He formed the folk-rock band Lindisfarne with Alan Hull in 1970, and wrote "Meet Me on the Corner", a UK Top 5 hit in March 1972, which won Clements an Ivor Novello Award.

Lindisfarne broke up in 1973 and Clements became a founding member of Jack the Lad, also working with Ralph McTell and Bert Jansch.

[3] As a bass guitarist, Clements teamed up with local musicians in North Shields to form a blues band (also called the Downtown Faction).

[1] Lindisfarne reformed in 1977 and Clements continued to be part of the line-up, contributing many songs to albums such as Back and Fourth, The News, Sleepless Nights and Dance Your Life Away.

Following Alan Hull's death in 1995 Rod became the band's main songwriter who, in partnership with producer and co-writer Nigel Stonier, provided the bulk of material for Lindisfarne's two last albums, Here Comes The Neighbourhood (1998) and Promenade (2002).

Clements has also toured and recorded with Rab Noakes and Michael Chapman and performed on albums by Peter Hammill, Wizz Jones and Kathryn Tickell amongst others.

[4] Songs written by Clements have been covered by artists including Melanie Safka and Joe Brown; and a Clements/Stonier composition, "Can't Do Right For Doing Wrong", was a British Top 30 hit for Erin Rocha at Christmas 2003.