Text by Lisle McKenty / FFanzeen fanzine, 1980
Introduction by Robert Barry Francos © FFanzeen blog, 2018
Images from the Internet
This review was originally printed in FFanzeen, issue #6,
dated Year-End 1980. It was written by Lisle McKenty. The article below was
based on seeing the Clash’s 1980 film Rude Boy.
In the very early 1980s, Lisle worked in the same office as me, and we
didn’t really know each other well, as she was the assistant to my boss, who
kept her apart from the staff. One day, at about three in the afternoon, I was
having my daily fix of wake-up tea, and Lisle walked by. Under her breath, she murmured,
“Boy was in a hallway drinking a glass of tea.” My ears immediately perked up.
I stated, “From the other end of the hallway a rhythm was generating.” She
whipped around, shocked that anyone knew the secret of Patti Smith, and we
became close friends for a few years after that. Our boss was not happy about
it.
As for the Clash themselves, my friend Nancy Neon and I had tickets in
1981 to see them play in Times Square at Bonds Casino, which is around the same
time period as meeting Lisle. Nancy found out that the Rockats were recording
their Live at the
Ritz album the same night. We both easily
agreed to scalp the tickets (at no profit as we were in a rush) in Front of
Bonds, and then we rushed down to the Ritz to see an amazing rockabilly set. –
RBF, 2018
Rude Boy comes under the heading, “A Michael White Presentation.” Michael White’s
London productions list includes Oh!
Calcutta!, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, The Rocky Horror Show,
A Chorus Line, and Annie… His previous films include Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Rocky
Horror Picture Show, and Jabberwocky.
Wild stuff. He’s big time.
David Mingay and Jack
Hazan directed and produced Rudy Boy.
You have to wonder about Jack Hazen. For an ex-cameraman, his shot sequencing
is that of a film illiterate. Of course, I don’t know a lot about English films;
I’m not what you would call a buff. David Mingay supposedly is. He studied English
literature at Cambridge, then spent a year doing Film and Drama at Bristol. He
also directed and edited a thirteen-part TV series, “Cinema: The Amazing Years
(1897-1916)” before starting Rude Boy.
Rude Boy is distributed by Atlantic Releasing Corporation. Shall I bring up a
fairly famous lyric-shall-we-call-it that says something about Atlantic?
As all the ads
promised, the Clash is “in” Rude Boy.
But how can you get guaranteed personality when you’re lost in the supermarket?
Rude Boy is not about the Clash. It’s
about Ray Gange [who also co-wrote the
film – RBF, 2018], who roadies (don’t get confused) for the Clash when he’s
not working in the Soho sex shop that passes for local color. There is also an obscure
subplot, but I’ll get to that later. Well, Ray’s in California now, by the way
of the money Hazan and Mingay paid him, and Freddy Laker. He has a Green Card,
a job as a construction worker, and an American wife. I hope he’s happy. At
least, I hope he doesn’t try any more flicks. Somebody please, I hope he doesn’t
start a band. Time to go back to anonymity [he
mostly DJs now, with a rare acting gig – RBF, 2018]. His best point might
be said to be that he is from Brixton. And he did seem to like the Clash, even
if his most memorable utterance was when he said to Joe Strummer, “Left-wing is
gonna fuck everybody up.”
Ray’s best scenes,
and the best in the movie, are the scenes of the Clash playing. No surprise if
you’ve ever seen the Clash (and so what if it was over the screen at The Ritz).
They’re electrifying. This dumb artsy flick doesn’t even begin to make sense
visually or literally. Then you read in the paper that twenty minutes of the original
film were cut (must have been the part that explained the subplot – I half-wondered
what was up with those pick-pocketing scenes and the subsequent arrest of that
Black guy).
Then again, maybe
Hazan and Mingay thought that playing the first eight bars of “Revolution Rock”
twenty times in less than two hours would drive an audience into an inspired
punk madness. Hazan and Mingay see punk
as a “phenomena of the working class consciousness” and a “fusion of New York
white punk and England’s polarized reggae, disco, and rock.” They don’t feel
it.
The Clash has been
there. They formed in 1976, when Joe Strummer (previously of the 101ers) joined
up with Mick Jones and Paul Simonon, under the management of Bernard Rhodes, a
partner of Malcolm McLauren, who “discovered” the Sex Pistols. They toured as a support group to the Pistols
on their Anarchy Tour of England, before pulling out in a dispute over the use
of Swastika armbands. Topper Headon joined the band as drummer in 1978. The
Clash on Parole Tour (featured in Rude
Boy) shortly followed.
