The Clash
Sandinista!
(Epic, 1980)

The story of the Clash’s originally ill-fated and finally appreciated fourth album has admittedly been well-documented, though that isn’t going to stop me from explaining what it means to me and why I think anyone who hasn’t yet come around to its charms might want to strap on their bullet belt, lace up their combat boots, and start doing the rebel waltz, pronto.

One of the most fabled two weeks in Clash history occurred in the spring of 1981, following the December 1980 release of Sandinista!. The band played its triumphant/disastrous string of shows at Bond’s Casino in New York, selling out the venue each night, something like five times over. When the fire marshal shut ‘em down, the band agreed to play make-up dates at their own expense, just so every customer would be satisfied. For anyone still in doubt as to whether the band was for real, if punk was still punk, and whether the Clash was up to the task of filling its brothel creepers two years after the Sex Pistols’ demise, the Clash proved they were, it was, and they did—for 17 nights in a row. 

I was witness to one night at Bond’s and because I had to blag my way in with a teenage whine—butwe came all the way from Califorrrrrrrnia—and it actually worked, it’s a night that lives large in my slightly aggrandized personal history. The rest of the night was appropriately historical, though I’ve reduced it to its tingly highlights, immediately apropos to this story: First, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five got pelted with foodstuffs by the bridge-and-tunnel crowd as they attempted to rap “The Message”: “Don’t push me ‘cause I’m close to the edge.” And second, the sound of the Clash’s swelling, spaghetti western intro music and their backlit silhouettes onstage created an off-the-hook, anything-can-happen vibe in the room. And then it happened: Angry with their small-minded fans, the Clash ripped into their latest single, a little rap tune of their own called “The Magnificent Seven”, the lead-off track to Sandinista!

It was with great risk to their career and to the dismay of their record label (first they had to figure out how to market punk—now rap?) that the Clash had followed their two-record London Calling with the triple album set, Sandinista! The band insisted that it be sold below the list price for a double record (which meant no royalties). Sure it was a popular move with the people, but financial failure would prove inevitable, as would the label’s undying enmity toward them. What did the powers that be make of Jones and Strummer’s cautionary tales of war, racism, media manipulation, dirty business deals, filthy politics, US government intervention, and foreign dictatorships? Who knows—they probably didn’t even listen to them. As for critics and fans, well, they were divided, the detractors asserting it would’ve made a fine single album, while the defendants gave it top honors (like in the annual Village Voice “Pazz and Jop” poll). Twenty-eight years on, the Clash’s missives from the frontlines of dispossession do indeed read like prophesy; musically they are a mixture of reggae, dub, hip-hop, gospel, jazz, punk, rockabilly, R&B, and more. “Mensforth Hill” might even be a template for the 21st century mash-up.

Like Bob Marley who documented the relationship between the two brands of rebel music in “Punky Reggae Party” (inspired by the Clash), the band did something similar on Sandinista! when they welcomed rap to the conscious party. It was just a moment in time, but the ghetto sounds of reggae, punk, and hip-hop were once interdependent on each other (a fact that likes to remain fairly obscured in official rock history, though it is a point the Clash took great pains to demonstrate again and again). 

Among the guests joining them in their tightly-knit studio camp were Jamaica’s Mikey Dread (RIP 2008) and singer Ellen Foley (”Paradise by the Dashboard Light” and Jones’ girlfriend). Phil Ochs and the Bible were quoted, Victor Jara was remembered, Spanish was spoken, and Mose Allison was covered. Bill Price in the production lab contributed to pulling together the potentially messy mess into a masterpiece. Thirty-six songs in all, among the most memorable to me are the slice of life rap, “Lightning Strikes (Not Once but Twice)”, Eddy Grant’s tale of police harassment (years before N.W.A. ranted) “Police on My Back”, guest singer/fiddler Tymon Dogg’s wonky folk song “Lose This Skin”, and the de facto title song, “Washington Bullets”, that lets the listener decide which incident in government intervention history yielded the worst results.

And, I could be wrong, but I’m thinking Topper Headon and Paul Simonon might just be one of the most grossly underrated rhythm sections in rock. The pair consistently locked-in for frontliners Joe and Mick who, along with Paul, famously tapped heels in unison throughout just about every song they ever played. The way the drummer and bassist swing from light calypso to heavy dub and back to regulation 4/4 rock time on Sandinista! is simultaneously barely noticeable and a revelation. (How is it we live in a world where these two aren’t making music together anymore?)

Among the many things to love about the Clash is that they were truly rebels—with any number of causes—and, as rockers rather than revolutionaries, they still died fighting. By the time they released the follow-up to Sandinista!, the commercial breakthrough Combat Rock (by no means a sonic or thematic lightweight), they were experiencing a band version of the eve of destruction. Drugs and egos had infiltrated the ranks. Management was working personnel’s nerves. Big money was at stake. No one even mentions the Jones and Headon-less Cut the Crap anymore.

The Clash’s public service broadcasts hadn’t changed the world nor could the Clash resist the changes to the world or to their band, though for a brief spell—a time in which actual Nicaraguan rebels toppled their government, a punk rock band named their record after them, then talked a major label into releasing a triple record set dealing in anti-imperialist themes to sell it for the price of one and a half albums—it seemed like they could have. That might partly explain why such a strong cult following grew around the album, and sparked The Sandinista! Project, a covers album released in 2007 featuring musical politicos Camper Van Beethoven and the Mekons’ Jon Langford and Sally Timms. But it’s Sandinista! itself that stands as a tribute to the Clash’s career, and a reminder of an era when a band could matter, and quite possibly impact the world order. At the very least, it’s a reminder of a time when some of us thought that was even possible.

A couple of months after the Bond’s shows, the all-new MTV would launch, and music and media would change inalterably. The Clash’s studied image fit right in and within the year, their next album would explode, thanks to the new medium and a clever clip for “Rock the Casbah.” The reggae-punk-hip-hop alliance, the likes of which the Clash had presented at Bond’s and on Sandinista! had fallen by the wayside (MTV chose not to broadcast a black face until 1983). And though the Clash’s musical influence didn’t always extend to their liberation politics (nor did they consistently practice them), the passion with which they delivered their ideas and executed their music set a bar that has rarely been reached by bands since. Sandinista! will forever remain a watershed moment in the history of revolution rock; in a word, it’s magnificent!

Listen: “Somebody Got Murdered” [at youtube.com]

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Wayne Kramer: Mad for the Racket and Not Near Done

The Mekons: Three Decades Outside the Mainstream

Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten