'White Men In Hammersmith Odeon'
Happy New Year!
I haven’t posted any live music in a while and it seems the new year would be a good time to get back into the habit. I had tried to plan this as a New Year’s Eve post, but other activities got in the way.
I picked this particular performance from the Clash because of its date. I was looking for an NYE performance and this December 27 show is the closest I could find. It’s actually from the 1979
Concerts for the People of Kampuchea benefit show. The Clash appeared along with Ian Dury and Matumbi on the second night. There is an official album from the four-day event, but only one Clash song, “Armagideon Time,” made its way onto that release. For the sake of my sanity, I’m not gonna post that here (although savvy readers may find a “bonus” track in the RapidShare DL).
A bit o’ background: The Clash had toured America in September and October of 1979, where they previewed some songs from the-then-unreleased
London Calling LP. With that album fresh in the shops by the Kampuchea show, songs from it were much more prominent in the set list. Also of note is a revved-up ska-like version of “Bankrobber,” different from the soon-to-be-released single, which was more in the reggae style of its inspiration, Max Romeo’s “Public Enemy Number One.”
Clash City Rockers.mp3 Brand New Cadillac.mp3 Safe European Home.mp3 Jimmy Jazz.mp3 Clampdown.mp3 The Guns of Brixton.mp3 Train In Vain.mp3 Wrong ‘em Boyo.mp3 Koka Kola.mp3 White Man in Hammersmith Palais.mp3 Stay Free.mp3 Bankrobber.mp3 Janie Jones.mp3 Complete Control.mp3 Armagideon Time
London Calling.mp3 or – get it all in one shot
here.
Labels: live music, punk, the Clash
Havana 3am
The other day I found something very cool that heretofore I had not known existed. (Really, how often do you see the word “heretofore” in the common blog?)
I had always considered myself a pretty knowledgeable fan of the Clash, but I did not know that after the Clash split, Paul Simonon started a band called Havana 3am. Named after a 1950’s album by Perez Prado, the Cuban “King of Mambo,” Havana 3am consisted of Simonon on bass; Gary Myrick on guitar; Nigel Dixon from the British band Whirlwind on lead vocals; and Travis Williams, a drummer they found through a newspaper ad.
Havana 3am recorded a self-titled album in Japan in 1991. Following Dixon's death in April 1993, and the departure of Simonon, who resumed a career in art, Gary Myrick put out one more album with different line-up, but by 1996, the band had called it quits.
The band’s
Wiki entry describes Havana 3am as rockabilly with a heavy Latin influence. I think some reviewers make that call based on the horns in some of the songs or simply on the band's name. Havana 3am is not to be confused with salsa or merengue. Rather, it’s similar to the Clash’s forays into roots rock, with a twist of spaghetti Western for atmosphere. The horns merely add a touch of
spice, if you will.
Along with not knowing Paul Simonon did this project after the Clash, I wasn’t aware either that post-Havana 3am, he returned to art, which he had been doing before joining the Clash. In 2008, after an eight-year break, Simonon began
exhibiting paintings again with a show at Thomas Williams Fine Art in London, where Lily Allen reportedly bought one of his paintings for £23,500.
Reach the Rock.mp3 Death in the Afternoon.mp3Labels: punk, rockabilly, the Clash
As I slowly wake up...
Maybe I need to pay closer attention, but I don’t think I knew Carbon/Silicon was Mick Jones’ latest project.
I just read about a series of gigs Carbon/Silicon played in the Clash's old stomping grounds in London's Notting Hill neighborhood. According to
Yahoo news, the band has been putting on ticketless shows at Inn on the Green, accompanied by young punk bands. They just played their last show there last night.
The shows were notable not just for the passing of the punk baton, as the story says, but also for some of the guests who have stopped in to jam with Carbon/Silicon. The first show saw ex-Clash drummer Topper Headon take to the stage for encores of Clash classics “Train in Vain” and “Should I Stay or Should I Go.” It was the first time the pair had played together for 25 years. Subsequent nights have seen the Sex Pistols’ Glen Matlock and Paul Cook step up from the audience to do show stoppers like the Pistols’ cover of “Stepping Stone.”
Carbon/Silicon will be at SXSW in a couple of weeks, kicking off their North American tour, which surprisingly (note the sarcasm, please), does not bring them to Miami. Info on what cities they
are playing can be found on the
Carbon/Silicon Web site.
Some quick bio info, in case I’m not the only person who’s a little slow. James and Jones came together in 2002 and wrote “M.P.Free,” inspired by P2P networks. Since then, they’ve slowly evolved into a four-piece band, and have continued to release their music for free online. “We will continue to write, record and release new songs for free through our Web site as well as ‘conventional’ media like CDs out in the real world,” Mick and Tony wrote on their site. “We believe the 2 worlds will co-exist happily and Art will prosper... We will continue to follow our beliefs... Who knows what the future holds for us?... and if there is a revolution going on - we’re in.....”
