A Legendary Punk Singer Went Missing on This Day in 1982, Forcing His Band to Cancel Their Tour Before a Major Album Release
· Vice
In 1982, The Clash dropped one of their biggest albums, Combat Rock. The album’s release, however, was plagued with chaos. Right before, frontman Joe Strummer went missing for three weeks, forcing the band to cancel a major tour.
According to an editorial from Grantland, the band’s management reported that Strummer “disappeared.” He was eventually discovered to have been living on the streets of Paris. Turns out, the whole thing was a publicity stunt hatched by The Clash’s band manager, Bernie Rhodes. The story goes that Rhodes saw the band’s Scottish tour underselling, and he wanted to do something drastic to reinvigorate interest.
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The Clash released Combat Rock in May 1982
Originally, the plan was for Strummer to travel to Austin, Texas, in secret. There, he would stay with a friend, singer-songwriter Joe Ely. Strummer, however, did not follow the plan and instead headed to France, fully disappearing from the public, his band, and his managers.
While Strummer was gone, the rest of the band members started to grow tense and disillusioned. They began to fight, and it was possibly the beginning of the end for The Clash. As for the frontman, after being found, he claimed that he’s just been hiding out in the City of Light. He even claimed he ran the Paris Marathon during his time there.
The Clash released Combat Rock on May 14, 1982. The album was very well-received and featured two of the band’s biggest songs: “Rock the Casbah” and “Should I Stay or Should I Go”.
Not long after the album was released, the majority of the band’s members exited, leaving Strummer as the lone founding member. He brought in some new musicians and recorded one last Clash album, Cut the Crap. Afterward, Strummer ended the band.
Joe Strummer officially ended the Clash in 1986
In a previous interview, Strummer opened up about where he believes the band lost its way. From his perspective, things started going bad when they booted drummer Nicky “Topper” Headon in 1982. The skinsman’s substance abuse issues had reached a boiling point, and the band felt they had no option.
“Let me tell you, we were in [bassist Paul] Simenon’s basement flat, it was dark and raining outside,” Strummer recalled, per Louder. “We’d just came from an open-air festival in Holland and we told Topper he was falling apart and he had to go.”
Topper, understandably, did not handle the news well, and Strummer wishes he’d handled things differently. “The best times were when it was just me, Mick, Paul, and Topper,” he later admitted. “We didn’t have a manager, and we were putting triple albums out and getting no royalties. That was what it was all about, that was when it was a team.”
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