The Clash on the Clash by Sean Egan

Author:Sean Egan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Published: 2017-01-08T05:00:00+00:00

JOE STRUMMER ANSWERS

THE CALL-UP

Paolo Hewitt | December 13, 1980 | Melody Maker (UK)

Although now viewed as a classic, on its release London Calling actually attracted not inconsiderable criticism: some thought its slick grooves and occasionally internationalist lyrics constituted a sellout of punk values.

Such sentiments only increased over the following year, albeit with somewhat greater justification. For instance, the band that had once professed themselves so bored with the U.S.A. seemed to be spending a lot of time there, either touring or, in the case of Mick Jones, as resident. This itself caused a creative problem: the songs the Clash continued to write about poverty in their home country assumed a phony aura. Meanwhile, songs they wrote about other countries such as “The Call Up” and “Washington Bullets” had an air of irrelevance: the draft and Latin American nationalism were not exactly burning issues for UK council-estate youth. The triple-album format of new album Sandinista! was for many the height of hubris, as was its cold, substandard self-production. To cap it all, the band were looking increasingly comical, swathed—as on the cover of Sandinista!—in an arbitrary jumble of military and outlaw chic. Not even the album’s low price could mollify ex-fans.

Perhaps because of this recent wave of criticism, Strummer had gone back on his assertion to Susan Whitall only six months previously that he had “a six-foot thick skin.” In this interview, he complains that journalists don’t understand how “sensitive” musicians can be.

Strummer is in alternately defiant and defeated mood, admitting the naivete of past stances and acknowledging that the Clash have lost ground in their home country. It’s particularly noteworthy how catty he is about the Jam. Enmity between the Clash and the Jam was long-standing. Enraged by the then politically conservative leanings of Jam front man Paul Weller, Strummer had gone so far as to ridicule the Jam on record in “(White Man) in Hammersmith Palais.” It can’t have amused him, then, to have seen the group that were once the runts of punk’s litter lately overtaking the Clash and all the rest of their peers to become what the Clash had always dreamed of being: a group who scored chart-toppers with social protest.

Notes: Lord Denning compiled a report on a notorious sixties sexual scandal involving a government minister.

For “Sandinista” read “Sandinista!”

For “Wells End Estate” read “World’s End Estate”

For “FSLM (Frante Sandinista Liberation Nicaragua Nationale)” read “FSLN (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional)”

For “Black Parenza” read “La Prensa”

For “Jose Chemaro” read “Joaquín Chamorro”

For “Paul Moreley” read “Paul Morley” —Ed.

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