Rude Boy

Directed by Jack Hazan Staring The Clash and Ray Gange (Tigon)

RUDEBOY has been guaranteed patronage thanks to the histrionic copy of the Fleet Street cinema hacks, and the less chauvinistic but equally provocative advance comment in the music press has guaranteed it substantial interest among its own readers.

It seems probable that an impartial judgment will be deemed unlikely, irrelevant or unconvincing until some time in the indeterminate future when the fuss has died down. So it goes.

As one who enjoys both rock and film, though rarely in the same cocktail, Rude Boy is a shattering experience. Filmed between `77 and `79 by Jack Hazan and David Mingay (who had previously collaborated on the intriguing, if fey, A Bigger Splash) it traces the history of Ray Gange, ex-dole queue lout, ex-sexshop salesman, ex-Clash roadie, during the Clash tours within the period.

Only Gimme Shelter has previously attempted to show the other side of rock and its effect on a nation’s youth through documentary evidence. But that was contained within the events of the Altamont Festival and it depicted a British band in an American context Rude Boy utilises documentary footage intercut with the re-enactment of related sequences to trace the careers of a British boy, a British band and a British politician in Britain of the late `70s. While many of the specific problems are peculiar to this sceptred Isle, the implications of the film are universal.

At the socio-political level, it illustrates the confusion experienced by `disaffected youth’ in the face of an increasingly repressive climate. While Maggie Thatcher campaigns for political leadership on the platform of increased police power, young black pickpockets are monitored on video by sinister plain-clothes detectives. They are later busted in a series of raids that reek of Starsky And Hutch overkill.

Earlier, we see a series of confrontations between groups of NF and SWP supporters tenuously separated by a wave of blue uniforms. Ray, uneducated, naive and alone, is easy prey for the radicals, and thanks to the hero ethic which associates power with ambition and reward, and pacifism with cowardice, it’s hardly surprising he leans towards the Right. Vaguely aware that The Clash stand for something else, he eventually manages to join them on the road.

Closely interwoven with the events is another theme that increases in significance as the film progresses; artistic responsibility. Chosen not because they are the quote Greatest Rock And Roll Band In The World unquote, but because they were the most influential new wave group and are still maturing, The Clash reveal more about themselves and rock than any amount of objective reportage can do.

Mick Jones is the actor, playing his part to the hilt whether it’s on the steps of Clerkenwell Magistrates Court or in the studio laying down the vocal to `Stay Free’ in front of an idolising Ray. Topper and Paul are in many ways the most dangerous, being almost solely responsible for the glorification of a violent and maverick lifestyle; shooting pigeons or stealing from Caroline Coon’s handbag, they are the naughty boys of the group. But of all The Clash the single most crucial figure is Strummer. In repose, he has the rivetting presence of James Dean or the young Brando. On stage, he is the quintessential rock martyr, and frequently unable to control the forces he has summoned. His anger and despair at the audience and at himself are among the most vivid memories of the film.

The lurching, inarticulate figure of Ray is the focal point and, ironically, from start to finish he remains a speck in The Clash’s vision. And that is the inevitable tragedy. For while the film charts the growth of a movement through the eyes of a typical member, it also shows how far away the agents of that movement are from the individual problem. The Clash have never doubted the reason for their existence; Ray was never offered a reason for his.

As a testament to The Clash in performance it is magnificent and as a depiction of life in a rock band it provides some of the most honest moments you’re ever likely to see — ranging from the back stage boredom to subsistence-level sex, and curiously touching moments like Joe at the piano playing `Let The Go6d Times Roll’ as Ray careers drunkenly around the rehearsal room.

A sprawling, monstrous, necessary film, it ultimately shows The Clash in imminent danger of sacrificing their humanity for immortality. No wonder they don’t like it.

Neil Norman

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Rude Boy Film Advert
English Civil War
(12/28/78, London Lyceum)
White Man In Ham Palais
(7/4/78, Glasgow Apollo)
I'm So Bored With the USA
(7/4/78, Glasgow Apollo)
Janie Jones
(7/4/78, Glasgow Apollo)
White Riot
(7/4/78, Glasgow Apollo)
Complete Control
(7/27/78, London Music Machine)
Tommy Gun
(6/7/78, Dumfermline Kinema)
I Fought the Law
(12/28/78, London Lyceum)
Safe European Home
(7/27/78, London Music Machine)
What's My Name
(7/27/78, London Music Machine)
Police and Thieves
(7/12/78?, Birmingham Top Rank?)
London's Burning
(4/30/78 Victoria Park,
Hackney, London)
White Riot
(4/30/78 Victoria Park,
Hackney, London)
Piano Song (studio/film)
Garageland (studio/film)

I'm So Bored with the USA

A Riot of Our Own

Melody Maker

Sounds UK music paper

??? The Manticore Theatre, Fulham [Secret Gig]
in an interview in the NME 15 July 78, two xtra late dates were played, Rafters in Manchester and Fulham.

