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LONDON CALLING: 25TH ANNIVERSARY LEGACY EDITION
The Clash
(Legacy/Sony)
Not to put too fine a point on it or anything, but Entertainment Weekly recently dubbed London Calling -- and we quote -- "The Best Album of All Time."
Perhaps that's a bit much. But only a bit. No matter how you slice it, this 1979 double album from the self-proclaimed Only Band That Matters was a monumental achievement.
An unexpected critical and commercial success, London Calling reconfigured the boundaries of punk rock with its genre-crossing mix of punk, reggae, jazz and funk.
It rejuvenated the struggling Clash artistically and vaulted them to full-fledged global pop stardom. Thanks to the last-minute inclusion of Train in Vain after LP covers were printed, it can even take credit for pioneering the album-closing hidden bonus cut.
So even if it isn't The Best Album of All Time, London Calling is certainly The Best Album of The Clash's Career.
For its silver anniversary, the band's crowning glory is getting the royal treatment. Precipitated by the discovery of long-lost demos and in-studio video footage, London Calling has been luxuriously expanded into a three-disc, 25th Anniversary Legacy Edition.
On the first disc, you get the remastered version of the original 19-tune album. On the second, you get the so-called Vanilla Tapes: More than an hour of demos and rehearsal tapes, including rough, lo-fi versions of most of the songs that made the album, along with a handful of tracks that didn't.
In case you missed that: The Vanilla Tapes has five previously unheard Clash recordings -- the rollicking country twanger Lonesome Me; the strolling instrumental Walking the Slidewalk; the reggae groover Where You Gonna Go (Soweto); a cover of Dylan's The Man in Me; and the Death or Gloryesque rocker Heart and Mind.
If that doesn't sell you, there's always the DVD, which has a half-hour documentary with plenty of interview footage (mostly recycled from the superior Westway to the World), three promo videos and, most significantly, home-video footage of the band in the studio with lunatic producer Guy Stevens, whose main input seems to consist of hurling chairs around to spur (or perhaps provoke) the band to play with greater gusto and abandon.
Hey, whatever he did, it worked. And London Calling: 25th Anniversary Legacy Edition is all the proof you need -- not to mention an absolutely indispensible addition to any Clash fan's collection.
Not to put too fine a point on it or anything.
Track Listing
Disc 1:
1. London Calling
2. Brand New Cadillac
3. Jimmy Jazz
4. Hateful
5. Rudie Can't Fail
6. Spanish Bombs
7. The Right Profile
8. Lost In The Supermarket
9. Clampdown
10. The Guns Of Brixton
11. Wrong 'Em Boyo
12. Death Or Glory
13. Koka Kola
14. The Card Cheat
15. Lover's Rock
16. 4 Horsemen
17. I'm Not Down
18. Revolution Rock
19. Train In Vain
Disc 2:
1. Hateful
2. Rudi Can't Fail
3. Paul's Tune
4. I'm Not Down
5. 4 Horsemen
6. Koka Kola
7. Death Or Glory
8. Lover's Rock
9. Lonesome Me
10. The Police Walked In 4 Jazz
11. Lost In The Supermarket
12. Up-Toon (Instrumental)
13. Walking The Slidewalk
14. Where You Gonna Go (Soweto)
15. The Man In Me
16. Remote Control
17. Working And Waiting
18. Heart And Mind
19. Brand New Cadillac
20. London Calling
21. Revolution Rock
Disc 3:
1. London Calling Live Concert Footage
2. I'm Not Down Snippet
3. The Right Profile Snippet
4. Brand New Cadillac Snippet
5. Hateful Snippet
6. Lovers Rock Snippet
7. Wrong 'Em Boyo Snippet
8. The Card Cheat Snippet
9. Lost In The Supermarket Snippet
10. Death Or Glory Snippet
11. Guns Of Brixton Snippet
12. Rudi Can't Fail Snippet
13. Train In Vain Snippet
14. The Right Profile Excerpt
15. Jimmy Jazz Snippet
16. Clampdown Snippet
17. Louie Louie Snippet
18. Louie Louie Snippet 2
19. Koka Kola
20. Revolution Rock Snippet
21. Louie Louie Live Footage