Setlist

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

London Calling Safe European Home The Leader Somebody Got Murdered White Man in Ham Palais The Guns Of Brixton Lightning Strikes Corner Soul This Is Radio Clash Ivan Meets GI Joe Charlie Don’t Surf The Magnificent Seven Junco Partner Train in Vain Career Opportunities Wrong Em Boyo Bankrobber Clampdown One More Time Armagideon Time Spanish Bombs Brand New Cadillac The Street Parade I Fought the law London’s Burning White Riot

updated 12 August 2004
updated 12 June 2007
updated 5 Jan 2010 - clarified intro song
updated June 2021 added local Spanish reviews

Audio 1

Sound 2.5 - time 1hr 31mins* - unknown gen. - tracks 26
distand and the *tape runs way too fast, needs sloring down

Somebody Got Murdered

Sound quality

An ok quality audience recording was made of the concert but the best source circulating is several generations off the master. It suffers therefore from exvcessive tape speed, a degree of flatness and loss of clarity making it one of the lesser quality recordings from an excellent tour. It is nevertheless an enjoyable listen, capturing the whole concert with little distortion, reasonable detail and good vocals, bass and drums.

The recorder was not close to the stage so there are some distance problems with guitars a little too far back in the mix, but the master recording was obviously a very decent one. An upgrade to the master would be very welcome especially as the performance is so strong.

the band enjoying themselves

The second recording from the Impossible Mission Tour reveals a much tighter more consistent performance than at Barcelona at the start of the tour. With several concerts played, the new songs that sounded under rehearsed at Barcelona are now taking shape live and benefiting from repeated performances.

This is a fine performance with the band enjoying themselves, especially Joe. His pleasure in playing on Spanish soil is clear and he takes every opportunity to display his knowledge (albeit limited!) of Spanish gained in his pre-Clash days. At the beginning of the concert he gives a short speech in Spanish, its exact meaning not clear even too a native Spanish speaker! Joe says very carefully to cheers from the audience, “We are dedicating this concert in solidarity with our countrymen who died in Ireland and Andalusia”

The rest is not clear but includes a reference to independence then he breaks mid sentence back to English, “music not played on the radio here”. A piece of pipe or flute music is then played which gets louder cheers.

San Sebastian is a major city in the Basque region and it's a popular basque song called "Aurresku", played with a basque flute called "txistu". It's a classical song for wellcoming or make an homage to somebody.

Ticket

San Sebastian - Velodromo de Anoeta

This large cycle stadium provides the setting still today for San Sebastian’s high profile concerts. See photo. Pearl Jam, Peter Gabriel and Massive Attack have all played there in the past. It was hardly though the best setting for a Clash concert but typical of the large capacity venues played on the Impossible Mission tour. Making a profit now over ruled other considerations due to the band’s perilous financial state.

Buenos Diaz”

The recording starts with the first hearing of the band’s new dramatic intro music, Ennio Morricone’s ‘60 Seconds To What’, evidently suggested by Topper. Joe then says “Buenos Diaz” and gives his speech referred to earlier, and then it’s into the twin familiar attack of London Calling and Safe European Home.

Joe shouts “Vamos, vamos” before The Leader to get the band fired up further. “Presentar Senor Mick Jones” as Jonesy begins the intro to a powerful Somebody Got Murdered. White Man in Hammersmith Palais is fine but with no adlibs in contrast to Guns of Brixton next where a few bars of Willie and the Hand Jive is added to the intro, as at Barcelona.

The most interesting aspect of this recording is hearing the development live of the Sandinista songs. Lightning Strikes is tighter than Barcelona with Joe adlibbing but retains the same abrupt ending. Joe calls for the audience to shout louder to stir things up. Corner Soul and Radio Clash are very good and then an edit leads into Ivan Meets GI Joe (a much better performance than the lame Barcelona one). Continuing with the Sandinista heavy set on this tour, Charlie Don’t Surf is followed by a strong Magnificent Seven, which now gets an extended instrumental ending.

It’s the first chance next to hear Junco Partner live and the band are clearly enjoying themselves with Joe adlibbing over Mick’s solo. “El Train in Vain!” is followed by Career Opportunities not performed for nearly two years (last time in San Francisco on the Take The Fifth Tour.)

Wrong Em Boyo is followed by a great Bankrobber played slower and looser in 1981. Mick precedes Clampdown with “This is for all those .?. in the Spanish army”. Again a better performance than the lacklustre Barcelona one and then the set ends with an extended One More Time.

The first encore begins with Armagideon Time followed by a fine performance of Spanish Bombs, essential to the occasion. Brand New Cadillac is excellent, the song really catching fire and then the pace drops again for The Street Parade. I Fought the Law ends the encore with the audience shouting for more.

The final encore returns to the frenetic passion of 1977 with fired up performances of London’s Burning and White Riot.

ERE Magazine The Clash Elrockj con mensaje

May 1981
Basque Country magazine

Local review

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