In The Clash’s 1978 anthem “White Man in Hammersmith Palais,” Strummer had written about other punk bands “turning rebellion into money.” If The Clash did break through, how could it evade that trap? Strummer wasn’t sure—but regarding Rhodes not only as a political catalyst but as a surrogate father, he trusted him to navigate the treacherous straits.
Jones was not as hopeful that Rhodes would bring commercial success, but he also was not as nervous about the idea of rock stardom. Indeed, he had groomed himself for just such a role, as a kid from a broken home, living with his grandmother in a tower block. Vinyl—who had been with Blackhill, but who continued on with The Clash after the return of Rhodes—explains, “Mick was one of those kids who locked himself in a room, listening to the Stones, Mott the Hoople, whomever, practicing his guitar, dreaming of living that rock star life.”
The Baker agrees: “Joe was from the squat scene, Woody Guthrie and all that, but Mick came from an old-school rock background, openly idolized bands like Mott the Hoople and the Stones.” When asked why “1977” declared, “No Elvis, Beatles, or Rolling Stones,” by a fanzine writer in October of that year, Jones grinned and replied, “Well, you gotta say all that stuff, ain’t ya?”
Both Vinyl and The Baker hasten to add that this did not mean Jones was not committed to the Clash political vision, only that his attitude toward the fruits of success was much less fraught than that of Strummer or Simonon. Such differences meant little when the band was an underground punk phenomenon, but would become a flash point as its popularity grew.
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As The Clash considered its next steps, Thatcher was recovering from a bruising year where her popularity had dropped to historic lows amid a deep recession. The contraction had been caused largely by her monetarist economic policies, bitter medicine intended to cure a rising cost of living.
Beyond inflation, Thatcher had ripped Labour for the high rate of unemployment. Yet joblessness had been rising ever since her election. It neared three million by 1981’s end. Her critics were hardly surprised when urban riots broke out in Brixton and other low-income areas. Yet Thatcher was undeterred, asserting, “The lady’s not for turning,” despite pressure from within her own Tory ranks.
The pain was immense and undeniable: over two million jobs were lost in 1979–81. Particularly hard-hit was British Steel, the government-owned enterprise headed by Thatcher-appointee Ian MacGregor. He had returned after decades of living in the US to serve in this moment of “creative destruction” with downsizing, privatization, and closures high on his agenda.
MacGregor had presided over similar wrenching cutbacks in places like Youngstown, Ohio. As factories were shuttered, only to reopen with cheaper labor overseas, this US region gained a new nickname: the Rust Belt.
Thatcher was determined to “privatize” industries such as steel that had been nationalized after World War II as part of building a socialist state that sought to protect citizens from the cradle to the grave. Seeing only inefficiency and waste in this method, Thatcher valued MacGregor’s hard-nosed approach to labor relations and improving profitability, and brought him on the team to do this specific job. But dismal poll numbers suggested that she risked being not only the least popular prime minister in UK history, but also a short-lived one.
Thatcher promised “a short, sharp shock” as her policies went into effect, with renewed growth and vitality to come. Many were not convinced.
As disaffection and upheaval in Great Britain were building, the Rhodes-led Clash had become the toast of New York City and Paris, turning residencies at the Bonds nightclub and Theatre Mogador into artistic and publicity triumphs. The Clash was especially captivated by New York, and had begun work on a new album.
Vinyl recalls the recording sessions themselves going smoothly—but not so the efforts at mixing or finalizing the record. Jones was even more dominant in the sessions than usual. He presented a finished double album tentatively called Rat Patrol from Fort Bragg that Strummer, Simonon, and Rhodes considered lightweight and too long. So producer Glyn Johns, renowned for work with the Who, the Stones, and other big names, was brought in on a rescue mission.
An impressed Johns later recalled to Tape Op magazine, “Joe let me rip it to pieces!” The result was a stripped-back single album that left Jones angry and aghast. Strummer was unapologetic: “I brought in Glyn Johns and I think . . . well, it isn’t all good but he shook some real rock and roll out of that record.”
If the musical disagreements were ominous, a more urgent crisis was the growing drug dependency of drummer Topper Headon. Drug addiction was a rock and roll cliché by now, and one The Clash had blasted with some regularity, despite the band’s obvious affection not only for alcohol but also marijuana—a predilection made public in a 1979 feature in pot bible High Times.
In that article, Strummer identified heroin as a bane to the counterculture, echoing the longstanding Yippie distinction between “life” drugs like pot and psychedelics and “death” drugs like speed, cocaine, and, above all, heroin. Clash antiheroin commentary dated back to “Deny” on the first album through “Hateful” on London Calling and “Junkie Slip” on Sandinista! as well as a new track, “Ghetto Defendant.” Yet Headon fell prey precisely to this drug.
On an early 1982 tour of the Far East, Strummer confronted Headon: “How can I be singing all these antidrug songs with you stoned out of your head behind me?” Headon was unmoved, and the issue remained unresolved after the band’s return, through the drama over the new album’s length and production.
Then on April 21, 1982—three weeks before the new record was to be released and only days before a UK tour was to commence—Strummer disappeared.
Much has been written about the time the singer was missing in action. The disappearance had its genesis in a stunt suggested by Rhodes, apparently worried about weak advance ticket sales on the UK tour. But it turned into a genuine reflection of Strummer’s desperation over pressures from the band’s growing popularity, the deepening tension with Jones, and Headon’s addiction.
Although Vinyl was able to locate Strummer in Paris after three weeks and convince him to return to do a lengthy US tour, the price was Headon’s ejection. Original Clash drummer Terry Chimes stepped in with five days’ notice before the two-month tour began on May 29, 1982, in New Jersey.
It was a challenging development, most of all for Headon, who felt betrayed and abandoned. Vinyl recalls, “Topper was the best drummer of his generation, but he had no interest in giving up drugs. We had no choice.” The Baker disputes this, but admits, “The band couldn’t just wait for Topper . . . things were moving so fast.”
Strummer would later bitterly regret his decision, and date the demise of The Clash to this moment. Yet it’s hard to see what else could have been done—not if the band intended to preserve its credibility.
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By the time this drama had played out within The Clash, the political ground had shifted—starting when Argentine military forces invaded and occupied the Falklands Islands on April 2, 1982. The Falklands were a somewhat embarrassing vestige of the faded British Empire. They were situated just off the coast of Argentina, which claimed them as “Las Malvinas.” While this Argentine assertion had history and geography on its side, the Falklands had been a British colony since 1841, and were largely populated by descendants of British settlers.
A series of errors had sparked the war. Budget cuts pushed by Thatcher led to British ships being removed from the South Atlantic, sending a signal that the Falklands were no longer a priority. Reagan emissary Vernon Walters subsequently assured the leadership of the Argentinian military dictatorship that in case of an invasion, “The British will huff, puff, protest, and do nothing.” And the Argentinian dictatorship apparently felt that reclaiming the Falklands/Malvinas would distract attention from economic troubles and political repression at home.
In the last instance, the junta was proved correct, at least at first. Argentinian