We Are The Clash. Mark Andersen
metaphorically and literally.
The work could be horrific. Untold thousands had been lost in mining disasters and from diseases like black lung. This underlined the cost at which our world had been built, and who paid the price. As such, coal miners’ rights to better conditions and pay resonated across history—especially in British society.
Once British miners had built a strong union, their unique combination of moral claim and practical power gave them a status unmatched in the country’s workers’ movement. Given their historic role, the miners would tend to have public opinion on their side, and a direct way to inflict pain on the government by causing power cuts—unless proper preparations were made in advance.
By late 1983, Thatcher was keen to complete just this. According to Charles Moore’s authorized Thatcher biography, “Preparations for the inevitable confrontation continued. ‘The first priority,’ Mrs. Thatcher told the meeting, ‘should be to concentrate on measures which would bring benefit over the next year or so.’”
Aware of the growing tension, the miners took action. As Moore notes, “The first rumbles of confrontation were felt on 31 October 1983, when the NUM began an overtime ban in protest at the current pay offer and rumors of pit-closure plans. In a meeting of ministers two days later, which Mrs. Thatcher chaired, it was agreed that the danger of a strike was ‘likely to increase in the second half of 1984.’”
If anything, the NUM’s prohibition of overtime—which would effectively cut miners’ pay, but also slow government efforts to build up surplus coal stocks to guard against a strike—was late in coming. Although Moore reports, “Ministers assumed that the NUM would not be so foolish as to begin a strike in the spring just when demand for coal would fall,” this seems disingenuous, for the Tories would surely seek to provoke a strike at the most advantageous moment.
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As Thatcher baited her traps, The Clash seemed to have bounced back in record time. While a couple of cuts on the demo seemed hardly advanced from the rattletrap grit of the 1976 Clash—or even the 101ers—the tape as a whole suggested a promising new unit. Far from a narrow punk fundamentalism, the songs conveyed a stronger rock foundation while still leaving room for other flavors.
Strummer knew that, despite any loftier intent, The Clash would rise or fall on its power as a band. Interviewed at Lucky Eight after the demo’s completion, he seemed resurgent, offering paeans to rock’s power: “The real things came off the street, invented by lunatics, madmen, and individuals, they’re the ones that last. I’m talking about your actual rock and roll, rockabilly, even psychedelic insanity rock and punk rock—these things weren’t created by the industry. The industry was running after these things, going, ‘What is it? Where can I get some?’”
The singer sounded ebullient about the new lineup: “In this place, seven years ago, we decided we were going to be bigger than anybody else—but still keep our message. And, in a way, there was no way of avoiding those things that we fell into. So, it’s been good rebuilding The Clash here because we’ve really come full circle, starting out here and coming back here now.”
Strummer then turned philosophical: “You mentioned that it was ‘unfortunate’ that we had to go through these things but I think that is the wrong word. I think it was inevitable. You don’t get issued with a map about how to avoid these things. I think it’s a question of learning, of being burned by life and learning from it.”
Asked finally to share his greatest thrill about The Clash, the singer said: “I get a kick out of it when someone comes up to me and says, ‘Because of your group I went and retook those exams that I failed and passed them all!’ I get a kick of hearing how we influenced people’s lives. ‘Because of your group I am majoring in political science.’ I get a lot of stuff like that.”
This power was real, but the responsibility it entailed was immense. For now, Strummer laughed at the thought that this role might bring him unbearable pressure.
Pieces seemed to be falling into place. Not long after the demo’s completion, however, a wild card was introduced: Greg White, who was living in Finsbury Park, was suddenly drafted as the second guitarist in the new Clash.
This most likely began as an effort by Rhodes to reduce Strummer’s burden. Vinyl was startled but supportive: “I don’t remember exactly where it came from, but I’m thinking it came from Bernard. Joe would not play guitar as much onstage and we would get two guitar players.” And, Vinyl noted, “there were five in the original Clash lineup,” recalling the early guitarist Keith Levene.
Vinyl was surprised by this sudden turn, but it hit Sheppard much harder: “Was I happy? Of course not. One day it was just announced that another guitarist would be joining us. I had no say, and it was hard not to take it personally, even if it made some sense musically, and there had been five in the beginning.”
The move acknowledged another reality: Strummer was a spirited but rudimentary guitar player who, by his own admission, was able to “jam out a few chords but couldn’t do any fiddly bits.” In the heat of a performance, his playing could become even more hit-and-miss, as he lost himself in the moment, “looking for the ultimate wipe-out,” as he once described his attitude toward performing.
In 1982, Jones noted this challenge: “Joe stops playing the guitar a lot, and those are moments where the instrumentation could use a bit of embellishment, so me hands are going all the time.” Though Jones tried “to hold it all together,” he did so with only mixed success, as live tapes from that era sometimes showed.
Live performance is not entirely about hitting all the right notes. Nonetheless, there was wisdom in the idea that songs written for two guitars should be played by such. This interplay was part of the power generated “when two guitars clash” as Belfast’s Stiff Little Fingers put it in a tribute to the band.
This promised to be a boon to Strummer, who was now freed “to go loopy,” as he laughed later. The rub came in finding the right person for this job.
If Sheppard had been a somewhat known commodity, White was anything but. Later Sheppard would admit to uncertainty about whether White had ever played publicly before his gigs with The Clash. White actually had, but he acknowledged the largest pre-Clash crowd he had faced was perhaps less than two dozen. Even so, he had the skills and the looks—and a serious attitude. That’s likely what won him the job.
Feeling lost in a dead-end life, working at a warehouse, White was intrigued and annoyed in equal measure by a NME ad in that read, “Wild Guitarist Wanted.” He passed an initial telephone interview, and joined dozens of guitarists summoned to audition for an anonymous band.
Unlike Sheppard, White only had a vague notion of what band he might be joining. “They kept it very hidden,” he recalls. “I wasn’t totally sure, but there was a rumor that it was [The Clash]. Some people were saying it was Tenpole Tudor, and a few people were saying it was somebody else.”
Auditions took place on The Clash’s Camden Town stomping grounds, at the Electric Ballroom. There, White and the others cooled their heels until it was time to play with a prerecorded backing track. Strummer and Simonon were nowhere to be seen, leaving Rhodes and Vinyl to run the proceedings.
Bored by the process, White entertained himself with a few beers he had smuggled in. He took the stage angry and a bit drunk, swiftly breaking a string, but playing straight through what White later described as “a load-of-crap electronic rhythm-and-blues track,” then stalking off in a huff.
By musical standards, it was hardly a successful audition. But while White’s skills couldn’t match those of some of the other players, his aggro caught the attention of Rhodes and Vinyl, who tailed him outside to get contact information. Later Rhodes triumphantly told Strummer and Simonon, “We found a real street punk!”
The move was not entirely ludicrous, as White had been a fervent fan of the band and often in its audience. He no longer dressed “punk,” but that was easy to address. As White later laughed, “When I joined The Clash, I basically reverted to how I had looked a few years before, as a teenage punk!”