, Terry Chimes decides, for the second time, to leave the band to its own devices.

The Clash, however, want to carry on and choose former Cold Fish man Peter Howard, with whom they rehearse for a couple of months before setting off for a series of American dates.

But this time the stage doesn't work its magic, and the band appears exactly as it is: nervous and drained of energy.

It's May 29, 1983: at the US Festival, the Clash play their last concert with Mick Jones.

After an unsettling press silence, on September 10 the NME publishes a statement: "Joe Strummer and Paul Simonon have decided that Mick Jones must leave the group, as he has drifted away from the original idea of the Clash. The band, however, will carry on working, returning to its original vision."

The red star has exploded.

Clash Mark II

By the end of 1983, Mick Jones is part of a story that's already over, but the guitarist is keen to have his say, responding to the NME's statement: “What's been reported doesn't correspond to the truth. I wanted to make clear that there was never any discussion about me being kicked out of the group. I don't feel I've betrayed any of the band's original ideas and I'll keep working in that direction.”

Strummer and Simonon, meanwhile, are firmly set on carrying on the Clash adventure, but once again need new travelling companions. Joe is thinking of focusing mainly on singing, and so hires two young guitarists to give the band fresh life. Nick Sheppard (ex-Cortinas) and Vince White, however, lack the experience and strength of Mick Jones, and will prove utterly inadequate for Bernie Rhodes's risky plan to relaunch the Clash on the music scene of the 80s.

Combat Rock, in fact, is still selling very well, and the United States is loudly calling the band back.

Rhodes, of course, can't wait to satisfy the American audience and, at the start of 1984, puts together a sort of jukebox tour that takes the great classics of the (former) Clash around the world.

The return to roots prophesied by Strummer turns out, in reality, to be a muddled pretext for feeding the hunger of fans who keep hailing the band from London to Rome. The so-called “Clash Mark II” has no clear artistic direction, limiting itself to relighting the old torch of the small-town busker strumming immortal songs in subway stations or pubs on weekends. This humble contentment can't last long, especially since it's Joe himself who fails to find any meaningful answers to the question marks hanging over the band, eventually dropping everything and disappearing from the scene for a while. By now only Bernie Rhodes is left believing in the (commercial) future of the Clash, and it's precisely he who, without meaning to, delivers the fatal blow to the heart of his boys.

At the end of 1985, the old mentor decides to get his hands on some tracks written by Strummer, mixing and recording them without his permission. Joe disowns and disavows the manager's work, but it's too late: the new Clash album is already out in the world.

Cut The Crap (CBS, 1985) is a record that doesn't hold together, lost in the Hamlet-like fog swirling around the new band, which lacks the only genuine musicians, Jones and Headon.

Strummer, in the album's liner notes, tries to find his way back to commitment, but musical internationalism is, by now, gone for good. “Can you beat the old system? No, not without your participation… Radical change begins in the street! So if you're looking for a bit of action… throw away the shit and go there.”

Listening to the melodic slow-down of “This Is England” you might even feel like following, once again, the pied piper's call. At war against Thatcher's England. When, however, the synthesized rock and roll of “Dictator” or the revamped punk of “Dirty Punk” kicks in, it becomes extremely hard to raise your hand in front of the Clash and answer: “I'm in!”.

Change no longer comes through the unsettling “ice age”, but through the pointless electronic ska of “Three Card Trick”. The street-level revolt of “White Riot” has become stadium-sized crowd chanting in the pseudo-anthem “We Are The Clash”. Action itself seems to have vanished entirely, at least judging by the synth-rock of “Are You Red..y” and “Life Is Wild”. With Jones out of the picture, the Rolling Stones-style fury becomes harmless and ends up being boring, as in the riff of “Cool Under Heat”.

This isn't the Clash at all, and so, if we're talking about musical action, we really have to do as Strummer says: throw away this record and go elsewhere.

Now it's truly the end. After the album's release, a disgraceful shadow is cast over the group, which then decides to split up. For good.

Knights of rock and roll

Ousted from the Clash, Mick Jones doesn't give up and presses on with his new musical ideas.

While Strummer chases the ugly, nasty ghost of the original band, Jones begins, piece by piece, to assemble a strange sonic mosaic. In essence, the guitarist tries to further expand on the intriguing lesson of Sandinista!, mixing suburban rap with disco funk, warm beloved reggae with the evergreen punk riff.

This fresh, innovative cocktail takes the name Big Audio Dynamite, a group Jones forms in 1984 with his friend dj Don Letts, completed by Leo Williams on bass, Greg Roberts on drums and Dan Donovan on keyboards.

The band wastes no time and goes into the studio to record its debut album, which - by a twist of fate - is released by the very same Cbs and, more importantly, in the very same year as Cut The Crap.

This Is Big Audio Dynamite (Cbs, 1985) is Mick Jones's sweet revenge, proof that he's the only one able to carry on the most classic Clash tradition. While Strummer loses himself in pointless stadium rock and roll, Jones looks to the future through songs that, in their cross-pollination, wouldn't have been out of place on Sandinista!. The guitar punch of "The Bottom Line", the reggae-blues of "X-Party" and the hits "E=MC2" and "Medicine Show" are the first, colourful pieces of a promising new sonic adventure.

