by Mick O'Shea
Bernard had apparently intended on making a speech to the gathering, but on realising he wasn't going to be allowed a platform he instead settled for giving Mick and Joe a personal reading and dragged them both off into a corner. His one-time charges, however, were no longer interested in what he had to say.
While telling Chris Salewitz (who had contributed to the Bob Gruen book) that he and Joe had told Bernard to 'go away', Mick mentioned being asked to sign a fan's book and spotting the inscription 'I started it all'*, after which Bernard had appended his signature.
Mick also chose the occasion to enquire what had become of the new songs he'd co-written with Joe for the Mescaleros' recently released follow-up album, Global A Go-Go. 'No, they weren't for that,' Joe had playfully corrected him. 'They are [for] the next Clash album.'
It wasn't until he appeared on BBC 6Music alongside Paul and Topper in October 2013 that Mick finally expanded on the story surrounding the songs he and Joe had collaborated on for The Mescaleros. 'We did write some more songs together and he was going to do them with the Mescaleros,' he revealed. 'We wrote a batch – we didn't used to write one, we used to write a batch at a time – like gumbo. The idea was he was going to go into the studio with the Mescaleros during the day and then send them all home. I'd come in all night and we'd all work all night.'
In reference to Joe's comment about keeping the songs for a new Clash album, Mick said that the idea came to nothing because both he and Joe knew it wasn't going to work. 'Later on, a few months later we were at some opening or something (the Bob Gruen exhibition) and I said, "What happened to those songs?" If you didn't do them straight away and get them back straight away, it was like, "What's wrong with them?" So, I went, "What happened to the songs?" He went, "Oh man, they're the next Clash album."'
* * *
* I was the fan in question. The book wasn't Bob Gruen's hefty tome, but rather Pennie Smith's The Clash: Before and After, and the full quotation (which I had to scribble before handing the book to Bernard to sign) read: 'From the guy who started it all… but hasn't started yet.' (BACK)
– CHAPTER EIGHTEEN –
SOUND OF THE JOE
'There were a few moments at the time [when] I was up for the Hall of Fame reunion. Joe was up for it, Paul wasn't. And neither, probably, was Topper. It didn't look like a performance was going to happen anyway. I mean, you usually play at that ceremony when you get in. Joe had passed by that point, so we didn't.'
– Mick Jones
ALTHOUGH A NEW CLASH ALBUM was never likely to materialise, the possibility of a Clash reunion was back on the agenda in October 2002 following the announcement they were to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame the following March along with AC/DC, Elvis Costello and the Attractions, the Police, and the Righteous Brothers.
At the time of the announcement Mick was enjoying the plaudits for his production work on the Libertines' debut album, Up The Bracket, while Joe was gearing up for a Mescaleros' UK tour, which as to be followed by a two-week booking at Rockfield Studios in Monmouthshire where they were set to record their third album. However, as it was customary for those acts accepting the award to perform one of their best-known hits at the gala ceremony (held at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York), prior to going out on the road he and Mick got together over a liquid lunch to mull over the pros and cons of playing the ceremony.
This, of course, was far from the first time that the two had convened to chew the fat over getting The Clash back together, but it was the first occasion they'd done so without a cash incentive sullying the air. While they both recognised the annual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremonies were little more than back-slapping corporate affairs, they knew it was still a great honour to be inducted because – as with the Ivor Novello Award the previous year – it was their peers that had voted them in. And if they didn't play, they faced the unpalatable prospect of having other people playing their songs whilst they sat and watched.
Topper's condition was undoubtedly a concern, but while Terry Chimes was also being inducted, Joe provided Topper with a twentyfour carat incentive by saying he wouldn't get up on stage unless it was with the classic Clash line-up.
