I'll skip the AllMusic Guide/Trouser Press analysis of this record since either you love it or you hate it. Hate it for being the tipping point where it could be said The Clash went bigtime 'mersh; or love it because it personified a really salient time in your life, a jumping off point, if you will. It's brilliant hybridization of genre, lefty politics and pure party formed (in my head) a standard, an expectation of what a complete record should contain. Something like the full range of emotion, starting with indignant resistance to the ugliness, celebrating the war against all that shit that drags you down, throwing hats in the air because there will always be more hats, swallowing your pride in the face of adversity and overcoming injustice with a populism and a twist of red humor.
Ok, that was rambling... Anycrap, Combat Rock came out when I was 12 years old and was, at that time, already sick of the crass commercialism of the MTV VJ death squad and their 24/7 Billy Idol/Duran Duran rimjob. So when "Rock The Casbah" came across it signalled something a little different to me. Can't put finger on it. Maybe the chaos and stupidity of the video was in such hard opposition to the well quaffed, emotionally lit "Rios" and 'Rebel Yells" shat out left n right. Yeah I knew the Clash already, and was a daily consumer of Black Flag, JFA and DOA at the time. But this "Rock The Casbah" moment of open market accessibility was a sea change in some ways (kinda like "Nevermind" going triple platinum) -- taking the message big time.
Whatever you think about this record, try it again. "Straight to Hell" is still one of the finer moments transferred to magnetic tape.
Sadly, the kids won't know the significance of "Should I Stay Or Should I go" outside of a challenge to their fingering proficiency in Rock Band.
Lastly, an open question: Is there any band out there right now as important as the Clash were?
Hear
3 comments:
Car Jamming was/is still my favorite from this record because of lines like:
"The radios hive like bees."
and
"The ragged stand in bags soaking heat up through their feet."
plus the Lauren Bacall shout out.
Outside of the songs from this album that made the box set, I can't recall any of them (though I like the bit that JV cites). Just didn't seem CD-worthy.
the only band that matters
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