"Looking through your site yesterday i noticed a mention of a 'secret' gig somewhere, but no mention of the show at (I think) The Manticore Theatre in Fulham sometime in late 1978. It was the same night as a 'secret' show by Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers at the Marquee ( I went to The Clash, the girlfriend went to Tom Petty). This show was inevitably broken up by the police after 30/40 mins but no real problem"
Jun 28

Friars, Aylesbury
Jun 29 Queens Hall, Leeds
Jun 30 Top Rank, Sheffield
Jul 1 Granby Hall, Leicester
Poster Ticket De Montfort Hall was one of the best venues in Britain with amazing acoustics, easy to enter or leave and had a decent bar the whole length of one side. Granby Halls was a temporary tin hut of a cattle shed, decades passed its sell by date and acoustically hell on earth (but held 4,500) - Bob Geldolf once spent a whole concert apologising for playing there and the Boomtown Rats did two nights at De Montfort the next tour "rather than ever play Granby Halls ever again".

Coventry Specials - did not spot them then as what became one of my favourite bands of the next decade.
 
Suicide - loved by the older, art school types at the back (I went out and bought the album) but hated by the skinheads and younger fans at the front. Half the front were lighting boxes of matches and throwing them onto the stage to set fire to the band, fortunately(?) the other half were pissing into the plastic glasses and throwing them at the band thereby putting out the fires. Joe Strummer had to come on to ask the crowd to let them play as he wanted to see them.
 
Clash - the improved PA was lost on the appalling sound quality of the hall, at the front it was all fuzz and at the back as tinny as hell. Nigel
Jul 2 Apollo, Manchester
Jul 3 Rafters Club, Manchester
A Riot of Our Own mentions a gig at the Apollo going down well and Joe asked for another Manchester date on their day off. Green found a small venue but had difficulty putting up Pauls bomber plane backdrop. A Riot of Our Own pg 61.
Jul 4 Apollo, Glasgow, Scotland
Another extensively chronicled night in Johnny Greens book. The bouncers beating up the fans was re-enacted for the film Rude Boy. See A Riot of Our Own pg89+
Jul 5 Music Hall, Aberdeen, Scotland
See A Riot of Our Own pg89
Jul 6 Dunfermline Kinema, Scotland
Correct info from a late tour poster. Johnney Green also refers to this as a venue on p89. End of White Riot appeared on Scottish TV the day after...
Jul 7 Deeside Leisure Centre, Queensferry, Nr Chester
Resheduled from the 6th? An audience recording was made.

Alternatively... Just looking at your Clash tourography, pretty sure they never played Deeside Leisure Centre in July ‘78, I can remember it being advertised but they never actually played.
Jul 8 Sports Centre, Crawley
Johnny Green says he trapped Micks fingers here and that after a trip top the hospital they all headed for the next venue which was Southampton. A Riot of Our Own p96.

.. after the gig we started towards Three Bridges Rail station, we'd heard we could get a train back to London from there. After ten minutes walk we encountered a group of punks walking back towards Crawley; a large group of skinheads had collected at Three Bridges station waiting for *us*. We walked back with them and hung around near the gig - after awhile the sounds of trouble and sure enough the skins had gotten tired of waiting and were now back in Crawley causing problems. My mate and I managed to get to the venue where the crew were loading out. We expalined what was happening and asked them for a lift back to London [with Johnney Green & Co]; we were dropped off on Streatham High Rd and walked home to Balham." Steve

Confirm story re skinheads (from Croydon). Me and my friends ran across railway sidings at 3 Bridges to escape. Specilas were then known as the Coventry Specials. This is the gig where the skin jumped on stage and lamped Alan Vega from Suicide. Colin
Jul 9 Locarno, Bristol
another confirmed performance in A Riot of our Own and dated the 9th on tour posters and later prom adverts and dates given to music press. However Green states Southamton followed Crawley - he needs to check BMC a lot more often?!.

Bristol followed Crawley not Southampton. I have door stub.
Set list: Complete Control, T Gun, Cheapskates, Jail Guitar Doors, Drug Stabbing Times, Clash CR, Riot, Stay Free, Capital Radio, Police and Thieves segueing into Blitzkrieg Bop, English Civil War, Safe European, What's My Nmae, London Buring, Garageland encores Bored USA, Janine Jones, White Riot. Colin

check Swansea 16 May 1977 - punters comments
Jul 9 Southampton
Jul 10 Town Hall, Torquay
Jul 11 Top Rank, Cardiff, Wales
Jul 12 Top Rank, Birmingham
Suicide, Coventry Automatics (later Specials) and Spizz 77 were supporting.