Having said that, however, Paul was refusing to even consider the idea of playing the ceremony on account of the tickets costing a colossal $1,000 a head. In an attempt to cajole him into strapping on his Fender bass again, Joe – only half-jokingly – threatened to give the gig to Primal Scream's bassist, Mani. Paul's telling response was 'go ahead.'1
With the opening date of The Mescaleros' Bringing It All back Home Tour – a star-studded benefit for Diane Fossey's Gorillas' charity at the Royal Opera House on 10 November – occupying his thoughts, it's unlikely that Joe would have wanted to make any serious decision about The Clash playing the Hall of Fame date until he'd at least emerged from Rockfield Studios.
♪♪♪
Following on from the Royal Opera House bash The Mescaleros' tour took in dates in Edinburgh, Newcastle, and Blackpool, before returning to London for another benefit show – this one for striking workers of the Fire Brigades Union at the Acton Town Hall on Friday, 15 November.
Technically, the firemen were no longer on strike as the two-day action that had begun two days earlier had officially ended at 6 p.m., but with the FBU having failed to broker a new pay deal further strike action was inevitable. Joe had agreed to play the benefit back in September whilst The Mescaleros were in Japan, and although it was a noble gesture on his part, the show was set to be no different than any other date on the tour.
With the news of The Clash's impending induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame doing the rounds, the main topic of conversation in the bar leading up to showtime was whether The Clash would reform to play the ceremony. And rumours that Mick was coming along to see the show served to gave the proceedings an added air of excitement. It didn't take long for the five-hundred-or-so punters to discover that Mick was indeed in the house as Joe announced as much from the stage early into the set. Mick would subsequently admit that he'd almost been forced to cancel owing to a friend letting him down at the eleventh-hour, and that it was only because he was already suited and booted that he'd hailed a cab to the town hall.
Once the cheering had subsided Joe toasted Mick for his recently becoming a father again (Mick had named the new arrival Stella in honour of his beloved Nan). Having shouted out 'this one is going out to Stella,' Joe hit the opening chord to 'Rudie Can't Fail.'
As was Joe's custom, the Mescaleros' set was peppered with other notable Clash standards such as '(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais', 'Police And Thieves', 'Police On My Back', and 'I Fought The Law'. Those standing closest to Mick were no doubt amused to see him singing along to the songs he'd last played some nineteen years earlier at the Us Festival in San Bernardino, California. But no one expected to see him emerge from stage right clutching a guitar when The Mescaleros returned to the stage for the encore and Joe began strumming the opening chords to 'Bankrobber'.
A momentary hush filled the air as the audience tried to fathom whether what they were witnessing on stage had been pre-planned, but the reaction of Tymon Dogg and the rest of The Mescaleros as Mick – somewhat apprehensively, it has to be said – came across and plugged into Joe's amp told its own story. 'Alright, baby, play that guitar now – for the baby,' Joe teased; his voice brimming with undisguised merriment.
In that instant the years rolled away and at the song's finale a beaming Mick stepped up to the mic and dedicated the song to the Harlesden and Willesden Fire Companies. As Mick had had no preconceived idea of getting up on stage, he was in the dark as to what song was coming next. He didn't have to wait long, however, as Joe – having mischievously slotted 'White Riot' into the running order at the Royal Opera House – bellowed out 'In the key of A' before ploughing into the one song Mick had thought to never again play.
What had already proved an extraordinary evening was brought to a highly apt conclusion with 'London's B
urning'.
When reflecting on the events of that momentous night with Kris Needs in September 2004, Mick said: 'I just felt compelled to go up there. It was halfway or a third of the way through "Bankrobber". He [Joe] was just there playing and I ended up on stage with him, which I felt totally compelled to do. It wasn't planned in any way.'2
When Kris asked Mick what Joe's reaction had been on seeing him come out on stage, Mick responded: 'Joe was happily surprised. He shouted out when he saw me, "play guitar now!" just like that, and then the next number was… he wouldn't say what it was. He just said, "You know it". And he went into the A position, [but] he didn't let me know that we were playing ["White Riot"].
