AntiCurrent.com Archives Vol 13: Joe Strummer- The Permanent Record Outtakes

This is the thirteenth edition of the "AntiCurrent.com Archives", a collection of rare bootleg-albums I'm releasing through this blog. Click here to view all past AntiCurrent.com Archive Albums. If you'd like to hear more about this album, we cover it in the Slippin' Through The Tracks segment on Episode 12 of my podcast, The Soapbox Office.

Joe Strummer was many things: Rockstar. Punk Rock Warlord. Composer. Of the few films he wrote the music for, the one that has fallen through the cracks is to a movie titled Permanent Record. The reason for this is although he wrote thirteen tracks for the album, the powers that be largely hated his work and only released five of them on the official soundtrack.

When Paramount approached Joe to write the music to the movie, they screened the film privately for him at their lot. During the middle of the screening he reportedly broke down crying and immediately agreed to do it on the spot. They booked him time at The Baby O Recorders Studio and he went to work right away. Early on in the process, the studio expressed their displeasure with Strummer's work and started looking for other tracks to fill out the album. Strummer, though knocked back, continued on with the process and finished the whole of the thirteen songs intended for the movie (the film's star Keanu Reeves even guests as the rhythm guitarist for the theme song).

This being his first undertaking with a group of musicians since he left The Clash, he assembled a band to help him execute the undertaking and named them The Latino Rockabilly War. This group consisted of Zander Schloss, Joey Artuda, Willie MacNeil, and Jack Irons. This lineup changed slightly through the few years it existed, but these are the same musicians responsible for bringing about Joe's first solo album, Earthquake Weather.

The album is raw and feels as if most tracks were captured live in the studio during one solid take. Though the album as a whole does lull at times, one has to keep in mind that much of it was designed to be an accompanying score to a film. The one track that is the absolute stand-out from the rest of this undeniably has to be the super-catchy Trash City. The lyrical style of this song was a foreshadowing of what to come with his future band The Mescaleros while the backbeat of the song is reminiscent of his past work in The Clash.

If you dig this album, buy the soundtrack as it is a much higher audio quality than these outtakes. If you are looking for more rare Joe Strummer that is actually purchasable, I would suggest looking into his first Pub-Rock band The 101'ers as it's one of the biggest unheralded masterpieces of his career.

Download Zip File Here

The tracklist is:
1:  Trash City
2:  Louisiana Turnpike
3:  Search Party
4:  Baby The Trans
5:  Plymouth Roadrunner
6:  Nefertiti Rock
7:  Outta Space
8:  Theme From 'Permanent Record'
9:  Nothin' 'bout Nothin'
10: Detour
11: Japanese Cars
12: Nameless
13: Cholo Vest