Their still clash city rocking!

It was Mick jones who said in 1978 "whoever said that punk is dead is a cunt", (punk geeks rush for your crass lp's now for the actual quote.) and it's still alive and kicking judging by the way the bands ex members have been caught acting, firstly, poor old mr jones got caught on camera with a rolled up banknote hanging out of his nose along with kate moss (to be more precise she was sitting near him, and not actually hanging out of his other nostril) while trying to do some producing for 'totalshambles' pete doherty's band.
This situation, and the stress of managing everybodies favourite (sad) sid vicious clone, has taken its toll on an undeserving poor old mr jones, so much so that poor old mick has been seen sitting in his local with his head buried in his hands looking like hes just been castrated with a blunt spoon while in front of him sits an overspilling ashtray and a pint which looked as if it was already well into the warming process.
not to be outdone, paul simonononon (crazy name, crazy guy!) (sorry, that was a terrible pun, awful, awful.), anyway, he has been seen of late in the tabloids sporting a fat swollen nose and one beauty of a shiner, which i can tell you with all authority has now all cleared up, i know coz i saw him on the 24th of december in notting hill gate(ooo!). it seems that paul had been thinking only from below the waist and had bedded his mates mrs, this led to a big 'bally hoo' that has put the hampsted pop set in a state of flux and crisis and has caused battle lines to be drawn forcing 'friends' to take sides against each other. this i would imagine, has been hardest to bear for poor old sadie frost, because even though she probally had her eye on him (she has had for everyone else she knows at one time or another, except her dad...i hope.) sadly she cant cross 'enemy' lines to see him and has to stay loyal to the 'side' of her whom he shagged.
for a bunch of serial bed hoppers it does seem like a storm in a teacup, i mean c'mon, slappers, the lot of them!
And finally, from beyond the musical graveyard comes joe strummer and his old pub rock band. the band, 'the 101ers' have now released their 3rd single (i only knew of the 'keys to your heart' one), the single, called 'letsgetabitarockin' or something like that, is a good'en, it sounds like the clash did in between their second and third lp's, even like an early version of a track like 'jail guitar doors', or (at a stretch) it could even be a track taken from the 'give em enough rope' lp or even the 'london calling' lp, a fine example of good pub rock when it is played at its best. if you can find it then buy it coz i seriously recomend it, its on the 'astralwerks' label, find it on www.astralwerks.com.
it is also telling regarding the clash's fucking great sound and one of the musical directions they drew their sound from (thats not forgetting mr jone's large 'big up' contribution to the bands music for a single moment of course, nor of course that of mr simonononon's either).
clash city rockers indeed.
p.s, that cut the crap lp they released, its not what the band sounded like live at that time. i remember the first time i saw the 'new' band play, although they played lots of 'oldies' they also played a lot of new songs, and ive got to say, they were good songs.
the new songs had a sound akin to that of 78/79/80. but without mick jones, to his credit, his imprint on the bands new songs was reflected in the material they had newly written.
those songs were standout songs the first time you heard them. i saw the band play those sons on a few occasions and looked forward to hearing them on vinyl, me and friends were convinced that the clash were back! how could they fail? with a great new line up, strong songwriting and a new set of songs that were the dogs bollocks. so it was with joy in my heart that i first put trembling hands to the turnteble with the newly released 'this is england' single, after two minutes of the song i felt like the bollocks had been cut off me using a rusty tin can lid.
what was i hearing? this wasnt the same as the song i had heard them play live, what had happened? i began to fear the worst when the 'cut the crap' lp got its release date, would it be like the single? i hoped to dear lord it wouldnt be. but alas it was not to be, this lp was as..... well, it sounded like the single. lots of people thought the same as me and this helped to end the band why? when the songs were played live they had promise, power, and tons of the 'clash attitude' that we had grown to love over the years. cut the crap shat on that promise joe strummer's almost prolapsed when he heard it, it wasnt the lp he had just recorded with the new band. so what happened? well it turns out that bernie rhodes had got hold of the master tapes and remixed the songs to his liking, sadly, the silly bastard had cloth ears and sitting in the mixing booth alone at night where he could work alone without anyone knowing he created a new 'modern promethius', a monster of his own hand, except that it had less use than an aswad gig at a u.s 'white power' weekend in the southern backwoods ("ah kno were kin mary-lou an all but will you marry me? then we can still be brother an sister too" "oh billy joe ah is jes so happy, i am gunna have me your baby in wedlock jes like mammy and daddy did") many theories have been put up to explain why the lp was like it was but i think the most plasuable is the "bitter bernie rhodes still smarting at getting the sack originally plus he wanted to outdo his great 'friend' and rival malcolm mclaren in an act of silly situationist, dadaist 'destroy of your idols' type bollocks. to ruin the band that had so easily taken the pistols 'crown' would be the ultimate situationist artistic statement, a legacy worhty of no less than 'king mob' the angry brigade and the events of paris 68. what a fucking prat, all he really wanted was to be a bloody star in his own right, i have no doubt his ego assured him the lp would be a hit, number one even, where is he now? where he belongs. but for at least for a short time there was a great new clash with great songs that were great to watch live. what ever the lp sounds like (i can honestly say that i havnt heard the lp sinse it first came out) i dont care because i will have good memories of good gigs with great songs played by a great band. oh, and fuck the critics and what they had to say, the petty tossers were only ever looking for the next fashion at the best of times .
"the clash are dead, long live the clash!" (fuck me, if that wasnt one serious arse licking session)