'It was great. He was being driven home and the guy who was driving him said, "Well, what did you think when Mick got up on stage?" and Joe went, "Bloody cheek!" But he was only joking.'3
Needless to say, Mick's joining Joe on stage and playing Clash songs together went viral on the internet, and not only did it further fuel the likelihood of The Clash reuniting for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony, but possibly also beyond that date?
Sadly, however, The Clash reunion would never come to pass owing to Joe suffering a (supposed) fatal heart attack at his home in Broomfield, Somerset, on Sunday, 22 December.
The subsequent autopsy would reveal that Joe had in fact died as a result of his being born with a congenital heart defect – a main artery that should have gone around his heart passed through it instead – which meant he could have been struck down at any time.
It seems Joe had collapsed whilst reading The Observer shortly after returning home from walking the dogs. Although the unfinished Mescaleros album* would have been at the forefront of his mind, Sony were rush-releasing a new compilation album* to coincide with The Clash's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame event and Joe – as indeed, had Mick, Paul, and Topper – had been asked to choose which tracks he wanted on the album.
Performing at the ceremony was also occupying his thoughts it seems because prior to going out on his walk, he'd faxed his song suggestions to Tricia Ronane, coupled with a postscript asking Paul to reconsider his stance.
By his own admission, Joe spent some considerable time wandering aimlessly within 'the wilderness' as he described his ailing career between his calling time on The Clash and his return to form with the Mescaleros, but judging from the media's response – with many newspapers running two-page obituaries – it was obvious that he was still held in great esteem.
Fans the world over were left to reflect on their own personal memories of Joe either with The Clash, The Mescaleros, or one of his solo shows in-between, and raised a glass to the man who had been the voice of a generation. First and foremost, however, Joe was a family man, and his wife, Lucinda, daughters, Jazz Domino and Lola Maybelline, (and step-daughter, Eliza), were left mourning a husband and father.
Mick was one of the first to hear of Joe's death, and found it all the more bewildering as he'd spent an enjoyable evening with Joe at the Groucho Club in Soho just two days earlier. 'A friend of Lucinda's called in the afternoon,' he told Kris Needs. 'I didn't know this person at the time. I didn't know if it was completely true, but then I found out it was. It was quite soon after… It must have been a couple of hours or so. It was a terrible shock.'4
Managing to regain some of his composure Mick called Paul and Topper to give them the tragic news. As it so happened, Topper was playing his first gig in years with a Dover-based blues outfit at a local pub, and though he'd seen the messages from Mick saying to phone him urgently he was understandably nervous about performing in public again and decided to leave off finding what the problem was until after the gig.
Johnny Green, who was with Topper that night in a show of moral support, said that Topper hurled his phone across the room before crumpling to the floor when Mick told him Joe was dead.5
It's unlikely that Mick got much sleep that night, but the following morning he dutifully drove down to Ivy Cottage to do whatever he could to help Lucinda. 'I went down there the next day in the morning, because all the people would be calling,' he explained. 'I would know all the people from the Clash part of Joe's life so I went to help with all the calls, which was massive.'6
As the public tributes began pouring in from across the globe Mick issued a simple, yet heartfelt statement: 'Our friend and compadre is gone. God bless you, Joe.' He also paid tribute to Joe in song by releasing an already written tune online called 'Sound Of The Joe'.
Christmas was just two days away and although Mick had a family of his own he would be a near-constant presence at Ivy Cottage dealing with the press and helping out with the funeral arrangements. He and Joe had long since settled their differences, but had Joe died during their estrangement Mick would surely have acted no differently. Though it was probably of little consolation at the time, he could at least be thankful that they got to share a stage together one last time.
♪♪♪
Tony James revealed on www.carbonsilicon.com that it was Mick's producing the hedonistic, indie-rocking Libertines' debut album Up The Bracket during the summer of 2002 that proved the inspiration behind Carbon/Silicon. Having chosen to embrace the internet as the 'saviour of creativity, rather than its downfall', he and Mick had got together in the March to pick up where they'd left off in 1994 to see if they could 'find the drive and inspiration to create something new again.'
