In the Spring of 1981 you couldn't walk around Manhattan without seeing flyers for the Lounge Lizards, a band that was half rock/ half jazz. The jazz side included leader and sax player John Lurie and his pianist brother Evan. Noise guitarist Arto Lindsay, Feelies drummer Anton Fier and bassist Steve Piccolo made up the rock side. John Lurie described the Lounge Lizards as "fake jazz". The band deconstructed familiar tunes and added jagged edges courtesy of Lurie and Lindsay. They played together well into the 1990's . Lurie is now best known for acting and his HBO series "Painting With John".
The Rolling Stones : Everything Is Turning To Gold
On March 12, 1981 The Rolling Stones released Sucking in the 70's, which opens with "Shattered" and includes the B-side "Everything Is Turning To Gold", a live version of "When the Whip Comes Down" and only one never released track, "If I Was a Dancer ( Dance Part II)". Not essential by any stretch. Even radio programmers had trouble selecting a track to play.
The 101ers : Keys To Your Heart
In March of 1981 Andalucia Records released this compilation by the 101ers, Joe Strummer's pub rock band before he formed The Clash. Strummer sings lead on most of the tracks, recorded between 1974 and 1976. Best known tracks are "Keys To Your Heart", written about Palmolive of The Slits and a cover of "Junco Partner" which would be covered by The Clash on Sandinista!
Ellen Foley : Torchlight
And while we are on the subject of the Clash Ellen Foley has a new sound courtesy of her boyfriend Mick Jones. He and other members of The Clash write play and produce some of the songs on Spirit of St Louis. That explains the marimba!
Rosanne Cash : Seven Year Ache
The title track from Rosanne Cash's critically acclaimed third album would top the country charts. Produced by husband Rodney Crowell, Cash also offers cover versions of Merle Haggard's "You Don't Have Very Far To Go" and Steve Forbert's "What Kinda Girl". Two other songs on the album topped the country charts," My Baby Thinks He's A Train" and "Blue Moon with Heartache".
The 1980 Village Voice Pazz and Jop Critics Poll is made up of a surprising number of 1979 albums, including the winner of the poll, London Calling, which was released December 14 in the UK and in early January in the US. Other 1979 releases include #5 Public Image Ltd's Second Edition ( released as Metal Box in the UK on November 23), Gang of Four's Entertainment! ( released September 25, 1979) and Michael Jackson's Off The Wall, released in August of 1979. Also of note: a rap record topped the singles poll for the first time ever.
Albums
1. The Clash: London Calling (Epic) 1347 (89)
2. Bruce Springsteen: The River (Columbia) 973 (80)
3. Talking Heads: Remain in Light (Sire) 863 (77)
4. Pretenders: Pretenders (Sire) 702 (68)
5. Public Image Ltd.: Second Edition (Island) 625 (51) **
6. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band: Doc at the Radar Station (Virgin) 594 (56)
7. Elvis Costello & the Attractions: Get Happy!! (Columbia) 571 (53)
8. Stevie Wonder: Hotter Than July (Tamla) 400 (35)
9. Prince: Dirty Mind (Warner Bros.) 383 (38)
10. Gang Of Four: Entertainment! (Warner Bros.) 383 (30)
11. Peter Gabriel: Peter Gabriel (Mercury) 280 (31)
12. Steely Dan: Gaucho (MCA) 268 (24)
13. Michael Jackson: Off the Wall (Epic) 267 (24)
14. Peter Townshend: Empty Glass (Atco) 251 (26)
15. Rockpile: Seconds Of Pleasure (Columbia) 232 (28)
16. X: Los Angeles (Slash) 229 (22)
17. The Feelies: Crazy Rhythms (Stiff) 221 (19)
18. Dire Straits: Making Movies (Warner Bros.) 209 (24)
19. David Bowie: Scary Monsters (RCA Victor) 186 (19)
20. The Rolling Stones: Emotional Rescue (Rolling Stones) 181 (19)
21. The English Beat: I Just Can't Stop It (Sire) 178 (22)
22. Joy Division: Closer (Factory import) 166 (13)
36. Graham Parker: The Up Escalator (Arista) 116 (12)
37. John Lennon/Yoko Ono: Double Fantasy (Geffen) 114 (12)
38. Joan Armatrading: Me Myself I (A&M) 108 (10)
39. Diana Ross: Diana (Motown) 106 (16)
40. Pink Floyd: The Wall (Columbia) 103 (9) 1979
* * Includes 1979 votes: 26 (3) for Pretenders; 179 (16) for Off the Wall; 65 (5) for The Wall. ** Includes votes for The Metal Box (Virgin), the import-only 45-rpm mix of Second Edition.
Singles
1. Kurtis Blow: "The Breaks" (Mercury) 40 *
2. Joy Division: "Love Will Tear Us Apart" (Factory import) 38
3. Blondie: "Call Me" (Chrysalis) 36 *
4. The Clash: "Train in Vain"/"London Calling" (Epic) 32
On December 12, 1980 The Clash released Sandinista!, a three album 36-song set recorded in London, Manchester, Jamaica and New York.
"It just grew," Strummer explained to Smash Hits. "We went into Electric Ladyland after the American tour in February and we just made some music and it just kept going on and on. Six months later we got into a studio over here and we cut some more stuff. We added it all up and we realized we weren't going to get it on our usual two and so we thought let's go for three."
The band had to forego royalties on the first 200,000 copies sold in the UK and take a 50% cut elsewhere.
Sandinista! is a slog to get through and just about everyone agrees it could have been cut down to a great single album and a very good double album.In every case you would want "Washington Bullets", once the name of the NBA team and one of Joe Strummer's most political song.
