"The Future is Unwritten" - Rembembering Joe...

This past Tuesday would have been Joe Strummer’s 60th birthday had we not lost him like so many of our great voices. He was only 50 when he died and its hard to believe its already been ten years without him. In their prime the Clash were widely christened “The Only Band that Matters” and that sentiment has lost none of its truth in the passing years. With Paul bringing the style and swagger, Mick supplying consummate musicianship and Joe giving voice to the cause, the Clash succeeded in transcending the numerous labels heaped upon them in their all-too-brief existence. They were too big for punk and 2-tone’s limited scope but never lost sight of the values intrinsic to those worlds; infusing them into their later experimentation with rockabilly, rap, pop and the endless directions they pursued. They were punk with a soulful spirit; 2-tone with an incensed snarl; pop with an idealist’s manifesto. The intensity of their performances is legendary and has been described variously as a rallying discourse, a religious experience and a call to arms. It was the kind of intensity and urgency that can’t be controlled or sustained, always growing and looking for a release, and they would succumb to its pressure after ten short years, six albums and a vibrant flash of inspiration that we’re still only just learning to fully appreciate.

I was nine or ten the first time I heard Joe’s voice. I remember stumbling upon a cassette copy of Combat Rock somewhere around the house that must have belonged to my sister or one of her friends before she moved out. The only music I’d really been exposed to at this point were my parent’s old records; Steppenwolf, Janis, Elvis…not the worst but certainly not my own. I remember thinking the first time I heard “Know Your Rights” that it was unlike anything I’d ever heard before; it sounded angry and a little weird to my novice ears. There was a definite, desperate passion in the voice; he was pleading for me to listen, to act, to do….something, though I didn’t know what. I listened to the tape a few times and smiled whenever I heard “Rock the Casbah” or “Should I Stay or Should I Go” on the radio, thinking to myself “Hey, I know what this is”. After awhile my tastes changed; within a few years I was caught up in a whirlwind of De La Soul and Tribe Called Quest and The Clash had slipped away with my parent’s Buddy Holly and Creedence albums. I never saw the cassette after those first few months.

I didn't find the Clash again until I was sixteen. I was looking for new sounds and a brief flirtation with Nirvana and grunge provided a smooth transition into punk.  Whereas with my first experience I had jumped in at the end when the band was on the verge of collapse, this time I started in their frantic, idealistic youth. After hearing “Janie Jones” on a local AM punk radio show and being reminded of my first introduction a few years earlier I almost immediately ran out and picked up their 1977 self titled release . It was everything my angst-ridden teenage heart and soul yearned for; loud, confrontational, inspiring, alive. Songs like “White Riot”, “Hate and War” and “Career Opportunities” fueled my anger over social injustice and inequality and gave my teenage anger a cause to rail against and the words with which to do so. I spent the latter part of my teen years devouring Joe’s words; his thoughts and ideals about equality and justice. His belief that the poor and downtrodden masses were worth something; something more than their current lot anyway. That they deserved to be heard and the Clash could deliver this message to the world without compromising their integrity or losing sight of the message. I believed in the Clash and their message and still do to this day.

As my tastes evolved over time I was pleased to find that the Clash’s expansive catalogue kept pace. The two-tone beats of “Rudie Can’t Fail” and “Wrong ‘em Boyo” were there for my obsessive Specials phase while the haunting strums of “Straight to Hell” complimented my more melancholy tastes. I have sat and listened to "London Calling" until the days were indistinguishable and spread themselves leisurely across the span of a fortnight or more, and there have been near year-long stretches where I've not heard a word in Joe's voice, but have thought warmly of the words with the knowledge that they were intrinsically part of me. Other than the Cure no band has woven itself so completely into my fabric.

