at a glance...

Hometown: London, England
Formed: 1975

Members:
Joe Strummer -vocals, guitar, songwriting
Mick Jones -vocals, guitar, songwriting
Paul Simonon -bass, vocals, songwriting
Nicky "Topper" Headon -drums
Terry Chimes, a.k.a. Tory Crimes -drums
Lee "Scratch" Perry -producer
Mickey Foote, Bill Price -producers

Bands in the family :
Mikey Dread, Big Audio Dynamite, Big Audio Dynamite II, Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros, Lee "Scratch" Perry, Allen Ginsberg, Ellen Foley

What am I supposed to say about this album? This album is confusion wrapped in strength, a kiss from a purple-haired boy you don't know, a ticket out of Ackerman Junior High School and into the School of Kickin' Ass. This album is a bootleg tape that changed thousands of lives, it's a bomb exploding in the British museum, it's a huge shout-out to Trenchtown and brick-throwers everywhere. This album is everything that is the case, this album is all that and some fish and chips, this album is Punk Rock's Finest Hour.

Of course, the hour was early, and U.S. morons - um, record executives - just didn't get it; the Brit version of The Clash came out in 1977, but Epic was afraid that it sounded like crap, so we didn't get a domestically produced version until '79, after Give 'Em Enough Rope had already been released. Well, I guess some of the songs do sound kind of awful, but it's a glorious awfulness that makes it seem all the more urgent. And it's probably better that we got this version here, because it's better and has ace songs that the U.K. version doesn't have. What other "punk" band embraced reggae so wholeheartedly? How many other punk rockers could actually play their instruments? How many really gave a rat's ass about their audience and about music history? The Clash stands alone, pretty much, and they stand cool.

But we can talk about the rockabilly riffs, the coffin-pound of the drums, and Joe Strummer's wonderfully ruined voice all night and still never get to the important stuff: these are simple, great songs played by five guys (two different drummers, mate) who want to get you pogoing straight into the revolution. When I first heard "I'm So Bored With the U.S.A." in 7th grade, I knew then that hey, so was I, dammit! When I first heard Mick Jones talking about "Career Opportunities," I knew I better get my act together or else I'd be opening letter bombs for the man too. Above all, when I heard Mr. Strummer explain in "White Man in Hammersmith Palais" that all the punk solidarity was fake and false and useless, I wondered how a band could convert me to punk rock and then pull the flippin' carpet out from under me at the same time. A lot of people didn't expect the Clash to veer sharply away from punk rock on Give 'Em Enough Rope, but everyone who heard The Clash knew that it was inevitable, because no one could ever make a better punk album. No one ever has.

If you like The Clash, check out:
The Clash Live: From Here To Eternity
The Clash Give 'Em Enough Rope
The Clash London Calling
The Clash ¡Sandinista!
The Clash Super Black Market Clash
The Clash Combat Rock
Hüsker Dü Zen Arcade
The Minutemen Double Nickels on the Dime
Lee "Scratch" Perry Arkology

-- Matt Cibula