With the Clash saga ending ingloriously, Joe Strummer goes through a period of artistic crisis that leaves him without the brilliant ideas of the past.

In 1986 the "strummer" tries to relaunch himself by writing "Love Kills" for Alex Cox's film "Sid And Nancy", but above all by unexpectedly reconnecting with a more inspired Mick Jones, who in the meantime is working on his band's second album.

After almost four years, the old punk twins thus find themselves together again for N. 10 Upping Street (Columbia, 1986), B.A.D.'s second album. The glorious partnership, obviously, can't work miracles, but it does give off sparks of electricity when the Morricone-esque "Sightsee M.C!" kicks in, or on the Love Parade rhythm of "C'mon Every Beatbox".

The nostalgia operation, however, proves to be just an isolated flash, as Jones is too caught up in his own music, which is winning positive reviews and solid commercial results.

B.A.D. tour the world and, riding the wave of enthusiasm, release a third album, Tighten Up Volume 88 (Columbia, 1988), which, trailing the single "Just Play Music", veers toward mediocre disco funk.

The truth is that Mick Jones is suffering from a severe case of pneumonia and has to stop for a while.

In 1987, Joe Strummer tries his luck anew in the world of cinema, appearing as an actor in Alex Cox's western film, "Straight To Hell".

The guitarist's real wager, however, lies in composing various film scores.

Walker (Cbs, 1988) mixes, more or less skilfully, rock surges and Latin atmospheres, but the more interesting case is Earthquake Weather (Cbs, 1989), which combines, in Clash style, electric folk, rock and reggae.

Strummer thus seems to be reborn, forming a short-lived band - the Latino Rockabilly War Band - with which he returns to the stage for an English tour organised by the anarchist left-wing group Class War.

Sales of his latest albums, however, prove disastrous, leaving Joe in serious financial trouble and, above all, plunged once again into self-doubt.

Aside from producing the Pogues' "Hell's Ditch" (he'll also join them on tour, temporarily stepping in for MacGowan), the former Clash leader goes through what many will call his "wilderness years". Strummer withdraws from the scene, spending the early part of the '90s DJing at raves and recording tracks in the quiet of his new farmhouse in the Somerset countryside.

Having recovered from his bout of pneumonia, Mick Jones immediately returns to B.A.D, with whom he records their fourth album, Megatop Phoenix (Cbs, 1989). Produced once again by old acquaintance Bill Price, the record sticks to the band's danceable formula, but proves more convincing thanks to Jones's melodic flair.

It's the last work by the original line-up, who, at the dawn of 1990, all walk out en masse on the guitarist and his bold project.

The former Clash man, however, is determined to press on regardless, and reforms the band with Nick Hawkins (guitar), Gary Stonadge (bass) and Chris Kavanagh (drums).

The so-called Big Audio Dynamite II put together a European tour and, in 1991, hit the jackpot with The Globe (CBS, 1991), which sells extremely well thanks to the pulsing single "Rush" and the use of the "Should I Stay Or Should I Go" riff in the title track.

It's the last gasp of Mick Jones's career, as he'll never manage to recapture that form again, releasing increasingly modest and forgettable albums until he finally decides to keep B.A.D. going merely as a sound-system, touring the dance-halls of half of England to get kids dancing.

It is the very soul of Jones, the warm, romantic heart of the Clash.

In 1998, after years of quiet isolation and repeated refusals to consider reforming the Clash, Joe Strummer decides it's time to get back on the rock and roll road.

The strummer is seriously considering, together with former Elastica guitarist Anthony Genn, forming a new band, and so he breaks free of the contract still tying him to Columbia.

The Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros project gradually takes shape with the addition of Martin Slattery (keyboards and sax), Scott Shield (bass), Steve Barnard (drums) and multi-instrumentalist Pablo Cook, and really takes off thanks to Tim Armstrong of Rancid, who offers the group a carte-blanche deal with his label, Hellcat Records.

"Dedicated to everyone who fights for freedom", Rock Art And The X-Ray Style (Hellcat Records, 1999) is a multicultural record as much as a multi-musical one. Across ten tracks, Strummer tries to sketch out an end-of-millennium vision that, straddling past and future, might combine the rebellious spirit of roots music with new urban anxieties. The internationalist, third-worldist journey passes through classic Clash-ian bastard territory, but runs into a rather uneven mix of styles. Rock, reggae and African rhythms never quite cohere, yet Joe seems to have much clearer ideas than in the past. "Sandpaper Blues", "The Road To Rock And Roll", the lengthy single "Yalla Yalla" and the tear-jerking ballad "Willesden To Crickelwood" are the opening chapters of a story that could turn out to be both fun and stimulating.

After the release of the debut album, Joe Strummer takes the Mescaleros out on tour, scoring excellent success with audiences.

The enduring fame of his former band helps the guitarist, increasingly spurred on to continue with the new musical project, despite the departures of Genn, Cook and Barnard.

