Twenty years ago, on December 22, 2002, one of the great voices of English rock, Joe Strummer, passed away. Composer, guitarist, vocalist and founding member of The Clash, Strummer would be 70 years old today, immersed with us in a troubled time when far-right discourse is getting louder and louder in the United States, Europe and here. . We miss the voice of this militant artist, who spent his life fighting against racism and fascism. Released this fall, a box bringing together his work with the group The Mescaleros reminds us of the committed word of the musician.
The last song of Between Evilsthe very first album by Montreal singer-songwriter Paul Cargnello, released in 2003, is entitled Strummer. “The announcement of his death shocked me,” says Cargnello, who has never hidden the influence that the Brit has had on his own musical journey. “It shocked me, because I felt like I would grow old with him. At that time, I had played in the first part of Billy Bragg”, brother of struggles of Strummer who, like him, was firmly committed to the left.
“I thought to myself: Bragg still gives concerts, so it was possible that one day I would meet Strummer,” continues Cargnello, whose most recent album, Lees, was released in November 2021. He never met him, but saw him a few times in concert, including the memorable one given at the Spectrum on October 13, 2001 — Strummer’s first visit to Montreal since the last concert of The Clash at the Forum, in 1984. He also served us some songs from his former group, to the delight of the fans. “We all had our ‘anti-fascist’ pins on our jackets; the entire Montreal activist scene, all those who shared the same progressive values were there. I felt at home in a Joe Strummer concert. »
The musician was found dead at home, struck down by a heart attack, on December 22. “He was the passionate, intelligent voice of punk,” the BBC journalist said in his report aired the evening of his death. Recognized for his ten years (from 1976 to 1986) at the head of the punk group The Clash, Joe Strummer led his career without compromise, addressing in his work such urgent themes as economic, racial, social, police violence, denouncing politics and the military, getting involved in Great Britain with the Anti-Nazi League and the Rock Against Racism movement.
“At the time, in the 1980s, Strummer was reacting to the policies of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan,” recalls Paul Cargnello, citing rants like straight to hella song about immigration and refugees, taken from Fight Rock (1982). “What fascinated him was revolutionary music,” insists Cargnello again, emphasizing the link that Strummer made between rock and reggae, one of the musical characteristics of The Clash which, on its first album released in 1977, took up Police & Thievessuccess of the Jamaicans Junior Murvin and Lee Perry.
Life after The Clash
The safe Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years represents the best of the post-The Clash career of the musician who, before founding the group The Mescaleros, had composed film music, collaborated with The Pogues and found his old accomplice Mick Jones, guitarist of The Clash, with his project Big Audio Dynamite. However, we will have to wait for the release of the first album with the Mescaleros, Rock Art and the X-Ray Style (1999), to find Joe Strummer at the top of his game.
“This first album overwhelmed me,” says Paul Cargnello. You see, I’m also a big John Lennon fan; I like the Beatles, but I prefer the solo career of Lennon, and for Strummer, it’s the same. In his solo work, he found maturity. His texts, his pen, were in my opinion superior to The Clash era. We still found the punk rock side there, but it is his love of music from elsewhere, from the Caribbean, Africa and Latin America that is expressed. »
Musically, this first album like the next two — Global a Go-Go (2001) and Streetcoreposthumous album released in 2003 on which we hear his poignant reinterpretation of Redemption Song by Bob Marley — less emphasis on electric guitars than in the days of The Clash. The folk guitar prevails, as well as the studio effects coming to enhance the intoxicating flavors of Jamaican dub. Strummer even ventures on the electronic side, on a song like Techno D-Day — the new box set reveals a demo version of it, included on a compilation of fifteen studio outtakes, obscure or totally unreleased recordings.
A striking detail when listening to these three albums again: Joe Strummer, what a pen he had! With the Mescaleros, the storyteller in him reveals himself, drawing inspiration from life and everyday life to weave pearls of songs that contrast with his many positions.
“My favorite Joe Strummer song of any era is Get Down Moses [de Streetcore], confides Cargnello. He discusses racism in the United States through biblical references and LSD. I’m so fascinated by these songwriters able to evoke several things in a single song. And his poetry, his pen… magnificent. We rarely talk about Joe Strummer comparing him to a Bob Dylan, and yet he was also a great writer “who would have so much to say about the state of the world in 2022…