Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years [Deluxe Boxset)

Product Information

This richly curated boxset was executive produced by Lucinda Tait (Strummer) and produced by David Zonshine and features exclusive new interviews with Joe’s friends, collaborators and Mescaleros band mates, plus never-before-seen handwritten notes, lyrics, and drawings by Joe taken from the Joe Strummer Archive. Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years arrives September 16, and will feature remastered editions of all three of the band’s studio albums, plus 15 rare and unreleased tracks spanning the first demos Strummer wrote for the group. Released in 1982, the now-classic album served as the final release from The Clash line-up featuring Strummer, Mick Jones, Paul Simonon and Topper Headon. The first six vinyl sides include the first two releases in double-album format with the third as a single LP. Like that record, Global A Go-Go feels less a collection of individual tracks than one overpowering whole.

Today Dark Horse Records releases ‘Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years’, the first-ever comprehensive collection highlighting Strummer’s work with his post-Clash band, The Mescaleros. Lucinda Tait will appear on a special ‘CFATR RESITANCE STREET RADIO SHOW’ dedicated to the ‘002’ release in October (Date to be announced) with Robin Banks, Dr Louise Raw and Richard David. Joe Strummer 002 serves as a loving tribute to Strummer’s final musical output, released in celebration of what would have been his 70th birthday year. The jamming and experimentation of the first two Mescaleros albums were fine-tuned into a concise record that sent Strummer off this mortal coil on a high note. Fantastic’ heralds Dark Horse Records’ upcoming release of Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years, the first-ever comprehensive collection highlighting Strummer’s work with his post-Clash band, The Mescaleros, arriving everywhere Friday, September 16 on 4 CD w/72-page book and 7 LP w/32-page book, special edition packaging and exclusive 12”x12” art print.

In a press release, she spoke of how work on the upcoming release had in fact begun with 2018 box set ‘Joe Strummer 001’, a 32-song collection from across Strummer’s storied career. The set also includes outtakes and the single “Ocean of Dreams,” which features Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones.

On side C of "Vibes Compass" I hear an ever so slight, and intermittent static on the right channel, particular the first tracks.Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years highlights this intense period of creativity from 1999-2002, collecting for the first time such extraordinary albums as Rock Art and the X-Ray Style (1999), Global A Go-Go (2001), and the posthumous Streetcore (2003), along with Vibes Compass, a brand-new compilation of 15 B-sides and rarities, including early demos of some of the first tracks Joe wrote for the Mescaleros such as ‘The Road To Rock ‘N’ Roll’, ‘X-Ray Style’, ‘Techno D-Day’, as well as the previously unreleased ‘Secret Agent Man’ and the original recordings from Joe’s last ever sessions, including outtakes of ‘Get Down Moses’, ‘Coma Girl’ and the song ‘Fantastic’. Joe Strummer 002 combines all three albums released by Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros between 1999 and 2003 and adds a fourth collection of mostly studio demos and outtakes named Vibes Compass. I hadn't listened to Global a go-go yet, and there it is, static on the right channel, side A, the first tracks.

The late frontman of The Clash, considered one of punk’s most influential figures, died of a heart attack at his Somerset home on December 22 2002. Joe Strummer 002: The Mescaleros Years collects together Rock Art and the X-Ray Style (1999), Global A Go-Go (2001), and the posthumous Streetcore (2003), along with Vibes Compass, a brand-new compilation of 15 B-sides and rarities, including early demos of some of the first tracks Joe wrote for the Mescaleros such as ‘The Road To Rock ‘N’ Roll’, ‘X-Ray Style’, ‘Techno D-Day’, as well as the previously unreleased ‘Secret Agent Man’ and the original recordings from Joe’s last ever sessions, including outtakes of ‘Get Down Moses’, ‘Coma Girl’ and the song ‘Fantastic’. Among the 15 tracks on the Vibes Compass collection of additional recordings, the earliest, “Time And The Tide” demonstrates how strongly the through-line runs from Strummer’s “lost” years.

Global a Go-Go begins with a jaunty little slapper named “Johnny Appleseed”, an ode to peacemakers: “If you’re after getting the honey, hey / Then you don’t go killing all the bees. The entire album is an hour and 12 minutes long, though the closing track “Minstrel Boy” occupies over 17 of those minutes. London Is Burning”, the original take of Streetcore’s “Burnin’ Streets” is a simpler, sweeter thing and shows how much a Clash sound was on Strummer’s mind.