I remember the last and only time I saw Joe live; playing a small club in Phoenix with the Mescaleros. A weeknight concert and the general set-up of the club allowed me to push my way to only a few feet from the stage.Joe paced the spotlit stage; boxing our ears with his well honed  verbal assault that had lost none of it's frenetic energy after two decades of touring. I'd like to say I remember every song he played; every note and every word that transpired over those two hours, but in my excitement it passed before me in a glorious, hazy dream scape of sight and sound. When the encore came he spoke of Joey Ramone who had died less than a year earlier; about the importance of the Ramones to the Clash and every English band in the early punk years (and, in truth, to every rock band since as we are now realizing). He closed the night with a cover of Joey's classic "Blitzkrieg Bop"; and then the Blitzkrieg was over. I went home feeling like I'd cheated time somehow; that I'd been allowed a glimpse of some transitory yet timeless phenomenon, like the last bit of dream bleeding into the waking dawn. By the end of the year he was gone.

I'm older now; my hair isn't blue anymore and I packed my patch and button covered jacket away years ago. Most of all I'm not the angry, confrontational, punk I used to be. I know what I believe and try to live by those beliefs and let others do the same; but there are times when I feel the anger building just below the calm, responsible exterior; this twisting, clawing indignation building in the back of my throat at whatever social injustice has stirred me. I feel it and I know it's Joe reminding me to keep fighting the wrongs of the world; that there are some beliefs that must hold true and not be compromised. I don't know if its a code to live by, or whether it means he's my hero, but I like to think I'm a better man because I have that guiding voice. In the end Joe wouldn't have wanted to be thought of as a hero anyway; had that sort of status attracted him he could have achieved it by simply following in the footsteps of his father, a diplomat, or his mother, a nurse. Instead he chose a life where the music and the message were the weapons of change for a voiceless, downtrodden majority. In the end he is more than a hero; he is words and ideas that continue to inspire. With that in mind, I'll end with some of those words:

     “I'd like to say that people can change anything they want to; and that means everything in the world. Show me any country and there'll be people in it. And it's the people that make the country. People have got to stop pretending they're not on the world. People are running about following their little tracks. I am one of them. But we've all gotta stop just following our own little mouse trail. People can do anything; this is something that I'm beginning to learn. People are out there doing bad things to each other; it's because they've been dehumanized. It's time to take that humanity back into the centre of the ring and follow that for a time. Greed... it ain't going anywhere! They should have that on a big billboard across Times Square. Think on that. Without people you're nothing."

• Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten (2007)

I LoveHate you, New York...

Saturday the 18^th marks two years in New York for Jess and I; though often times the city still feels so completely alien and new. As is the case with any point on a map its life’s little, stolen moments of bliss that matter, not the few grandiose occasions that generally involve far more stress than enjoyment in the end. This is exponentially true in New York where realizing that you’re sitting in the sand at Rockaway Beach with the Ramones blaring in your ears renders all that day’s troubles to nothing more than vague background noise. Walking through winding streets in Greenwich Village; stumbling through the doors of a new found bar or restaurant that is this weeks “best food I’ve ever had in my life!”, these are moments of surreal perfection that only a handful of places in the world will ever be able to deliver.

Admittedly, however, there are also times when it seems like we’ve been here ages; too long to remember the hopes and dreams that brought us here and far past the point when the city’s sights are able to distract from the indelible struggle of life lived in subways and single room apartments with eight million other’s pushing against the same current as you. Your patience, once seemingly without limit, is spent by mid morning; the weather is perpetually too something not ideal, be it hot, cold, rainy, humid, snowy etc, etc. Your annoyance with yet another person begging for money on the A train when you’re just trying to get home from work is only compounded by your self-directed anger that you don’t care more about a fellow human’s misery when you know you should. You start questioning the kind of person you’ve become; what the grime and cynicism and intolerance of this city has turned you into. You wonder if leaving will bring you back to normal; a part of you is terrified it won’t.

