My first record was The Clash Train In Vain 45.
I had several records (mostly 45s and 8-tracks) by this point, but they had all been handed down to me by relatives or given as gifts. Most of the time, if a song came on the radio that I liked, my mom or one of my cousins would usually already have the record, but I heard this late one night while in bed trying to get to sleep (I had a crappy little one speaker 8-track player/radio that I’d take under the covers with me) and I fell in love with it. The DJ didn’t say who it was by, so I listened to the radio obsessively for about a week waiting to hear it again. When it came on, I called the station and asked who it was. They said it was The Clash.
I asked my mom and everybody I knew about them. One of my cousins said, “I think they’re one of those punk bands,” but nobody else knew anything. So I begged my mom for 89 cents so I could go get the 45 and she gave me a list of chores to do. It took me nearly a week to do all of the chores, but, man, was I a happy little kid (I think I was 6) when I finally had it in my hands. The b side was “London Calling” and I loved it equally as much. My mom ended up digging it too and bought me/us (she said it was for us to share, but I hoarded it) the whole album (on 8 track) about a week later. I was initially bummed because “Train In Vain” wasn’t listed, but I thought the whole album was awesome and was cool with it not being on there by the time channel 4 started, but then, at the end…. there it was.
THE CLASH “train in vain” (EL edit) by Eoin Long
I told Mick Jones that story when I met him and he said it was really sweet and he was honored!
Kliph Scurlock is the drummer for the Flaming Lips.
