Joe Strummer (born John Mellor), raspy-voiced lead crooner for the English rock 'n' roll combo 'The Clash,' died suddenly of a heart attack on December 22. He was 50.

With the variety and experimentation of their music, the Clash proved to be unlike any other group of the time. They began as part of the UK punk rock scene, but by 1979, it was clear that they had higher aspirations, mixing their rock sounds with reggae, funk, and dub.

"The Only Band that Matters" deserves a tribute. So, the Gazette has called on music authority Mark Prindle (creator of www.markprindle.com) to give us the no-nonsense lowdown on the Clash's principal records with ratings using the 10-point Prindle-meter.

The Clash (UK version) - CBS 1977.

An essential punk record. If you've already got Never Mind The Bollocks and Ramones, try your darnedest to pick this one up by the end of the week.

It may be tinny, but almost every song books and bops along with the excitable reckless abandon of a bunch of scruffs getting a chance to make a record for the very first time!

Mostly simple, poppy, and punky, the strength of these songs is multiplied ninety-fold by the rotten stinking cockney gruff shout of lead boy Joe Strummer. Ignore the happy melodies; it must be punk if the singer sounds like he's about to sock you in the back of the head!

Classics include "Career Opportunities," "I'm So Bored With The U.S.A.," "White Riot," and "London's Burning." Did I mention the word "essential?" Plus, one of the finest tracks on the disc is the incredibly well-placed 12th track, a reggae cover called "Police And Thieves" that gives ample warning that this band, though a perfectly fine punk band, isn't about to shy away from the concept of artistic growth.

The flow is great, the energy level is high; basically, the only thing keeping this one from getting a ten is the inclusion of a few weak tracks (all of which would be removed for the American re-issue!).

Give 'Em Enough Rope - CBS 1978.

A total snore. Presumably in an attempt to refine their sound for popular American consumption, the Clashers have slowed everything down and made their songs longer without bothering to break from the three-chord pattern that, though perfectly suited to speedy angry little hardcore songs, renders a Tom Petty-length song boringer than a damn church sermon.

Play it on 78 and maybe it kicks ass, but at thirty-three revolutions per minute, these songs lope along like mediocre mid-'80s glam metal.

Classics include nothing. "Safe European Home, " "Stay Free, " and "All The Young Punks" are kinda catchy, but the "Can't Explain" rip-off (that inspired a darn fine Crass song, by the way) and the "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" rip-off are, well, rip-offs, and the other five tracks sound like Rancid. Dullsville, U.S.A. Or Britain, as it were.

I don't blame a band for changing its sound, but they should at least try to change it for the better!

* London Calling - CBS 1979. *

Somebody must have complained about Give 'Em Enough Rope, 'cause this sounds like a completely different band!!

No more a one-dimensional barre chord combo, The Clash here present themselves as a fully-realized (and incredibly well-produced) rock/pop/reggae/funk/soul/jazz/blues/punk/ lounge act with more great melodies than J.D.'s got Considine!

Nineteen tracks and two albums big, this thing is darn near perfect in composition and presentation! Cereal! Rolling Stone Magazine labeled it "the finest album of the '80s, " and, for once, they're actually in the right ballpark! I can't help but exclaim!

Who'da dreamt that the washed-up old men that tossed out that last clunker could have transformed into this gang of tight professional musicians? Sí, señor!

Okay, superlatives aside, what does the album sound like? Well, it's reeeeeal poppy. The title track and "The Guns Of Brixton" are bitter little things, but the other seventeen numbers are happier than wallpaper. Every last one of 'em!

Whether they be '50s rock and roll, swing, clompy amphetamine rushes, or "Train In Vain," they're all so bubbly and full of spirit, verve, and glee that only a bitter old snooty toot could flip them an Irish bird. I love this album.

Yeah, some of the songs have stupid little bits that I could do without (the hokey middle-eight in "I'm Not Down, " the ugly chorus in the otherwise beautiful "Lost In The Supermarket, " the entire track "Four Horsemen"), but spread across eighty minutes of tar, you hardly even notice the minor shortcomings! No, it's not punk rock, but it's just glorious.

It's got this great song about snorting coke, and another one about Montgomery Clift, and ooh! That one about "working for the clampdown" with that neat chiming guitar thing at the end - that's killer, too. So great. "The Card Cheat" is a triumph. Goddammit, they're all triumphs! You can't even tell which ones are the covers, they're so great! Purchase it!