I was talking with a friend and mentioned my love-hate of New York and she, a fellow transplant with a full two decades under her belt, said that feeling is the bond that unites most New Yorkers, especially those not born in the city. The discussion progressed until the realization hit us that living in New York is not un-like being in an abusive relationship. You’re initially attracted by the adventure and inherent coolness of it all; so hip, so cultured; full of parties and romance and knowledge. When you first start this relationship all you see is the excitement and adventure and you willfully ignore any incongruence. You fight for your new love; defend it against naysayers and question the mental faculties of any who would cast aspersions. When you start coming home in anger or tears; when you’re a little shorter with the people you encounter, you refuse to believe it could stem from your new surroundings. After awhile your calls to friends and family to remind them of how great it all is in New York morph into exasperated rants about being broke and the goddamned cold and the goddamned trains and how amenities used to be a pool, storage, weight room, fire place, patio and in apartment laundry and have somehow now been redefined as an elevator and an in building communal laundry, They tell you to just leave; you’re miserable. Deep down though, the thought terrifies you. You can’t leave; leaving means giving up and more than that you know, you absolutely KNOW that nowhere else could be as great as New York. Besides, it will get better, eventually.

I guess that little bit of hope is really the key to lasting in this city. I’ve known people who’ve come to New York on their parent’s dime and were back home within a couple months. Jess and I showed up two years ago homeless and jobless with four bags and two dogs; somehow we’re still here. For how much longer we’re not sure, but for now those few perfect moments are enough to nullify, or at least dampen the noise. The best example of this I can share occurred one Monday night this past summer. We had gone to a late movie at Lincoln Square on the upper west side and after the cinema spilled its crowds out into a perfect eighty degree city night we skipped the closest subway for one nearer the park. We walked through the night down the streets lined with stately, quiet mansions and museums; laughing and talking and feeling like the sleeping city was new and vibrant and at that moment belonged only to the lovers and dreamers awake enough to see its silent beauty. We got to the train and leaned against the pole as it ferried us and our fellow passengers swiftl and unnoticed beneath the streets and buildings that still echo the horns and voices of Harlem’s golden age. We’re talking, and laughing and just over Jess’ shoulder I can see the man laying down; sleeping; blissfully unaware of where the train would take him, as in truth we all were on some level. He twitched. He stirred. He shuffled in his haze. He snorted and rolled to his side and as he unzipped and began covering himself, the bench and the floor of the car in piss I gave Jess a calm and resolute look and stated “you need to follow me this way; NOW”. I pulled her toward the far end of the car, near the other passengers huddled close to the implied safety of the exit. Amidst the disgusted exultations of the passengers the man nearest me looked at Jess and I and spoke the timeless mantra which succeeds in excusing all the city’s transgressions to those willing to accept the truth of it’s simple reasoning; “Goddamn Man! Only in New York!!”

To infinity and beyond....

The Mars rover Curiosity is scheduled to touch down around 1:30am this evening and for fourteen minutes we won’t know if it ended in nothing more than a cloud of red dust and a tangle of twisted metal and wire. The unfortunate truth is that even if the rover sticks a landing so improbable that the entire scenario seems more based in science fiction than science fact, it will in all likelihood count for little in swaying the current opinion of space exploration; that we are better off worrying about the problems on earth than dreaming about the stars. The justifiable concern is that a disastrous landing would lead to complete disillusionment in the Mars program and a moratorium on our efforts to explore further; that the aspirations of the great, golden space age of the last century will finally be snuffed out entirely in our retreat from adversity. The truth is that space exploration compensates for the millions invested not in rocks or soil samples, but in increased knowledge and new technologies for all mankind; in inspiring us to work together to solve greater problems and in renewed hope and optimism for the human race. It forces us to embrace our future; to not wallow in our apathy or resign ourselves to the dystopian world that some would say is all but inevitable. It fosters the belief that one day all the sacrifices made and “wasted” efforts will lead to a discovery of such importance that it will unite us against our shared problems to benefit mankind as a whole. With that in mind I say good luck and safe landings with the hope that it marks a new age of exploration rather than signaling an end to an adventure that has barely begun.

Hiatus...

After a half a year of no posts I arrived at a conclusion; while I love fashion, I inherently dislike fashion blogs. Fashion will continue to be a frequent topic, however I've decided to broaden the scope a bit and include the many other thoughts, obsessions and peculiarities that run through my mind on a daily basis. With that in mind I've chosen a more appropriate title, Tommyrot, which better describes the future writings to be found here (i.e. nonsense). I'll try to keep posts more frequent, though I make no promises.

Cheers,
The Dandy Gent (Still)