The Tim “Napalm” Stegall Substack Interview: Pearl Harbour, Part Four

The conclusion of our conversation with The Queen Of Modern Rockabilly, in which she describes watching The Clash break up in her living room, among other things.

Pearl and Paul Simonon . at home. (From the Collection of Pearl Harbour)

Ending this ongoing, multipart discussion with Pearl Harbour is a little sad. This has been fun! Pearl participated in and witnessed so much of the late 20th Century rock ‘n’ roll history we love around here, plus she is just fun, upbeat (even as she was battling cancer, and successfully), and so sweet. And of course, every reader of The ‘Stack should pick up Liberation Hall’s supreme reissue of Pearl’s December 1980 punkabilly LP Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost Too. I mean, how can you go wrong with 3/4ths of The Clash backing you, alongside Wilko Johnson [whom Pearl discussed in the last installment], the late guitarist Nigel Dixon of ‘billy revivalists Whirlwind, and several other luminaries. Having these savage young guns handle the instrumentation brings a certain toughness and drive to these boppers, and I’d dare put Pearl’s version of “Fujiyama Mama” up against Wanda Jackson’s original any day. But why don’t we ease in by discussing yet another ‘70s punk luminary scrubbing guitar on the record? 

TIM: You've also got members of The Rumour on here, Steve New from The Rich Kids….

PEARL: The guitar player, yeah! He was another character, he was a real trip. Unfortunately, he liked drugs too much. I'm not a big drug fan. So that was sort of the warning on my side:  He really liked drugs, so that was too bad. But he's a great guitar player and a super nice guy. Very odd person.

TIM: So, the label doesn't like the record. And they kind of let it die a death, didn't they?

PEARL:  Yeah, they only printed up about five hundred copies of it, and then they just threw it down the toilet, and me as well. In one way, I can understand why they were mad at me: Because I said, “This is what I like and if you don't like it, I don't care.” And they said, “Well, not only do we not like it, but there's no hits, and then you don't put the musicians' names on it when that's a major selling point!” And I said, “Well, that's why I didn't, because I was trying to be sort of punk rock about it!”

The British press are really cruel to Americans a lot of times, and they were not very nice to me. Which is okay, that's the way it goes. But I didn't want to give them another excuse to hate me, because I could just hear them saying, “Oh, the only reason people bought this record or listened to it is because of The Clash and The Blockheads.” And that was probably going to happen. So instead, I chose to not list anybody, the musicians' names, and then the record company didn't like that. Looking back on it now, I kind of wish that I had, but too bad. It was what it was.

TIM:  I read exactly one record review of it here in the States, in a magazine that was called The Record. They somehow mentioned that The Clash were involved with this, so I knew about that. But you know it just wasn't... nobody was listed on the record obviously. And that was at an interesting period where The Clash were doing records with a lot of their girlfriends. 

PEARL: Yeah, I mean there was me and Ellen Foley, so that's two. I mean, Joe's girlfriend wasn't a singer, and Topper's girlfriend wasn't a singer either. But yes, Mick and Paul.

Robert DeNiro is waiting: From the right, Pearl, Paul, and a guy who threatens Cheeto Mussolini on the regular. (From the Collection of Pearl Harbour)

TIM:  It was like we were getting a whole lot of Clash records at that time, just sort of indirectly. One good thing that came out of the experience is that you had a fairly long relationship with Paul Simonon.

PEARL: Yeah, when we split up it was obviously really hard for me because I didn't want to split up.  But he wanted to go in another direction, because The Clash had broken up and he was looking for something else, including a different lifestyle, I think. So that was really hard for me. At first when we split up, we didn't get along that well. But at Joe's funeral in 2002, I saw Paul of course. And I said, “Why don't we just be friends again? Because we had so much fun and I'll never forget the fun that we had, so we might as well be friends." And he said, “Yeah, let's do that.” So ever since Joe passed away, we've been friends, and we write all the time to each
other, and he sends me paintings and drawings and things and I appreciate it. So I do have a nice relationship with him, and I'm thankful for that. I haven't spoken with Mick or Topper in a really long time. I love them as well.

TIM:  My two favorite bands in the world are The Clash and the New York Dolls. To me, that's what rock ‘n’ roll should be – those two bands, you know?

PEARL: I know what you mean. I love those two bands, too, and I love Iggy. I think Iggy is the real king of punk, myself. And I think Patti Smith is the real queen of punk, but that's just me. I saw Patti on her first tour in 1975. Wow! I couldn't believe it! I wasn't expecting to see this skinny girl in ripped up clothes, spitting all the time and cursing and jumping around and stuff. I just loved her. She was like a tomboy. When I was a kid, since I have four older brothers, I was a tomboy too.

TIM:  She managed to mix the Rolling Stones with French Symbolist poetry from the 18th century.  Bless her.

PEARL:  Yeah, no kidding.

TIM:  So you married Paul, and as I understand it, The Clash would hold meetings at your apartment, and you were kind of in the front row as they were starting to break up.

PEARL:  Yeah, it's true. I would sit quietly and listen, and if anybody asked me my opinion I would say it. But it was a hard time for everybody because everybody was unhappy. I mean, I personally wasn't unhappy, but they were because they weren't happy with the new version of The Clash. Everything was starting to go south, and I wish it had ended differently. I wish they would have just gotten Mick back and all that stuff.

TIM:  Yeah, well. Bernie Rhodes happens.

PEARL:  Don't even mention him to me. I can't stand him. I can't believe that such great guys like The Clash liked such a moron as him, but what can I say?

TIM:  Yeah, well, you know, the worst thing to happen to your band is getting either Bernie Rhodes or Malcolm McLaren to manage you, so...

PEARL:  Well, I prefer Malcolm myself, but I sort of knew him a little bit in London. He's a character. He at least is funny and smart and cool. Bernie wasn't... there's nothing funny or cool about him. He's just a creep, a little creep.

That’s why she’s a honky tonk gal: Pearl now, snapped by Anthony Masterson.

TIM:  You've continued making music since this time. It's just been kind of a little bit more underground, hasn't it?

PEARL:  Yeah, when I left London, I moved back to San Francisco and I put a band together, another rock ‘n’ roll band. It was a really good band with East Bay Ray from Dead Kennedys on lead guitar. He picked out all these other great musicians that he liked to work with, Buck Naked helped me put that band together. He's passed away. Anyways, yes, I had a really good little rock ‘n’ roll band, and then I had them until I moved to Los Angeles in 1996. Then I put together another rock ‘n’ roll band, and I had that band for almost 20 years. We didn't make much money or anything like that, and I wasn't expecting much. All I wanted to do was play. And so we played all the time, and that was good. 

And now, I'm in my country and western phase. And so I moved out to the desert in Southern California, and I put together a country band. But I'm not sure if you know or not, but you could probably tell my voice is not very strong. I have lung cancer right now, so I had to stop the band and I'm going through all the treatments and I'm having a really hard time and I hope I can sing again. So we'll see what happens.

It's no fun, but so many people get cancer nowadays. It seems like everybody knows somebody or has a family member that has cancer or something. Plus Jesus, I smoked cigarettes for over 50 years! What the hell do I expect, you know? Two of my brothers and my mother, they all died from cancer. I know it's a tough, tough one, but I'm hanging in there and I hope to live to tell the tale.

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