Here are a couple of new tracks from their Web site. There are also a few others posted on
the site.
Pier 51.mp3 Prophet.mp3Labels: new stuff, rock, the Clash
Rude Boy
Let’s open things tonight with a little history lesson about the Rude Boys.
The term “rude boys” originated in Kingston, Jamaica, in the 1960s. They were juvenile delinquents and criminals who took influence from American gangster movies, dressing stylishly in suits, and wearing thin ties and pork pie hats. As Jamaicans immigrated to the United Kingdom during the 1960s, Jamaican “rude boy” music and fashion became a strong influence on the skinhead subculture.
During the 1970’s 2-Tone ska revival in England, the terms “rude boy” and “rude girl” were often used to describe fans of that genre. This revised use of the term continued with the late 80’s third-wave ska movement. In these two contexts, the term “rude boy” became separated from its past.
The 1980 Clash film / semi-documentary “Rude Boy” plays more on the ska context than the term’s historical context. The Clash was, of course, a seminal punk band, but it goes without saying that they also drew very heavily on Jamaican-inspired music.
“Rude Boy,” which was released on DVD in 2006, features a great deal of live footage, with the band performing songs from their first two albums. The action footage of the band is largely what drives the movie; the plot itself is somewhat convoluted. On one of the DVD extras, Ray Grange, who stars as “Ray,” admits the film was incoherent and complains about playing a character named after him but who wasn’t really a reflection of him. Neither did the Clash really care for the movie, distributing buttons saying, "I don't want Rude Boy Clash Film."
Tonight’s music comes from “Rude Boy.” I don’t remember where I got this stuff – if it was ripped from the DVD or what. As far as I can tell, there is no soundtrack album, but I could be wrong about that.
Rudie Can’t Fail (demo).mp3 Garageland (demo).mp3Good Times Roll (outtake).mp3 No Reason (outtake).mp3 All You Young Cunts (outtake).mp3 Stay Free (outtake).mp3Labels: movies, punk, the Clash
The Clash - The Vanilla Tapes
I’m back, baby! And while I still have a couple of things to fine tune, I think everything is good.
I want to celebrate the “Grand Re-Opening” of the Licorice Pizza blog with some stuff from the Clash’s
Vanilla Tapes sessions. This disk came packaged with the 25th Anniversary
London Calling reissue, in 2004.
Long thought of as either lost or the product of fans’ wishful thinking, Mick Jones found the box of tapes while packing for a move in early 2004. “I recognized them instantly for what they were,” he said. “They hadn’t been heard since the record was made. It was pretty amazing.”
According to the disk’s liner notes, the story starts in 1979, after the Clash came off the first American tour. They had split with manager Bernie Rhodes and in so doing, had lost their rehearsal space. Eventually, they found a converted rubber factory / car repair shop that was now called Vanilla Studios.
“It was like a drive-in garage-type pace,” Paul Simonon said. “There were mechanics and parked cars and fumes.”
The band worked on new material through May and June of that year, putting together tracks for the album that would be
London Calling. The plan in Joe Strummer’s mind being, “Suppose a group came along and decided to make a 16-track LP on two Teacs, which drastically diminishes the cost factor called ‘studio cost.’ Suppose you presented that tape to the record company and told ‘em that it took just a few quid to make – you can still get a fucking LP for two or three quid.”
These rehearsal tapes, or “sketches,” as Mick Jones called them, included five previously unreleased Clash songs: “Heart and Mind,” “Where You Gonna Go (Soweto),” “Lonesome Me,” the instrumental “Walking the Slidewalk,” and a Bob Dylan cover, “The Man in Me.” In addition to four of the five of these, I’ve also tossed in the version of “London Calling” that Joe alludes to in
The Clash on Broadway box set – here London calls to “the fools and the clowns” and “the Mods on the run.”
The closing paragraphs of the
Vanilla Tapes’ story notes what has become of Vanilla Studios. In the early 1990’s, the site was redeveloped and a church building placed there. The London Diocesan House now stands on the site where Joe Strummer sang the words “I believe in this and it’s been tested by research / He who fucks nuns will later join the church.”
It feels good to be back!
Lonesome Me.mp3 Walking the Slidewalk.mp3 Where You Gonna Go (Soweto).mp3 The Man in Me.mp3 London Calling.mp3Labels: punk, the Clash
I picked this particular performance from the Clash because of its date. I was looking for an NYE performance and this December 27 show is the closest I could find. It’s actually from the 1979 Concerts for the People of Kampuchea benefit show. The Clash appeared along with Ian Dury and Matumbi on the second night. There is an official album from the four-day event, but only one Clash song, “Armagideon Time,” made its way onto that release. For the sake of my sanity, I’m not gonna post that here (although savvy readers may find a “bonus” track in the RapidShare DL). 