Steve Jones came on for an encore of 'Pretty Vacant'
Jul 13 Liverpool Empire
Cancelled due to the venue getting cold feet. Reararranged from the Empite to Erics a week later. Also Bob Gruens book pg39
Jul 13 King Georges Hall, Blackburn
Blackburn was a late addition to the Tour. Liverpool was cancelled due to the venue getting cold feet. See below. Refered extensively (p84) to in A Riot of Our Own where Mick got busted by Blacburn CID for possession. The motel he refers to is the Moat House. This is the date bacause it gets a late mention in the NME of the previous week. Steve Jones came on for the encores though the noise and atmosphere was incredible. For the afternoon soundcheck the band performed Desmond Deckers 'The Israleites' (which was about 4.30 for statisticians).
Jul 14 Corn Exchange, Bury St Edmunds
a late addition to the tour and the last night according to johnny Greens A Riot of our Own pg99

I was just re-reading Johnny Green’s “Riot of our Own” and when I got to the bit about the Bury St Edmunds gig (July 14 1978) my mind wandered back almost 30 years, to when I was 16.

I had taken two extra things to Bury St Edmunds that day - a “White Man in Hammersmith Palais” single sleeve (to be autographed) and one of those piano-style tape recorders (for bootlegging purposes). Positioning myself at the front, right-hand side, I thought life would be easier if I just placed the tape recorder on the stage; that way I could forget about it and enjoy the band. Paul Simonon was over on that side & when he made his darting runs forward he kept kicking the tape-recorder. At first I thought it was accidental, but he kept on doing it. I could see he was getting annoyed, because he couldn’t manage to knock it off the stage. Whenever it went close to the edge I simply stopped bouncing around for a second and moved it back.

Half-way through the gig this typical Camden Town rockabilly type came over and grabbed the tape-recorder. I obviously looked crest-fallen.
“You can come and get it after the show,” he said, not at all unpleasantly. It was Johnny Green of course. But I was still a bit concerned that I would never see it again, and tape recorders (in those days) were expensive items.

After the encores I said to the people I had come with that I was going to try and get my belongings back. I think they wished me good luck. In those days I didn’t really drink, so my only courage was righteous indignation at the loss of my tape-recording equipment. I soon found the backstage area and also the Camden Town rockabilly. True to his word he gave me the tape recorder back, minus the tape. We chatted amiably about the possibility of recording the band live, the reprehensibility of amateur bootleggers and (his words, not mine) the fact that the Clash never really sounded as good as they should when these live recordings surfaced. And then he invited me in for a drink.

What a scene of utter debauchery ! Half pint cans of Heineken and bowls full of peanuts. Mick Jones sitting in a chair looking pleased with himself, Paul Simonon glowering away at nobody in particular (surely not me). I helped myself to a can of lager and some peanuts. Then Mr Rockabilly decided to introduce me to Mick Jones as the person who was trying to bootleg the show. Well, he couldn’t have been more good humoured about it.

“Who’s a naughty bootlegger then ?” he said. “Hold your hand out.”

I held my hand out. He tried to whack it, and I pulled it away just in time. Backstage with the Clash was just like being at school, but with free beer and peanuts. I was probably on my third can of Heineken, sitting on the floor, when somebody said,
“Hey, what are you doing here ?”

“Oh, it’s alright,” I said, “he said it was okay.”

By this time I considered the Camden Town rockabilly as my friend and passport to beer & nuts. He really was a good guy.
The Clash, now I know, had finished their tour. They were in no rush to do anything. They lingered around in the empty Corn Exchange chatting to the fans. They all signed the “White Man” sleeve, even Paul, bless him. And afterwards, if the Camden Town rockabilly’s account is true, the roadies got paid & had a whale of a time.

So, there does exist a tape of that Bury St Edmunds gig. It was confiscated by Johnny Green & was probably recorded over or thrown in a bin, or strewn around the streets of Bury St Edmunds by the road crew. Tim Joyce
Jul 15 Picketts Lock Sports Centre, Edmonton
gig cancelled due to local residents complaints. the Clash also banned from Newcastle.
Jul 21 Liverpool Eric's - Friday evening
They also played an extra show on Friday July 21st at Eric's in Liverpool with the Specials in support. This was in response to the cancellation of the Empire concert and the large demand.
Jul 22 Liverpool Eric's - matinee for under 16's
Jul 22 Liverpool Eric's - evening
the Liverpool show on the 13th - the Empire show was cancelled due to the venue getting cold feet.  They re-scheduled Liverpool to Saturday 22nd July and played two shows at Liverpool Eric's - an afternoon matinee show for under 16's and an evening one.  It was so fucking hot... Paul Simonon mentions the 'ceiling raining' at Eric's on page 39 of the Bob Gruen book - that was the time he meant. 
Jul 24 Music Machine, London
Jul 25 Music Machine, London
Jul 26 Music Machine, London
Jul 27 Music Machine, London