Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros
Global A Go-Go

There are records, or rather there is music that has no age. There are artists who have no age.

They had something to say and became protagonists. They stopped doing a certain "thing" and started with another... even getting the satisfaction of doing well in that other "thing" of theirs. There are people who come before the artists. And some people, as we know, never die.

About ten years after the breakup of the Clash, Joe Strummer, having found inspiration and new companions for adventures, returned to the scene with The Mescaleros. Thus Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros in 1999 released their first record "Rock Art and The X-Ray Style," which received good reviews and created renewed attention for an artist who was almost forgotten.

Two years later in 2001 "Global a Go-Go" was released. This album is perhaps the one that represents the artistic maturity of a person who has ignited spirits, influenced generations, and written countless rock pieces that still cause people to feel emotional today. Musically, "Global a Go-Go" is a mix of styles and influences, always dear to Strummer.

In this "bastard" musical album, Joe explores and reinterprets in his way and with great skill reggae, Celtic, Hindi, and Latin music. Musically, the atmosphere in this album makes one associate Joe Strummer with Manu Chao, but it differs from the latter for a definitively greater rock base, which results in excellent compositions with strong influences; alternating tribal percussion with electric riffs or seductive electronic inserts mingle with touching violin phrases. It is like imagining yourself with eyes closed in a market of an exotic, strange country, perhaps a fantasy country where you are sure you have recognized something but step by step, your certainty is undermined by clues that toss you left and right... leaving you with that sensation of delightful bewilderment and immense curiosity. This example might fit to describe the 11 tracks on this album.

If you are wondering when "getting dirty" in music, playing with styles, rhythms, and instruments that are even distant from each other, becomes a mess... from my side, I tell you that in this album there are moments that at first listen may seem forced, but with a little more attention they reveal themselves in all their beauty. Even at supposedly weak moments, when maybe you feel like skipping a piece, here comes a transition, a use of electronic pills, a violin, or percussion that will make you shift your focus from the overall view to the particular.

The strength of this album lies precisely in being varied, sophisticated, and captivating yet at the same time simple and direct. This record, along with the previous and the next, are very current testimonies of an artist who never hid his ideas and his music, rather he promoted them, shouted them, then sang them and afterwards recited them.

An artist who is a citizen of the world, who musically and beyond, is more missed than ever today.

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