him beforehand through John Beverley,
who I played in the Flowers of Romance
with, and who as Sid Vicious went on to
join John’s band. So we were both sitting
on our own, and I thought, fuck it, I’ll
go and talk to him because he looked
so fucking pissed off. We both hated
our respective bands. I knew I definitely
wanted to leave The Clash and John
and I had already spoken about getting
together if we did. But I don’t think he
believed I would actually leave them. At
that point the Pistols had a naiveté about
them, which was something purposely
put together by Malcolm and Bernard
Rhodes, the idea of putting flash guitars
in the hands of burglars. The raw energy
of it all inspired me.’
Chimes’ days with this first line-up of
The Clash were also numbered.
As Levene noted, much of this
manoeuvring was down to manager
Bernie Rhodes. Like the Pistols’ manager,
Malcolm McLaren, Rhodes was an ideas-
man, an agitator inspired by anarchism,
situationism, and the student-led Paris
uprising of the sixties. Opinionated and
galvanising, Rhodes was a radical, intent
on applying his ideas to the rock ’n’ roll
format, and it worked. During an early
TV interview, Strummer directed the
camera to Rhodes sleeping nearby and
declared, ‘He invented punk’.
‘You have to understand that Bernie
Rhodes was integral to the birth of The
Clash,’ Simonon agreed, speaking over a
quarter of a century later. ‘After rehearsals
we’d sit down and ask each other what we
wanted out of it, and there’s that famous
line about Terry Chimes replying, “I
want a Lamborghini”, which was fine for
him. But, yeah, we cross-referenced with
each other and asked, “Where are
we going? What makes this band
different?” rather than, “Let’s all
get drunk, pull birds, and play
guitars”, and that’s it. We wanted
more depth, a more human
a ppr o a c h...’
As 1977 rolled in, The Clash
found themselves perfectly placed
and began to speak of a ‘year zero’
approach to music that wiped
the slate clean and only looked
to the future. The Sex Pistols
had already galvanised a new
movement that drew together art
students, small groups of alienated
middle-class kids from the suburbs,
and working-class kids from the
different neighbourhoods of London. The
Clash played with the Pistols as well as
such other new bands as The Damned
and the ace all-girl trio the Slits.
All the bands were united by a basic
grasp of their instruments and a disdain
for all that had gone before. ‘No Elvis,
Beatles, or Rolling Stones / In 1977’Strummer famously spat in the timely-
written 1977. As they played more shows,
the likes of NME, Melody Maker, and
Record Mirror filled more column incheswith talk of this new movement. Punk
passed into the parlance of young music
fans and the record companies began to
pay interest.
Along with the Pistols, The
Clash was certainly the most
tantalising prospect. Though
there was a certain raw shoddiness
to their early sound, a constant
dedication to their art – including,
at various times, living in the
sub-zero rehearsal space – honed
them into a tight band. The songs
also had a strong socio-political
conscience, born out of the left-
wing counter-culture, while their
paint-splattered, Pollock-inspired
clothes (created by Simonon)
offered a look that was hard-
edged, new, and a much-needed
antidote to their looser-looking
contemporaries, most of whom
were still dressing like it was the sixties.
To hammer the point home, they also
daubed slogans onto their instruments
and street-and-stage clothes (for they one'''Where are we going?
What makes this band
different?' rather than,
'Let's all get drunk,
pull birds, and play
guitars', and that's it.
We wanted more depth, a
more human approach...''Paul Simonon
Mick Jones (left) and Paul Simonon performing live at the Lochem Festival.