London Calling. Four stars.
First just let me say that in all the genres huddled under the rock umbrella, my favorites are folk/singer-songwriters and intellectual art-rock (Bowie, early Eno, Roxy Music, etc). I'm telling you this just so's you'll know how much store you want to set by this review.
1979's double album saw the introduction of post-punk and pointed the way for the Clash selling out. This is an artistic statement, you can hear ska, reggae, horns, honest to god pop tunes strewn across the record. It's all carried off well, but it means that, as far as punk was concerned, the Clash were making a fast exit.
Like all double albums, it's got filler. All the songs are short, making the weaker songs less noticeable (queue up Physical Graffiti), so taken as a whole, it mostly works.
Okay, song by song...Brace yourselves!
London Calling is a pull-out-the-stops apocalypse song. Flooding, nuclear destruction...heck, even zombies. Joe Strummer (lead singer) sounds quite pleased with all this, possibly because Beatlemania doesn't survive the experience...
Brand New Cadillac was an extra the band used to warm up before recording the serious stuff. It's dumb, basically rock and roll, and funny if you're in the right mood.
Jimmy Jazz is one of several songs dealing with criminals of one stripe or another. Horns show up alongside the guitar bridge, and Strummer sounds like he's ad-libbing through most of it. Not bad, not memorable.
Hateful is not a punk diatribe. It's about a drug addict and has a fabulous chorus.
Rudie Can't Fail is also gifted with a memorable chorus, and is driven by the brass section. Reggae inflected standout.
Spanish Bombs features grand, soaring guitar as the lyric looks to the Spanish Civil War, including a few lines in the language. When I first heard the CD two years ago, this was my favorite track, telling you how accessible it is.
The Right Profile is about the actor Montgomery Clift. This musically chaotic piece follows him down the drain. Hardly pleasant (that's the point) and Strummer's diction is really, truly horrible.
Lost in the Supermarket is gentle, a pop tune. Mick Jones, the other half of the songwriting team, sings it. The lyric is good and it's damn catchy...but it drops the ball in the second half by repeating the chorus over and over and over...Must repeat six times, rendering the song rather tedious.
We return to rock on Clampdown. Anarchy. The Establishment. You know the drill. High quality tune.
The Guns of Brixton is the real reggae moment. Paul Simonon wrote and sang it. An ominous story of civil unrest, it's one of the standouts, and that's saying something, since I've never liked reggae.
So, that's part one. It's all quite interesting, never excessive and surprising well paced. Part two?
Wrong 'Em Boyo is a ska-inflected pop song. It sounds like nothing so much as Madness. It's a riff on the traditional Stagger Lee murder ballad.
Death or Glory is archetypal from the title in. It's pretty good, and makes me curious to hear their first two albums.
Koka Kola has another strong melody, and at two minutes it doesn't overstay its welcome. In fact, it is my own favorite on London Calling.
The Card Cheat has all the instruments recorded twice to get a bigger sound, and includes piano and brass to make it swing.
Lover's Rock is the weakest track. Mildly interesting, but it drags out into a dull coda again. Superfluous; outshone by the rest.
Back to business with Four Horsemen. No, it is not another apocalypse song. Actually, I'm not sure what it is about, but never mind that.
By this point, the album is unbearable to me if not broken into two days of listening. So we come to I'm Not Down, a repetitive, uplifting little tune. Verse, riff, chorus, rinse and repeat is a mite bit predictable.
Last proper song is Revolution Rock, which is a misleading title. The brass calls up ghosts of Herb Alpert for God's sake! Though the lyric would be unacceptable in his world. Judging from the lyric sheets, I'd guess Joe Strummer was very fond of ad-libbing...
Train in Vain is an odd inclusion, a single tossed on at the last possible minute, so the original album sleeve didn't even mention it. I'd enjoy it more if it wouldn't play back in my head for the next 24 hours.
Okay, so it has more strengths than weaknesses. It makes a cohesive artistic statement and judging from what I've heard about Sandinista and Combat Rock, they didn't have anything to say afterwards.
If my review hasn't convinced you that this isn't a punk record, you can see my statement backed up by the cover art, which is both an homage to Elvis Presley and a shot recalling The Who more than anything else.
In conclusion, I'm pleased with London Calling, though I'd hardly call it one of the greatest records of all time, and the length deters me from taking it off the shelf for another two years.
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