I began listening to the Clash in late March 2022. They are among my all time favorite artists, cracking the top five, and neck-to-neck with The Rolling Stones as my favorite band.
The Clash (1977): A+
Give 'Em Enough Rope (1978): A
London Calling (1979): A+
Sandinista! (1980): A-
Combat Rock (1982): B-
Cut the Crap (1985): C-
The Clash (1977):
Johnny Rotten reacted to the social/political state of the UK of the 70s by making an nihilistic album rife with hysteria, confusion, and void of any calls to action (other than anarchy). Joe Strummer isn't so pessimistic about the future. Although he notes that the divisive forces partitioning the working class make his hopes for a political reckoning all the more unlikely, he embodies everything "Street Fighting Man" was about and more: that is, he believes in change and is going to do all a rock'n'roll singer can. And unlike Rotten, his resentment with society's current state is clearly directed and articulated: he despises the police and their racist practices, schooling and the limited job market, and politeness and the London's traffic system (the Clash also have their fair share of jokes). The Ramones light-hearted lyrics were fun to laugh along with and the Pistols' whole anarchy thing was real cute but the Clash's combination of spritely, amateur rock'n'roll with a youthful sense of entitlement for a better life already make them well on their way to becoming the quintessential punk band. It's like when Dylan finally distilled the folkies' political and social frustrations onto tape, only this time Freewheelin' is a fiery punk record. A+
Give 'Em Enough Rope (1978):
After finding commercial success in the UK, the Clash trade the cardboard box they recorded their debut in for a real studio and a real producer Sandy Pearlman, who gives them a crisp, hard rock, and guitar-crunching sound. Fittingly, the band have become more versatile, precise players--very impressive technically for a punk band--which coincides with the addition of skilled jazz drummer Topper Headon. Despite the production and proficient instrumentation, they still wear their working-class roots on their sleeve, exemplified by "All the Young Punks" and "Stay Free." Strummer, however, isn't writing about politics with the same fervor, which I'm slightly disappointed by. Beside the "Guns on the Roof," the album's political commentary is either indirect (i.e. not a song's primary theme) or, in the case of "Tommy Gun," written from a character's point of view, which Strummer has proven to be less adept at. Still, I love every song, none more than "Safe European Home," where the musical pilgrimage of two starry-eyed punks doesn't go as smoothly as they hoped. A
London Calling (1979):
Though the Clash as musicians were never as lacking in skill as punk often implies or their low budget debut made them sound, the band's initial appeals were fairly straightforward: they were a scruffy, likeable, working-class, and socially frustrated English band who wrote and played simple rock 'n'roll with a political charge. That such a band would turn around in two years and make such a skillfully crafted masterpiece is truly unbelievable. Strummer used to struggle writing songs that didn't come from his point-of-view, now he casually pens lines like "I wasn't born, so much as I fell out/Nobody seemed to notice me/We had a hedge back home in the suburbs/Over which I never could see." They used to dabble with reggae, now they synthesize the worlds of the blues, rockabilly, jazz, hard rock, and punk at will on an expansive album that is at once eclectic but uniform. And after somewhat tiring of political lyrics, Strummer and the band return to the garage with the engine roaring: "London Calling," "The Guns of Brixton," and "Lost in the Supermarket" are their most scathing and literate political commentaries yet. Rarely are albums--much less double albums--such through and through successes and for that London Calling deserves every penny of praise it gets and more. A+
Sandinista! (1980):
London Calling saw the Clash succeeding so spectacularly, it was easy to assume they could pull off anything. It seems the band came to that conclusion as well. Nevertheless, their reasons for recording this ambitious 3-LP album does not come from a place of ego. Rather, the band uses their past success as leverage against the record company for greater recording freedom, which allowed them to appease their growing and eclectic pallet as well as their boyish enthusiasm for experimentation. With one or two listens of this monstrous album--which is already a lot to ask--it's easy to write off re-recordings of old Clash songs with children's choirs as needless filler. With a few more listens, however, Sandinista! reveals itself to be a complete project as immersive and uniform as Exile on Main St. or The White Album. Most of the time, it's too long for an uninterrupted listen--you already knew that--but nearly all of the thirty-six songs are essential to this off-the-wall manifesto. In fact, the only knock I have against the album is the upper echelon of quality. Rarely does Sandinista! include cuts that peak above the average song on their magnificent third album--of course, how far could any album get trying to meet that expectation?--but there are a handful of superlative Clash classics including "If Music Could Talk," "Police on My Back," "Charlie Don't Surf," and one of Strummer's most directed political lyrics "Washington Bullets." If you do the work to love the Clash prior to picking up this album and, perhaps, have particularly long shifts delivering pizzas that provide ample listening breaks, I don't see how you couldn't also fall for even this album's most tedious moments. A-
Combat Rock (1982):
It's not the commercial direction that makes this project so disappointing but that it is easily the Clash's most forgettable and downright mediocre collection of songs yet. I can't recall a melody on side two besides "Ghetto Defendant" and side one only harbors three good songs: the two big singles, which I doubt I'll play much moving forward, and "Straight to Hell," a fantastic song which recalls Sandinista!. The album's lyrics are consistently some of Strummer's most political, cutting, and insightful but their musical accompaniment was butchered in the studio, none more so than "Know Your Rights," which features one of the Clash's worst arrangements ever, and "Red Angel Dragnet," which is terribly annoying. B-
Cut the Crap (1985):
The football-style chants have potential but Bernie Rhodes uses them to death; amateur guitarists Vince White and Nick Sheppard give the album energy whenever they're moved to the front of the mix but such occurrences are much too infrequent; and though Strummer has some fairly strong vocal performances, the lifeless drum machines and cheap synthesizers are all I'm able to pay attention to. Incredibly, Cut the Crap is almost as disastrous as London Calling is magnificent. Though Rhodes ruined this largely unlistenable record with surgical precision--not that there were many songs with all that much potential--the album does have one cut that's not half bad: "This is England." C-
