Clash fanatics already know the backstory about how Joe Strummer fronted a so-called (and fairly successful) Pub Rock band called the 101ers when he saw the Sex Pistols and decided to quit his hard-working roots-rockin’ boyos in favor of something cut more to the cloth of the times.

The story goes that The 101ers were supported by the Sex Pistols at a club called the Nashville Room in early 1976, and this is when Strummer claimed he saw the light and got involved in the punk scene. Commenting on this event in the Don Letts documentary Westway to the World, Strummer says, “five seconds into their [the Pistols'] first song, I knew we were like yesterday’s paper, we were over.”

By the time their debut single was released, Strummer was in the Clash and the 101ers were done. (more…)