Strummer then calls up his old busker friend Tymon Dogg (violin and guitar) and shuts himself away in the studio once again to record the second album.

Global A Go Go (Hellcat Records, 2001) continues the multiracial journey, and this time the direction to take seems clearer and more assured. The joyful, chaotic lesson of Sandinista! gives rise to a colourful, improvised album that stretches its sonic seams like the suitcase of a citizen of the world.

Strummer chases Irish skies in the folk-and-roll jig of "Johnny Appleseed" and, above all, in the long, tragic lament of "Minstrel Boy". Amid African bongos and calypso patterns, the record moves naturally from one continent to another, finally landing in the familiar black warmth of the pianistic reggae of "At The Border, Guy" and the enveloping sway of "Mondo Bongo".

The old strummer, in short, returns as a folksinger and crafts a more refined, more considered work, a flag for a musical world without fixed borders.

Between 2001 and 2002, the Mescaleros went back on tour in the United States, earning ever more enthusiastic acclaim. The uncertain Strummer of the early soundtracks now seems a pale ghost next to the new Joe, reborn as a third-world minstrel.

This rediscovered hyperactivity led to a third album, Streetcore (Hellcat Records, 2003), which, sadly, turned out to be the final act of an entire life.

The refined multiracial sound of Global A Go Go this time stays in the background, making way for the rawer rock and roll of "Coma Girl" and "Arms Aloft", which winks at the old energy of the Clash.

Strummer had found his winning formula, writing fresh apocalyptic folk songs straight off, from the acoustic softness of "Long Shadow" to the driving urgency of "Burnin' Streets". His poetic, literary streak rediscovers the heartfelt magic in the cover of "Redemption Song" and ends up captivating with the cinematic nocturnal drift of "Midnight Jam". Music that remains "on the border", with the Clash still alive in his heart, in the hope of having given something to a different world.

Clash 77 Revisited

With the adventure now truly over, the time came for the Clash to open up all their secret vaults.

The Story Of The Clash (Cbs, 1988) thus begins the celebration of Strummer and co.'s most creative period, above all with the splendid reggae contamination of "Armagideon Time".

It's time, in other words, to pore over the books and go back over the scorching history of English punk.

Course manuals, Crucial Music: The Clash 1977 Revisited (Sony, 1990) and the imposing Super Black Market Clash (Epic, 1993), which expands on the Ep from thirteen years earlier with b-sides and rarities, including the epic "1977", where Strummer, over the driving riff, bellows out the famous slogan: "No Elvis, Beatles or Rolling Stones in 1977".

And let's not dwell on the fact that, in 1993, the Stones-esque riff of "Should I Stay Or Should I Go" became famous worldwide thanks to a Levi's ad. Those were decidedly different times.

In 1994 came On Broadway (Sony, 1994), a three-CD box set containing the aggressive rock of "One Emotion" and the crystalline ballads "Every Little Bit Hurts" and "Midnight To Stevens".

…Into Eternity

In 1999, the first and only Clash live album was finally released.

From Here To Eternity (Sony, 1999) is the fitting musical testament of a band that, on stage, gave so much with heat, sweat and electric energy. The moment the booming "I Fought The Law" kicks in, we're transported back to the raw fury of Strummer and co., when the main mission was to set the streets ablaze and shake people's consciences. The slurred roar of "London's Burning" and the riff of "Clash City Rockers", the first reggae contaminations of "White Man In Hammersmith Palais" and "Armagideon Time".

From the fire of Victoria Park to the great American shows of 1982, the album is the best travel itinerary for discovering the heart of "the only band that matters".

In 2001 the Clash received the Ivor Novello Award in London for their undeniable contribution to English music. Even if only to collect the prize, Mick Jones, Joe Strummer, Paul Simonon and Topper Headon found themselves together on a stage. It hadn't happened since 1982.

The four seem at peace, fulfilled, but the answer to the ever-persistent reunion proposals is always the same: the old band is now a legend, and no one intends to tarnish it.

In November 2002, however, Mick Jones joined Joe Strummer at Acton Town Hall in London for a benefit concert in support of the British firefighters' union. Their usual social commitment took on a wholly unexpected, particular hue. "Bankrobber", "London's Burning" and "White Riot" were the sparks of a brief moment the two musicians hadn't shared in almost twenty years.

It was the final musical farewell to his old twin brother.

On December 21st, on a quiet afternoon at his home in Somerset, Joe Strummer, sitting in the kitchen, was struck down by a heart attack.

In 1977 he sang: "London's burning with boredom now, I'm in the subway, looking for my home. I run through the empty petrified streets because I'm alone". His heart burned for fifty years... now he leaves the flames to us, because he's not alone anymore, and he's found a home.

Outro – The Ten Thousand Days

1979. Joe Strummer: "The oil reserves will last another ten thousand days".

Journalist: "Do you mean we have ten thousand days left to find an alternative energy source?".

Joe Strummer: "No, I mean we still have ten thousand days left to play rock and roll".

In memory of Joe Strummer (1952-2002). Rest in peace, brother strummer.

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