But, and I mean this as a valid warning - you gotta like happy pop music or you'll despise this record. Of course, you also have to like Joe Strummer's voice, which immediately eliminates about 9/10ths of all happy pop music fans, but those remaining 15 or 20 of you - look out, Tokyo!!!!

Sandinista! - CBS 1980.

Good lord. You know, with the teeniest bit of editing, this could have been a phenomenal single album, or even a really good double-album. But a TRIPLE-ALBUM??????? WHY THE HELL WOULD WE POSSIBLY WANT TO SIT THROUGH EVERY FRIGGIN' DUB REGGAE BLOOP THESE GUYS FEEL LIKE PUTTING ON TAPE?????

Oh, enough bitterness. There really are some wonderful tracks on here; lots of dippy pop stuff ("Hitsville UK, " "Somebody Got Murdered" - both great tracks), some delightful funk ("The Magnificent Seven"), gospel ("The Sound Of The Sinners"), novelty (child-sung versions of "Career Opportunities" and "The Guns Of Brixton"), and other neat experiments in that vein.

The problem is that, between every couple of great melodic trackers lies a bunch of boring interchangable reggae crap. Now see, if you're a reggae AFFICIONADO, you might really dig sittin' through this guff, but aside from the stand-out tracks "The Crooked Beat" and "One More Time," I personally can't find anything interesting to grab ahold of in any of these slug-paced ganja anthems.

Your best course of action would probably be to find somebody who owns the record, borrow it, and just tape your favorite songs because, trust me on this, the thought of sitting through all 36 of these tracks on a regular basis is daunting to the point of inducing seasickness, or at least carsickness, slight nausea, or tinnitis. Not lupus, though. That kills people, and isn't funny at all. Unlike tinnitis, which is hi-friggin'-larious!!!!!

Combat Rock - CBS 1982.

Cheese Louise, is this a weird album.

Starts off innocuous enough, with the brash chanka chank rock of "Know Your Rights" (followed by the poppy reggae "Car Jamming" and the classics "Should I Stay Or Should I Go?" and "Rock The Casbah"), but soon takes a weird left turn followed by a couple of swerves around in a circle before coming to a standstill somewhere in the middle of Amsterdam.

Side two is so weird! Funk, sure, but what the hell is that other stuff? Poetry? Pop? Ambient lounge jazz? Strange and DEFINITELY not "rock," these tracks nevertheless present a defining truth about this here combo - they had aspirations far beyond anything that anybody ever gave them credit for.

Sorry about that preposition at the end there, but, again, people still call The Clash "a classic punk rock band," and everyone talks about how Rancid "sound just like The Clash!," but the truth is that Rancid most likely will NEVER come close to sounding like the true Clash - the Clash that took musical chances and stepped all over the globe for positive influence (unlike Rancid, who can only play "boring midtempo retro-punk" and "white reggae," but ooooh! They have mohawks!!!).

This is The Clash that blows me away. Why would anyone in their right mind put out an album full of disjointed unconnected genre-bending little thingamajigs and dare to call it Combat ROCK??? Oh man, what a band.

Don't buy this expecting twelve variations on "Should I Stay Or Should I Go?," though, 'cause, as great a little rock and roll song as that is, Mick and the gang had other plans.

Now, of course, everybody trashes this album, but they can frig off, because it's actually really great. "Straight To Hell?" Heard that one? Man. Sell-out? Aaaaah, no. Generally, when a band desires to "sell out," they record songs that people might actually want to BUY!

Cut The Crap - CBS 1985.

I know this is obvious, but how am I supposed to resist pointing out that if you replace the first two words of the album title with "Worthless Fucking," you've got a pretty good idea of what Joe Strummer and his gang of scabs have recorded for your listening pleasure here. This record is offensively atrocious.

With Mick out of the way, Joe tries to make every song recapture the lost glory of old school Clash (Give 'Em Enough Rope) by piling on the boring chord sequences, ridiculously bombastic band choruses, and utterly moronic lyrics. An appalling degeneration in every way.

Not only is it full of the worst songs ever recorded by any band called The Clash ("Fingerpoppin'" is, in fact, one of the worst songs ever recorded by ANYBODY), but they're all full of cheesy mid-'80s keyboards and fake drums!!!! Classics include flushing the damn thing down the toilet.

I'm not saying that Mick's Big Audio Dynamite was any better (I wouldn't know; I've never heard them), but at least he didn't claim to be The Clash. Darn that Joe Strummer to heck!

You know what you should do now? Go over to www.inch.com/~freevers/ and download the "Jared" software. It's pretty darn entertaining.

From Wilshire Gazette (February 2003)

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