Sandinista!

Sprawling, messy, at times glorious, Sandinista! is either the best of Clash albums or the worst of Clash albums, depending on whom you ask. In a Charles Dickens-y kind of way, perhaps it is both.

I've considered the possibility that Sandinista! is the band's best album, but I haven't been able to seriously entertain that notion for long. I hate to take up a standard line, but it's true: this material would have made a truly masterful double album instead of a triple.

Which isn't to say that there is any poor material here, just that some of it is clearly better than the rest. My own suggestion would be to trim down a few of the four-minute-plus songs down to size (imagine, instead of a 4:32 version of "Up In Heaven (Not Here)" a version that ends about a minute earlier; while you're at it, shave a minute off of "The Crooked Beat," and you get the idea) and to take the dubs and "Mensforth Hill" (and perhaps "Hitsville UK" or "Lose This Skin") and put them on a 12" attached to the double LP (as what we would call "bonus tracks" today), and the album proper becomes leaner and more powerful. Then you might have a serious contender for The Clash's best album.

As it is, I appreciate what the band was after -- to give the people who buy the album the best deal they can offer, the most material for their money, in their own attempt to bust the rock star-money grab/corporate chain of greed that they so detested.

So, where is the greatness of Sandinista! to be found? To put it simply, Sandinista! is the band's most creative album. If London Calling was The Clash's masterful attempt at fusing its own innovative reggae-punk with classic rock idiom, Sandinista! takes the formula a step further not only by exploring those musical traditions in greater depth but also by reaching out to further corners of the world of sound: to rap, funk, jazz, and dub, in particular, abetted by the spacey, echoey sound of Mick Jones' guitar. Mickey Gallagher's keyboard (in addition to Topper's nimble drumming) is the great enabler here, creating a substantial difference between Sandinista! and the band's punkier earlier material. Strummer had not yet reached out to the far corners of the globe -- to East Asia -- as he would with Combat Rock, but lyrically the bloke from Ladbroke Grove had traveled far already, and the music from the rest of the band was keeping up with the beat. The Clash had started out a provincial band, capturing the spirit of a particular cultural and historical moment, embedded in a particular locale. While London Calling looked to far horizons, it filtered everything through the London sound. Sandinista!, by contrast, speaks of having been to those far horizons and come back. If there is a city backdrop anywhere in Sandinista!, it isn't London, nor is it Kingstown, Jamaica, where part of the album was recorded -- it's New York, the beat of which infuses "The Magnificent Seven" and carries through in a steady vibe throughout the rest of the album's thirty-six tracks. On this album, The Clash becomes, temporarily at least, an American band.

Particular songs to note:

"The Magnificent Seven": Strummer's convincing and bold excursion into rap without compromising in the least the band's muscular sound.

"Something About England": one of the Clash's most poignant songs to date, a song that deals with English culture and the pervasiveness of racism/conservative prigginshness in contemporary English society in a more nuanced way than Strummer's lyrics had treated these themes in the past--but without losing his signature vocal snarl.

"Rebel Waltz": showcasing a tough band's willingness to make a song that is, quite simply, very pretty.

"Look Here": No one would ever mistake The Clash for a jazz combo, Topper Headon's drum talents notwithstanding, but they certainly do Mose Allison no disservice with this cover. One of the band's most genuinely musically inventive moments.

"The Crooked Beat": Though perhaps a bit too long, still a great contribution by Paul Simonon, whose stilted vocals possess an unmistakeably crooked charm.

"Corner Soul"; "Washington Bullets": While sticking with a West Indian vibe, these songs lyrically take the band in a more truly global direction. "Bullets" is a bit blunt and clumsy with its lyrics, but it's still a delightful shock to hear a scrawny Englishman attacking the United States of America with such confidence.

"The Sound of the Sinners": Faux-gospel, something truly unexpected, but Strummer manages to channel the vocal enthusiasm required by the genre.

"Charlie Don't Surf": Lyrically, this song is a precursor to "Straight to Hell" and others on Combat Rock. Certainly, "Straight to Hell," with its surface ironies barely masking the song's poignant sensitivities, is the superior song, but there's also a place for the jokey approach of "Charlie" in The Clash's repertoire.

"Broadway": Perhaps The Clash's most melancholy song ever, a heartfelt street anthem. You can imagine Joe Strummer walking the streets of New York, early dawn, running into some bum, and the exchange that follows. A stunning New York counterpart to "Something About England."

I've left out a few others -- "One More Time," the album's best reggae track, and "Kingston Advice" -- but the album is simply too big to grasp in one sitting. I've never listened to the whole thing straight through, and I wonder who has. Maybe I'll try it some day.