The Clash - London Calling
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Free Music Notes for London Calling
Free Music Review: Influential, catchy, fun - a must listen...not punk, though
Hit: 5 Stars
I listened to this album the first time back in the early 80's. This was in the days before CD's. I liked a handful of songs; Train in Vain and Wrong `Em Boyo come to mind, but I found the rest of it to range from only okay to downright annoying. The reason? Back then, this type of singing was really "punk" and was only done by a handful of bands. It just didn't sit well with me that the guy (Joe Strummer) couldn't sing on key. Much of it was more like he was kind of yelling and not singing at all. Fast forward to last month. I gave it another listen and just couldn't believe I ever thought this was anything other than great, catchy, instantly accessible music. That just shows you how influential this band was - dozens of followers have had massive airplay and I've grown accustomed to this style of singing, so much that it seems pretty much mainstream.
As for the songs; the aforementioned two are still my favorites, but the rest really holds up, too. Ultimately there are 4 or 5 songs that are just okay - The Right Profile goes on a little too long and it's hard to find a hook. Revolution Rock definitely goes a couple minutes too long and gets messy. I wouldn't say there are any songs I would skip, though, which is pretty high praise for double album. Don't go in thinking this is a punk rock record, though. This isn't a gritty call for anarchy - it's catchy and fun rock - more like power pop. On this album, the Clash touch on several genres of music and, as another reviewer said, make them all their own. If you ever thought you might be a Clash fan, just buy it. This album would also appeal to most fans of power pop.
Free Music Review: A Defining Moment In Rock And Roll.
Hit: 5 Stars
The Clash's 1979 album "London Calling" is bar none one of the finest albums ever made. Filled to the brim with a heap of hard hitting classics that only they can provide, "London Calling" is one of the greatest achievements in rock and roll.
From the insistent echoing riff of the title track that opens the album right to the last few notes of "Train In Vain", "London Calling" is The Clash at their best. Songs like the aforementioned title track, "Rudy Can't Fail", "Lost In The Supermarket", "Jimmy Jazz" and "Train In Vain" are known to both casul and hardcore Clash fans and are on pretty much every "greatest hits" compilation the band ever had, but there's a number of classics here that only the Clash Elite are familliar with, such as "Brand New Cadillac", "Wrong 'Em Boyo", "Death Or Glory" (sometimes referred to as the ultimte Clash tune) and "Lover's Rock" that are just as good.
Overall, "London Calling" is a brilliant record that belongs in everyonbe's collection. I highly recommend it (but make sure it's the 2003 special edition which comes with bonus material).
Free Music Review: the first bad clash album
Hit: 1 Stars
This album is a critics' darling, and perhaps the most overrated album of the rock era. It would have made a decent single album, but as a double, it's like sitting through a bad movie. Part of the problem is that the first Clash album truly is one of the greatest rock albums of all time. Even "Give 'Em Enough Rope," which often gets bad reviews, is a great record. By the time LC came out, the Clash were billing themselves as "the only band that matters," and critics were accepting it as fact. This albums makes it sound as if the Clash were buying a little too heavily into it, too. It is a major dropoff from their earlier work and even when viewed on its own, LC is an uneven, uninspired effort. While it's often named as one of the top albums of all time, it wasn't even one of the best albums released at its time.
This was the really the first chink in the armor of the Clash, and they continued losing steam as they went on.
Songs like "Koka Kola," "Four Horsemen," "Death or Glory," and "Right Profile" are so tedious that you have to wonder if the Clash believed they could do no wrong. I can't listen to them anymore. The title cut, "Spanish Bombs," "Revolution Rock," and a few others are superb. Some are just filler. The rest are definitely not 5-star songs.
This would have been about a 4-star album had it been a single album. As it is, the only reason I can see that it got such rave reviews is that the critics were trying to make up for having overlooked the Clash when they were truly great.
Buy the first two Clash albums instead, borrow this one from a friend and burn the good cuts. You'll be able to pick them out easily enough.
Free Music Review: Genre busting gem
Hit: 4 Stars
I'm not so in touch with the history of the Clash as some of the reviewers nor am I into debating how best to pigeon-hole them, I just love this record! So many great songs, so many styles, how can one not enjoy at least some of these songs?
The title track and it's follow-up Brand New Cadillac are a one-two punch that any band would love to have laid down. The songs bounce onward with amazing smoothness despite the stylistic differences of Hateful, Jimmy Jazz, the aforementioned two, Lost in the Supermarket, et al. One could talk about what it means to be punk but I always thought it was more an aesthetic issue opposed to some instrumental or songwriting shortcomings. Give me this over the ridiculous Sex Pistols any day.
Free Music Review: Own a piece of music history
Hit: 5 Stars
This is the best album of the 70's combining rock, reggae and R&B and oh so relevant today.