After enjoying regional success in Texas,
Bobby Fuller and his band decided to switch to a major label—
Del-Fi Records under
Mustang Records—and they became known as
The Bobby Fuller Four. While producing minor hits, the band broke the national top ten when they re-recorded "I Fought the Law" in 1965 with Bobby Fuller (vocals, guitar),
Randy Fuller (backing vocals, bass guitar),
Jim Reese (backing vocals, guitar), and
DeWayne Quirico (drums). Just six months after the song made its first appearance on the
Billboard Top 100 chart, Fuller was found dead from
asphyxiation in his mother's car in a parking lot near his Los Angeles apartment. The police declared the death an apparent suicide, but others believe that he was murdered. The mono and stereo mixes differ in both Fuller's vocals and the guitar riffs. In 2015, the
Bobby Fuller Four version of the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Chart positions ==The Clash version== }} In mid-1978,
the Clash were working on their second album, ''
Give 'Em Enough Rope. Singer Joe Strummer and guitarist Mick Jones flew to San Francisco to record overdubs in September–October at the Automatt studio. The owner of the Automatt kept his collection of classic jukeboxes distributed around the various rooms of the studio complex. Strummer and Jones heard the Bobby Fuller version of "I Fought the Law" for the first time on one of the jukeboxes. Their version first appeared on the EP The Cost of Living'' in May 1979 in the UK, and later that year was made part of the American edition of the Clash's album
The Clash. This cover version helped gain the Clash their first taste of airplay in the States. A live recording of the song, performed at the
Lyceum Theatre,
West End, London, on December 28, 1978, features as the last piece of the 1980 film
Rude Boy, directed by Jack Hazan and David Mingay. The Clash were dressed all in black for that gig, and the song, at that stage, was considered the film's title song. On July 26, 1979, "I Fought the Law" was the first single by the band to be released in the United States. In 1988,
CBS Records re-issued the single (catalog number) in CD, 12-inch and 7-inch vinyl formats, with "City of the Dead" (2:24) and "
1977" (1:40) as its 7-inch B-side. In 1989, during
Operation Just Cause, the U.S. military surrounded the
Apostolic Nunciature in
Panama while trying to capture
Manuel Noriega, the strongman of Panama. U.S. forces blasted loud rock music—including "I Fought the Law" by the Clash—to put pressure on Noriega to give himself up. In 2007, the song was released as a downloadable track for the
music video game series
Rock Band. In 2012, it was featured in the video game
Sleeping Dogs, as part of a karaoke mini-game. The song appears during the end credits of the 2014 film
RoboCop, the 2016 film
War on Everyone and the 2018 video game
Lego DC Super-Villains.
Recording Some of the percussive noises on the record were made by hitting the pipes on a urinal. Jones told
Uncut magazine in 2015, "Yeah, we went into the toilets and banged on the pipes with hammers to make it sound like a chain gang. Y'know, that 'clang! clang!' at the end? And then at the very end you can hear a 'sssszzhhh!' That's it flushing!"
Personnel •
Joe Strummer – lead vocals and backing vocals, rhythm guitar •
Mick Jones – lead guitar and backing vocals •
Paul Simonon – bass and backing vocals •
Topper Headon – drums
Charts Certifications ==Other versions==