sandinista!
we've been having incredibly good luck at half price lately. found a clean, british vinyl copy of the clash's sprawling triple album from 1980 the other day while perusing the stacks, hoping for another find like the 'riginal '60s cecil taylor rec i unearthed last week. sure, i have a burned cd copy of sandinista! already, and my sweetie owned the clash on broadway box before we met, but certain recs you just _have_ to hear on vinyl. i'd include funhouse, the who sell out, and electric ladyland in that category; curiously, with other favorites like astral weeks i'm indifferent to format -- prolly has to do with how i first heard 'em (which 'splains why i only own live at leeds on ceedee now, since my preferred version is the '95 remaster that finally included all the pre-tommy songs that nik cohn said were gonna be on it in the new york times before the original elpee's release).
in the fullness of time, sandinista! seems like less of an indulgence than it did when it was new, and more in keeping with the way people listen to music now -- e.g., as a _bath_, rather than a precious artifact. it's about as different as it can be from their first album, which was the biggest-selling item in the history of jem records (new joisey-based import specialists of yore) -- diffuse where the green-covered album was focused. (i'll admit i prefer the u.s. version of the clash, which i heard first; can't imagine it without "clash city rockers," "white man in hammersmith palais," "i fought the law," and "complete control.") it's hard to imagine a band as unashamedly eclectic the clash, who omniverously absorbed and reflected the entahr musical world they inhabited, from rockabilly to reggae to dub to hip-hop, _and_ had mass-ass appeal, emerging in today's marketplace. that's partly a reflection of how fragmented the mass audience has become as its scale 'n' scope have ballooned out of all proportion, but also an indication of how much homogeneity the various component parts of that audience demand from musos of the particular stripe they favor. for that reason, it's also difficult to imagine a band as bifurcated as the clash -- wherein strummer really was a rootsy populist, while jones really wanted to be in mott the hoople -- existing in today's modern, now-a-go-go, um, united states of generica.
in the fullness of time, sandinista! seems like less of an indulgence than it did when it was new, and more in keeping with the way people listen to music now -- e.g., as a _bath_, rather than a precious artifact. it's about as different as it can be from their first album, which was the biggest-selling item in the history of jem records (new joisey-based import specialists of yore) -- diffuse where the green-covered album was focused. (i'll admit i prefer the u.s. version of the clash, which i heard first; can't imagine it without "clash city rockers," "white man in hammersmith palais," "i fought the law," and "complete control.") it's hard to imagine a band as unashamedly eclectic the clash, who omniverously absorbed and reflected the entahr musical world they inhabited, from rockabilly to reggae to dub to hip-hop, _and_ had mass-ass appeal, emerging in today's marketplace. that's partly a reflection of how fragmented the mass audience has become as its scale 'n' scope have ballooned out of all proportion, but also an indication of how much homogeneity the various component parts of that audience demand from musos of the particular stripe they favor. for that reason, it's also difficult to imagine a band as bifurcated as the clash -- wherein strummer really was a rootsy populist, while jones really wanted to be in mott the hoople -- existing in today's modern, now-a-go-go, um, united states of generica.
posted by stashdauber at 7:06 AM
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