Direct from Julien Temple’s movie The Future is Unwritten a great bit from Joe Strummer (RIP 1952-2002)when he’s waxing philosophic, he says “without people, you are nothing”. What I think Joe was driving at is we live in a insulated society and we need to pay attention to those around us to make our and their lives richer. Still to this day with dominance of office culture in our social networks this fact is even more true. Your head is down trudging along to the next email. In a recent interview, with my now friend Jack Rabid (for a project I’m doing), who had the pleasure of buying Mr. Strummer a beer when he interviewed him for his magazine The Big Takeover. I saw this intensity for people in Jack’s eyes and in how hiss a passion for the people who make music, and in the things he said, and in particular when he recalled said interview. I won’t be the spoiler until it’s released on Create or Else just yet. but somehow the vibe was transferred to guys like Jack and between the sub-text and fascination with culture and class that The Clash and Joe cared about so much. The notion that you can affect the future even if it is one soul at time is pretty great. Here are few tracks that if anything will enrich your day but for a moment every time you listen to them or they randomly come up on your ipod. They do for me anyways. Enjoy.
So did Farrah Fawcett get trumped or what? When one large icon dies it’s always a good time to remember some of the others who were nothing but good souls. Joe Strummer (1952–2002) was always true to his roots and the origin of rockn’roll. Thus his 50’s look I would say. Part of legacy brings the Strummerville Foundation which strives to enable folks the opportunity to create music who may not have the chance.
“Love Kills” was the title track for Sid & Nancy movie soundtrack. Being as I totally missed 7″ Friday yesterday I’m giving you a 12″ LP on Sunday. Here’s the dub mix promo of said song which I found in the bins at the Princeton record exchange. If you want some nostalgia check out this Out of Control T-Shirt from the good folks at worn free. I have a red one and so should you if they are still available. They have some cool stuff.
It is very easy to put Joe Strummer up there in the top 10 most influential list of Rock History. Julian Temple’s movie The Future is Unwritten, really captures Strummer’s enigma and beginings from a hippy squater, to his punk, to world traveler. The one thing that lasted, besides the band is his Punk Icon status up there with the like of Che, the Man in Black, Elvis, John Lennon and dare i say Bono. Temple uses a campfire for all the people in his past to talk about him and people he influenced or knew (Flea, Johnny Depp), which was one of Strummer’s things near the end of his life where he was inspired to put the Mescaleros together and perform. Bono’s sentiment said it best “…there is no reason why The Clash are still not a band today, they were victims of some classic mistakes”, he and the Edge obviously learned. One of the reasons I love The Clash still today was completely illustrated in the movie in the way they completely embraced all kinds of music(disco, Rega, Rap, etc) and also how relevant his words are still today even with their mega hit that put them on the global map and ironically destroyed them in the end.
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