Clash
(Epic/Legacy)
At this point in time it's probably pointless to restate the Clash's enormous legacy and influence upon modern music. I mean, hell - they're my 7-year old's favorite rock band, and he didn't even get into ‘em through me or my record collection, but from his cousin of the same age. Talk about a potent trickle down effect: it's like, Strummer won the fucking war after all.
So you won't be needing the aging likes of yours truly to tell you of the Clash's importance. Or of the significance surrounding yet another Clash artifact; there have been enough books, DVDs, remastered reissues and from-the-vaults unreleased recordings over the past few years to start to rival the Dylan canon. It should be noted, however, that the archival project at hand is positively bursting at the scenes with context. It documents the October 13, 1982, concert in which the band opened for the Who in front of a rain-soaked 50,000-plus crowd at Shea Stadium in New York. The concert was the second of two nights at Shea, and while the ‘oo was in the process of bowing out and mercifully laying the post-Keith Moon beast to rest (for awhile, at least), the Clash was unquestionably at a peak. Longtime fans, of course, know that this was a band that experienced a succession of peaks alongside occasional lulls, but for the Shea shows these four men, already buoyed by the American reception to Combat Rock (released earlier that year, it had spawned the hits "Should I Stay or Should I Go" and "Rock the Casbah"), were in a take-no-prisoners mood at Shea.
In the past, bootlegs containing audience recordings of the two Shea shows failed to do justice to the band's performance; I may have even misjudged the band myself based on not really having the full picture. But Legacy has tapped the original mixing board tapes that Glyn Johns recorded, and combined with an outstanding tape restoration and contemporary mastering job the results are downright electrifying, sonically speaking. Guitars careen and clang across the entire stereo spectrum; the bass is particularly resonant; the drums sizzle crackle with clarity; and the vocals in particular are ultra clear, but not mixed so in-your-face that they override the instruments (a frequent pitfall of live recordings).
Straight out of the gate, Strummer, Jones, Simonon and drummer Terry Chimes - replacing Combat Rock skinsman Topper Headon, who'd succumbed to his drug addiction - sound like they aim to prove to every single one of those 50,000 punters that they're worthy of taking up the mantle that the Who is laying down. After an MC-styled intro/rant from the band's loon of a road manger Kosmo Vinyl ("You ain't worried about no rain, are ya?" he blares. "Rain's a load of rubbish. Don't worry about rain.... What we have for ya is a little bit of what's goin' on in London at the moment. So will you welcome... The Clash! C'mon!!!"), the band plows directly into "London Calling," and with its irresistible Simonon-powered throb, skittering drum figure and Strummer's prowling vocals it's arguably as powerful as the original album version. Strummer even unleashes his signature wolf-howl midsong and it sends a chill down your spine.
From that dynamic opener the Clash could have taken the easy way out and just served up the obvious anthems - "I Fought The Law," "English Civil War," "Rock the Casbah," "Train In Vain," "Should I Stay or Should I Go," etc. - and bank on the audience's presumed familiarity with the band via then-heavy MTV rotation for the quirky-but-memorable "Casbah" video. Those songs are in the Shea setlist, true, and with the exception of, ironically enough, an underwhelming "Casbah" (lacking its signature piano riff, it just sounds flat), they certainly pull their weight.
Yet listening to this at home now, and you have to assume it was true for at least part of the Shea crowd as well, part of what gives the concert such a visceral kick is the less obvious material the Clash performs and the feral intensity with which they attack it. Included are early-career gems such as "Career Opportunities" and "Tommy Gun," both transformed here from their punk roots into churning, Nuggets-worth garage anthems. A pair of underrated London Calling cuts also stand out, "Spanish Bombs" and "Clampdown" (the latter delivered with a militaristic, jazzlike precision). And the midset dub-punk/hip-hop Sandinista! throwdown of "Magnificent 7"/"Armagideon Time"/"Magnificent 7 (Return) has such a joyful, improvisational vibe to it - Strummer's vocal ad-libs display a supreme confidence, while Jones layers some astonishing psychedelic fretwork filigrees atop the Simonon-Chimes riddim chug - that it's not hard to imagine an entire stadium of freshly-recruited Clash Army recruits all skanking in unison as one heaving unit.
Live at Shea Stadium, by virtue of the sound quality and setlist notes mentioned above, and the fact that it's a single-snapshot type concert document (unlike 1999's From Here to Eternity Live, which comprised cuts from various tours spanning 1978-82), really drives home what it was like to experience the Clash live. That it arrives more than a quarter-century after the fact and loses none of its impact testifies to all those legacy/influence issues - and bears witness to the fact that, truly, the Clash was The Only Band That Matters.
The CD comes handsomely packaged as a hardbound book containing 24 thick-stock pages of photos and liner notes courtesy Clash pal and ace shutterbug Bob Gruen. His images of the band both on- and offstage are candid and revealing (the dressing room shots showing Simonon sharing a joke with David Bowie and Strummer engaging a spaced-out looking Andy Warhol are priceless). A few years ago when I was in New York to interview Strummer prior to a Mescaleros concert I ran into Gruen, who at the time was about to publish a book of Clash photos, and when I observed how his career had been indelibly entwined with the band's, he beamed as if I'd just paid him the hugest compliment imaginable. "As a photographer," said Gruen, "you couldn't ask for a more formidable and a more fertile visual subject than the Clash. I mean, you just couldn't take your eyes off them - they were mesmerizing."
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POSTSCRIPT: "Daddy, will you play ‘London Calling' just one more time? Please?" my 7-year old implored, after listening to the Shea version about four times in a row while we were driving around one afternoon. "Sure, I think I can do that," I replied, thinking to myself, he's mesmerized, too. The kids are alright.
Standout Tracks: "London Calling," "Clampdown," "Magnificent 7" FRED MILLS