After their second
LP, Give ‘Em Enough Rope was
released, they split with Rhodes and announced self-government, with Caroline
Coon as a representative (she’s the pretty blonde who travels with Mick and
Paul on their pigeon-shooting charges in Rude
Boy [she also wrote the excellent book 1988: The New Wave Punk Rock
Explosion – RBF, 2018]). They toured
the US twice in 1979, completing London
Calling, and began a new formal management with Blackhill Enterprises.
Without a doubt, the
funniest line in Rude Boy is when
Strummer tells Gange that the Brigade
Rossi (the Red Brigade) is an Italian restaurant. Rude Boy did try to give an impression that the Clash are
revolutionaries. In the film, their performance at the Rock Against Racism concert
almost causes a riot (helped by Gange) and audience control is near disaster at
Glasgow when Strummer sings “White Man Looking for Fun.” Then there were Gange’s
political conversations with the band, but I’ve already given an example of
those.
It seems like a
million people have asked me if I think the Clash sold out with London Calling. To tell the truth, I’ve
wondered a bit myself when I saw the Clash up there on a wall, in-between Linda
Ronstadt and KISS, in a suburban record rip-off store. It was nice back in the
old days, having them to ourselves. But everything depends on what you mean by selling out.
Selling out usually
means trading musical and lyrical quality and morality for commercial success. London Calling is better produced than The Clash or Give ‘Em Enough Rope, let alone the singles (it took me weeks to understand
any lyrics on ”White Riot”). “Revolution Rock” is not “Clash City Rockers.” The
Clash have contained, purified and polished their riot on London Calling.
“Lost in the
Supermarket” is at once more subtle, more pointed, and funnier than “I’m So
Bored With the USA” (not that I don’t love “Bored…”). “Spanish Bombs” won’t get
airplay in Spain or in any other of what I call non-countries. If “Guns of
Brixton” doesn’t incite you, then nothing will. The Clash have retained and
strengthened their sense of “unreal politick” and their sense of humor. They
haven’t turned us off with any cloying songs, like “Alison” [a song of Elvis Costello I like – RBF,
2018], or distorted reggae to the extent of the Police. In London Calling, they haven’t traded a thing.
Just check out “Working for the Clampdown”: “Kick over the wall / Cause
governments to fall / How can you refuse it?... / To these days of evil
presidents / Working for the clampdown.”
Paul and Caroline |
So if they aren’t a
sellout crew (and they’re not), why did the Clash participate in Rude Boy? By the time of Clash on Parole,
they were packing houses all over England, and their first LP had appeared a
year earlier in 1977. Well, until recently, the Clash was denied airplay on both
the BBC and Capitol Radio networks (maybe it was just Mick’s affiliation with
the Shepherds Bush anarchists?).
As far as I know,
they have been continually in debt to their record company, CBS (Epic’s just a
trademark). I don’t know if Mingay and Hazan first approached Ray Gange, or the
Clash, to make the film, but I’ve got a horrible feeling it was Gange.
In any case, these people
wanted to make a “serious film” about punk rock and the working-class
consciousness. A band’s a band and a gig’s a gig; the Clash needed the PR, the
money, and they wanted the platform. And as far as a sell-out goes, didn’t I
use the term “commercial success”?
Rude Boy was made two years ago. Obviously, Mick and Paul and Joe and Topper were
a lot less sophisticated than they are now. In my mind, hell, they were damned naïve.
Maybe I can blame it on Caroline Coon (or was it Rhodes?). Rude Boy is a terrible flick, excluding the music scenes (“I Fought
the Law” was especially great), made by terrible people, in my book.
To bring in the
inevitable Beatles comparison (are you ready?), it’s like when Brian Epstein
stuck them in suits, albeit without collars. I don’t feel bad panning Rude Boy, and I’m a Clash fanatic. If
you like the Clash, then you’re like me – you’ll go see it anyway. If not,
maybe you should listen to “Jimmy Jazz” or “The Right Profile” for a while.
To conclude: I often
wear a tee-shirt proclaiming “The Clash: The only band that matters.” I’ve seen
lots of others around on various other bodies. According to the rumor, the
Clash now wants to make their own film. A terrific idea [didn’t happen – RBF, 2018]. Hopefully, next time they’ll make a
worthy one – humor, politics, emotion, a riot – one that matters.
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