I Live By the River

Live Concert series Pt 5

The Clash as I knew them

It had to be in early 1984 when I saw The Clash for the first and only time. They had already split into Joe Strummer’s Clash (the band I saw) and Mick Jones’ Big Audio Dynamite by then, and in this in-between stage, the last record, Cut the Crap, was likely in the works. It might sound strange that a band as well known and controversial as The Clash (check out Rude Boy for some of that political controversy) would play a small hall in Knoxville, Tennessee, but it happened. I was there, much to my joy and to my shame.

The shame will come soon, but just for a minute, please share my joy, my glee, my absolute anticipatory ecstasy at the first mentioning of “The Only Band That Matters” playing only five minutes away from where I lived.

I didn’t know there was such a day until this morning, and since I have been wanting to write about this show for a few weeks, it felt right and serendipitous to do so today.

Tickets to the show came in at something like $12. The show was held at UT’s Alumni Gym, which might now sound like a right venue for the working class Clash ideological stance. This old brick building, where the men’s basketball team played until the mid-1960’s, could have been condemned. Maybe it was condemned, but not for another few months, until I also had the shot at seeing The B-52s there, and then Husker Du.

Of course, The Clash had hit big with Combat Rock’s “Rock the Casbah” and had even appeared on Saturday Night Live, performing “Should I Stay or Should I Go” and “Straight to Hell.” Strummer wore a form of Mohawk then, and middle/mainstream America surely wondered what alien life form had invaded supposedly satirical TV land. “Straight to Hell” will always be a favorite Clash tune for me, those “Amerasian kids” haunting my sleep.

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