It’s been four years since the death of Clash singer, political activist, and film composer Joe Strummer.
I’m walking down to the Sixteenth Street Mall in Denver to busk in the style of the early 101ers (his first band) and Mescaleros. Anyone in the Denver area not terrified by the three or four feet of snow on the ground should come down there and check it out. Anybody else going to do anything to commemorate this great man?
Unless they died somehow heroically, I think its better to celebrate people on their anniversary of their birth.
And Mick is better anyway.
I commemorate the fact that he’s missed on his death day and try and do things to make certain he’s remembered. I went all over the city today, hair gelled up to look like Joe’s, hitching rides and riding the bus and walking through snow up to my knees with a guitar on my back, playing Clash and Mescaleros songs on streetcorners. I made about four-hundred dollars I’m donating to various revolutionary causes in places. I’ll celebrate his birthday, but I make certain he’s remembered today and that the messages he stood for don’t die with him.