carbon silicon

The Clash is one of my all time favorite bands.
Lets be frank, I am an alternative music junkie.
So when I recently heard a promo on NPR that they were going to interview Mick Jones and
Tony James for their new band Carbon/Silicon...my ears pricked up.
Mick Jones was The Heart of The Clash. Tony James was the bassist of Generation X.
What, you don't know Generation X? They were a "punk" band from the UK circa 1976...I never really felt like they were authentic, their music always kind of sounded forced and generic to me.They had one line of lyric that always struck me, "never sell out like they
did, they diii-iid"....
this belief was later confirmed when the lead singer Billy Idol went on to become, well....
Billy Idol.
And Tony James helped form the band Sigue Sigue Sputnik, which gave us the wonderful single "love missile f1-11"
You don't remember that one?!
Lucky you.
That boy sold the fuck out.
But what about Mick Jones?
Oh, well... after the glorious triumphs of The Clash?
He formed Big Audio Dynamite. B.A.D.
god help us all.
The Horses Are On The Track?
BOTH those boys sold out.
It makes you wonder. Sometimes an artist hits it once and then... that's it they should just hang it up.
But then again....Nirvana gave birth to Foo Fighters...so nothing is absolute...
But Carbon/Silicon is not bad. The music kind of sounds like if the guy from the Clash hooked up with the guy from Generation X and formed a band.
It's a sweet story when you consider they were best friends when they were teens and both of their first bands was together with the unfortunate name of London SS...which has Nazi connotations for most people but they meant it to mean "London Social Security"
The point is, our idols all fall, nobody stays cool forever...unless they die...