They'd penned a couple of new songs – 'M.P. Free' and 'Why Men Fight' – in the 'home' studio (built into Mick's lock-up on an industrial estate in Acton, west London) but were still 'enjoying the magic [of] writing and recording together,' rather than thinking about putting a group together. However, after seeing how Carl Barât and Pete Doherty had bounced off each other in the studio they'd started to write and record with a set game plan in mind.
Despite the glaring similarity to what Mick had already achieved with Big Audio Dynamite in combining rock samples and dance beats, Tony says the fruits of their latest labours sounded like 'nothing else around', and gave them 'a new musical palette to work from.'
Speaking on www.teletext.co.uk in 2007 at the time of the release of their first 'physical' album, The Last Post, Mick explained that his approach to songwriting hadn't changed all that much since he and Tony first collaborated together.
'One of the first lessons I learnt was to write about what affects you. We write about what it's like to be us now, our lives as fifty-yearolds. We make no apologies for that. It's what we did in the Clash. It's about trying to be good people. It's a very up, positive attitude. Music should rejuvenate the soul.'
As for the songs themselves, Mick admitted that if he was having trouble fitting a lyric to a melody he'd simply put it aside and go home and watch television. 'Songs come to me on the bus or walking; I walk all the time,' he said. 'As long as I don't hear anything else before I get home, this will be great. It's all a culmination. I know how to do this, and I feel better than ever.'7
By the following July, Mick and Tony had conjured up two six-track albums' worth of material from their musical palette – Sample This – Peace, and Dope Factory Boogie. While this might not appear all that noteworthy considering Mick's songwriting capabilities, it's worth remembering that he had to contend with the aftershocks from Joe's death during this time. Tony described new material as 'excitable, but unreleasable'; the latter (improvised) adjective no doubt alluding to the risk of certain copyright infringement laws that had come into force since BAD had first begun sampling for fun.
Undeterred, the duo continued through the winter months, the twinguitar-attack getting heavier as the project slowly took shape. After reading a magazine article by Susan Greenfield about how the future of human intelligence would be enhanced by use of silicon computer implants, they decided upon the name 'Carbon/Silicon as 'it represents the sound of the band – Mick's "Soul" – Carbon combined with Tony's "Computers" – Silicon.'
They may not have set out to form a group, but it was the
next logical step if they were to progress. 'It was Mick's idea,' Tony revealed on carbonsilicon.info. 'He said, "I think we should get a bass player and drummer… and get a band. I thought, "Shit I'm sacked already!" And he said, "I'll teach you to play, you can have the [Les Paul] Junior again; learn some chords this time."
Having brought in their Mancunian pals Danny 'The Red' on drums and William Blake on bass to augment the Carbon/Silicon sound, March 2004 saw them take the all-important litmus test by performing a selection of songs in front of an eager assortment of friends and fellow musicians*.
Speaking about these 'illegal gigs' with The Guardian's Anna Chapman in December 2008, Mick said that with the studio being so small they'd had to put sofas in the corridor for their guests. 'The VIP lounge was upstairs, accessible to anyone who dared go up the ladder,' he chuckled. 'Jonathan Ross turned up and was impressed by my comic collection. Pete Doherty's been here, too, to watch us rehearse.'
As with The Clash's 'behind-closed-doors' showcase at Rehearsal Rehearsals back in August '76, Carbon/Silicon's low-key unveiling within the compact surroundings of their Acton lock-up proved a resounding success, and thus inspired, Mick and Tony decided it was time to take their show out onto the road. They were both accustomed to breaking down musical barriers, first of all with London SS, and later individually with BAD and Sigue Sigue Sputnik, but going out on tour with Carbon/Silicon was nevertheless a daunting prospect because at that juncture the group existed nowhere other than in cyberspace.