Joe Strummer’s enduring legacy at Japan’s Fuji Rock Festival
Ahead of Fuji Rock Festival 2026, we trace the lineage of Japan’s seminal outdoor music event, from Glastonbury to the patronage of punk idol Joe Strummer
On an idyllic, dragonfly-buzzing summer afternoon nearly 25 years ago, Jimmy Mills was manning the bar at a ski lodge just outside the gates of the Fuji Rock Festival, at the Naeba Ski Resort, in Yuzawa, Niigata prefecture, Japan. It was 2002, and the sixth edition of the event was in full swing. From behind the taps, Mills watched as a pack of merrymakers approached with an unusual demand.
“They brought over this big, crazy, 20 litre jug – the kind used in office water coolers,” recalls Mills, now an IT professional living in Kawasaki, Japan. “And they’re asking, ‘Hey, can we fill this up with beer?’” Mills thought it was a joke, until he realised one of the people asking was Joe Strummer, former frontman of British punk group The Clash.
Strummer was then 50 years old. To his Japanese fans, “he was like Bob Dylan, Bob Marley and Elvis Presley, all rolled into one”, says Dave “Pockets” Garvin, one of Strummer’s close friends and a regular attendee of the annual Fuji Rock Festival since its founding in 1997.
Mills eventually got the green light from the lodge’s owner to fill the hefty jug. As he did so, Strummer tossed a wad of banknotes onto the bar.
Little did Mills know that this would be the singer’s final visit to Fuji Rock. Just five months later, Strummer died from a congenital heart defect. Yet, his legacy remains woven into the fabric of the music festival.
At the same bar, today, a photo of Strummer with the jug hangs above an ad hoc shrine called Joe’s Garage. It holds lots of Strummer- and Clash-themed memorabilia: badges, ticket stubs, limited-edition artwork and photos of fans posing with their hero. Ota Tetsuji, a 62-year-old superfan from Niigata, curates the collection.