Redemption Song: The Definitive Biography of Joe Strummer. Chris Salewicz

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СКАЧАТЬ Red Cow in Hammersmith. He officially left the group four days later, when Dan Kelleher – renamed ‘Desperate Dan’ – switched from guitar to bass. When I asked Boogie who Joe most related to in the group, he insisted that it was Mole. Such dispensing with people would become a characteristic of the behaviour of Joe Strummer – largely in his career, though also in personal relations. Soon would come the turn of the entire 101’ers to be so especially selected.

      Joe Strummer’s life wasn’t all one relentless slog keeping the 101’ers on course. He stayed in touch with his old close friend Paul Buck. ‘Once we had a wonderful Christmas,’ Paul told me. ‘He came down with Paloma over Christmas 1975. He wrote to me, “I’ve met this wonderful Spanish girl and her mum’s coming over for Christmas. Can you tell me of a decent B&B, somewhere around the farm, and we’ll come down there, because it’s nice countryside, and maybe we can meet up for a beer or something.” I said, “Don’t worry about the B&B: just come and stay here.” He turned up, there was him, Paloma, the drummer Richard Dudanski, his girlfriend Esperanza, their mother and some guy called Julio who didn’t speak any English. The whole bunch took over the house. Paloma and her mum were cooking Christmas dinner in the kitchen. My dad came back from the pub completely bemused. I’d forgotten to mention to him that they were coming.’

      Joe took other holidays with Paul Buck; together they went to the Norfolk Broads for a few days. On another occasion they hitch-hiked down to Bexhill-on-Sea, where, for the purposes of this trip, the young man originally known as John Mellor was again calling himself ‘Rooney’. ‘It was so cold that we lit a fire on the concrete on the seafront. We were nice and warm and then the bloody thing exploded, because the trapped air got so hot that the fire exploded and threw us over a wall.’

      Without Joe being aware of it, though, things were moving around him. ‘We used to go and see the 101’ers a lot,’ Mick Jones said. ‘He was out doing it, and we looked up to that. We never thought we could approach him. We’d looked around and we’d seen every band going, because we needed a singer. But there was a guy there who we knew we wanted more than anyone else. Bernie said, “Let’s ask him.” But we didn’t do it yet.’

      While playing at the Elgin in November 1975, the group were approached by Vic Maile, who had produced the first Dr Feelgood album, Down by the Jetty. Maile told the 101’ers he wanted to record them, with an eye to striking a production deal through selling the tapes to a record company. On 28 November the 101’ers drove up with their equipment to Jackson’s Studios in Rickmansworth on the fringe of north London, where Maile – an ex-BBC sound engineer who worked at the studio – recorded six of their songs: ‘Motor Boys Motor’, ‘Silent Telephone’, ‘Letsagetabitarockin’ ’, ‘Hideaway’, ‘Sweety of the St Moritz’ and ‘Steamgauge 99’. The 101’ers claim not to have enjoyed the experience: they didn’t take to Maile’s martinet-like approach to recording. He didn’t get them a deal.

      But others were also interested, among them Ted Carroll, who with his partner Roger Armstrong ran a pair of vintage record stalls called Rock On, one in Soho Market, the other in Golborne Road, at the top of Portobello Road, often frequented by Joe Strummer, as well as Paul Simonon. Carroll had decided to start his own independent record label, Chiswick Records. Joe said: ‘When Ted Carroll came to me after a gig at some university and said, “Hey, do you want to make a record then?” it was so far from my mind that anyone could make records who were in our world that I remember looking at him as though I was observing a lunatic, let out from a loony-bin for a day-out trip. I said, “What?” And he said, “Do you want to make a record?” I just couldn’t believe my ears – it was that far away. You know, we were under the sub-sub-sub-level of the subunderground level. It just baffled my head when he said that. I couldn’t believe it.’

      But Ted Carroll was completely serious. Two weeks later, on 4 March, the 101’ers were at Pathway Studios in Canonbury, with Roger Armstrong producing. They recorded a trio of songs, ‘Surf City’, ‘Sweet Revenge’ and ‘Keys to Your Heart’. Six days later Joe Strummer, ‘Evil C’ Timperley, Desperate Dan Kelleher and Richard ‘Snakehips’ Dudanski returned to Pathway, where they re-recorded ‘Surf City’ and ‘Sweet Revenge’, and added a version of ‘Rabies (From the Dogs of Love)’. Two weeks later, on 24 and 25 March, ‘Keys to Your Heart’ was mixed and completed.

      Under the auspices of Boogie, the 101’ers were in a different studio only three days later, on 28 March. Half a dozen 101’ers’ originals were recorded at the BBC studios in Maida Vale, where live performances were recorded for broadcast. It was not a successful session: ‘Joe didn’t really click with studios at that stage, with the repetitious listening to the stuff that had been recorded, and the laying down of vocals, and the post-production.’ The songs put on tape included another version of ‘Keys to Your Heart’, ‘5 Star Rock and Roll Petrol’ and ‘Surf City’.

      Perhaps Joe found the recording experience difficult because he needed the energy of a live performance to overcome his musical limitations, rather than resorting to drugs as did so many of his contemporaries. He and his cohorts were almost entirely outside the grasp of amphetamine sulphate, then widely used on the rock’n’roll circuit. As Joe Strummer told Paolo Hewitt, it was absurd to claim the 101’ers’ shows were the product of this cheap speed: ‘Used to annoy me. At the Western Counties one night we played this really great set, really firing on all cylinders. Then we went out into the bar to have a drink and this bloke goes nudgingly, “Not bad that.” And he’s winking and nudging me and I was going, “What’s the matter with the geezer?” And he says, “How many lines did you snort before that set then?” And we weren’t into speed. We couldn’t afford speed. We couldn’t afford a drink.’

      Something needed to change. Gigging on the pub circuit was draining, and Joe grew frustrated. ‘It was just a slog,’ said Joe. ‘It seemed after doing eighteen months of that we were just invisible. I started to lose my mind. I would go around the squat saying, “We’re invisible, we should change our name to the Invisibles.” You’d get back to London about 5 a.m., unload the gear, put on a kettle and go, “What the fuck’s that about?” And in the paper it’d be like Queen and all that. We were just shambling from one gig to the next banging our heads against the wall.’

      At least the 101’ers had spent five days of March in recording studios, and they had a full date-sheet of forthcoming gigs. On Friday 2 April 1976, accompanied by Tymon Dogg, the 101’ers played a ‘Benefit Dance’, at fifty pence a ticket, for That Tea Room at Acklam Hall in Notting Hill, beneath the Westway. The mildly psychedelic poster – all blues, greens, and oranges – sets the tone:

       Starring That Tea Room Food

       Eaten by

       101’ers Tymon Dogg

       Louis The Jeep (Late Bar Toilets)

       Co-starring Clowns Fire-eaters Idiots MC Philipe 4-speed

       record-player

       Dog-fighters bullitt and trouble

       The Dancing Pirana Sisters featuring Pirana Custard and

       Romero – solo – Dave The VD

       The Beatles. Rob on insults. Bouncers Dylan and Wiggin

       Foote and Boogie

       + Largest Flapjack in the World + a Nigel

       The Miserable СКАЧАТЬ