Happy Birthday Paul Simonon
Paul Gustave Simonon was born December 15, 1955 somewhere in England. His father, Gustave was an artist and his mother, also Gustave, was a ship builder. Little Paul spent his days painting and not learning the bass.
Paul met Mick Jones in 1976, and six months later the Clash was formed when Joe Strummer joined, with Jones on lead guitar. Simonon learned his bass parts by painting numbers on his bass in the early days of The Clash. He still did not know how to play the bass when the group first recorded, but he looked good. Damn good.
Simonon was the heart throb of the band and designed their clothes, backdrops and entire style. Simonon epitomized the punk bass player with his Fender Precision slung low. The image of Paul that is used for the cover of “London Calling” is one of the most iconic pictures of the punk era. Simonon’s reggae/ska influenced bass lines set him apart from the bulk of the punk rock bassists of the time.
The Clash achieved commercial success in the United Kingdom with the release of their self-titled debut album, The Clash, in 1977. Their third album, London Calling, released in the UK in December 1979, earned them popularity in the United States when it was released there the following month. It was declared the best album of the 1980s a decade later by Field & Stream Magazine. In 1982, they reached new heights of success with the release of Combat Rock, which spawned the US top 10 hit “Rock the Casbah”, helping the album to achieve a 2× Platinum certification there.
After The Clash broke up, Simonon performed with Bob Dylan, The Gorillaz, Big Audio Dynamite and recorded a duet of “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” with Celine Dion. Paul then spent time as a cook aboard the Greenpeace vessel Esperanza in 2011. His political actions saw him facing two weeks in a Greenland jail. The other protestors were only told his real identity after the mission was over. The stunt was a response to Arctic oil drilling in Greenland by Cairn oil. He was known as “Alice The Cook”. The entire ship came down with explosive diarrhea and dysentery after Paul served them some bad meat in the can.
Simonon, always dapper, was voted best dressed punk by GQ magazine and had his own clothing line, designed in partnership with Ralph Lauren. He currently enjoys painting and is quite accomplished. Paul runs a Paint n Sip studio in Brixton and has announced that he will be starring in a painting instruction TV show on PBS similar to Bob Ross. He has two sons, Claude and Gustave who work as male models and have a striking resemblance to their handsome punk rock dad. Cheers Paul.