The killing clowns, the blood money men
Are shooting those Washington bullets again
Although the album would eventually top the 1981 Village Voice Pazz and Jop Critics Poll, early reviews suggested The Clash let their ambition get the better of them. The punks said Sandinista! is not punk.
"We're gonna record exactly what we want to record," Joe Strummer declared to Smash Hits. "And nothing else. We never pay any attention until afterwards when the record is out and you're in Hamburg and there's some mob of punks shouting 'Sellout!' Then you start thinking 'I'm glad we put this record out before we met this bunch because we're right and they're wrong'. I know they are."
The album leaps from genre to genre as The Clash visit funk, reggae, dub ( for a few songs too many) and, on "The Magnificent Seven", even this new fangled genre known as rap.
It may all be a bit too much. Quick: name a great three disc album? All Things Must Pass? The final disc is made up of the forgettable Apple Jam. Yessongs? Why would anyone listen to a live album with muddy sound by a band that made its name in the studio? Even Public Image Ltd's Metal Box had three discs as a gimmick. No side totaling more than 13 minutes. And I'd argue it get tiresome in one sitting.
So here's the line-up of my single album version of Sandinista!:
On November 28, 1980 The Clash released the UK#40 anti-draft single "The Call Up", which preceded their new album Sandinista! I was seventeen when the draft was reinstated in the United States and Ronald Reagan had El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua in his gunsights. Central America would be our next Vietnam. The Clash, from overseas, told us "It's up to you not to heed the call-up".
Thanks to the music video the Clash introduced a new fashion trend: guerrilla chic.
On October 21, 1980 The Clash released the Black Market Clash EP in the US and Canada. Featured are nine rare songs previously unavailable over the past years, leading off with "Capital Radio", the title track from a 1977 UK-only EP. There's "Cheat" from the UK version of the debut album. You'll also find B-sides like "City of the Dead","The Prisoner", "Armagideon Time" and "Pressure Drop" as well as a cover of Booker T and the MG's' "Time Is Tight" from the Sandanista sessions.
Robert Christgau of the Village Voice gave the album a grade of A-, writing:
CBS's transparent attempt to class up a dumb new line of ten-inch LPs that some marketeer thinks will make collectors of us all, this hodgepodge makes more sense than Elvis the C's long-awaited full-sized hodgepodge nevertheless. First side combines B's and a U.K.-only album cut from '77-'78, when everything they did was touched with the desperate euphoria of revolutionary holdouts, with two garageland covers, the Toots appropriate and the Booker T. a stroke. Second is spacy Clash dub plus hooks, with the yearning "Bankrobber" more lyrical than anything else they've committed to plastic. Yet.
The EP has since been superseded by the 21-track Super Black Market Clash.
On August 23, 1980 Heatwave, a day-long New Wave music festival held near Toronto on August 23rd drew more than 60,000 people who saw Elvis Costello and the Attractions, Talking Heads, the Pretenders, the B-52's and Rockpile. Promoters need 90,000 to break even and failed. They blamed the lower-than-expected turnout on four factors: a limited advertising budget that didn't penetrate U.S. markets deeply enough and didn't include a sufficient budget for print ads; the lack of a big-name crossover artist like Tom Petty or the Cars, which would have attracted a broader audience; the riot that broke out a few days before the festival when Alice Cooper failed to appear at a concert at the nearby Canadian National Exhibition; and lack of support from record companies which were were reluctant to help with advertising costs and even wanted to charge the festival for photos and biographical material. It didn't help that The Clash dropped out. Overall promoters lost a million dollars.
But even if Heatwave wasn't a smashing commercial success, it was an artistic triumph. Particularly noteworthy were performances by Talking Heads and Elvis Costello (his only North American appearance so far this year). The Heads appeared with an expanded — and funk-infused — lineup of nine musicians, including keyboardist Bernie Worrell from Parliament-Funkadelic and guitarist Adrian Belew, who's played with David Bowie. Costello appeared friendlier than usual as he chatted and joked with the crowd ("Hi, we're the Clash" were his opening words), which brought him back for three encores.
On August 3, 1980, "Bankrobber", a new single from The Clash, debuted on the UK Charts at #60. Produced by reggae great Mikey Dread, who mixed Paul Simonon's bass up high in the mix, the non-album single would peak at UK#12.
To promote the album, The Clash made the low budget video below. Roadies Baker and Johnny Green are wearing masks in the open and 40 years before a worldwide pandemic what could be more suspicious? Police questioned the pair who thought they might actually be the real thing.
--Smash Hits
LESTER BANGS TEN FAVORITE SINGLES OF 1980:
Au Pairs: “Diet”/”It’s Obvious” (021 import);
Teenage Jesus & the Jerks (Migraine EP);
Mars (Lust Unlust EP);
The Mekons: “Snow” (Red Rhino);
The Clash: “Bankrobber” (CBS import);
Lipps, Inc.: “Funkytown” (Casablanca);
Ramones: “I Wanna Be Sedated” (RSO);
Was (Not Was): “Wheel Me Out” (ZE/Antilles);
Public Image Ltd.: “Memories”/”Another” (Virgin import);
On March 22, 1980 The Clash visited the Billboard Hot 100 chart for the first time with the ridiculously catchy "Train in Vain (Stand By Me)" b/w "London Calling", which debuted #84. The song would peak at US#23.
Written in the immediate aftermath of a break up with Viv Albertine of The Slits, Mick Jones sings lyrics we've all heard ourselves say at one point:
"Train in Vain, what a beautiful song. It still makes me laugh when I hear it because mmm… I wasn't that bad...I'm really proud to have inspired that but often he won't admit to it. He used to get the train to my place in Shepherds Bush and I would not let him in. He was bleating on the doorstep. That was cruel. It's such an odd title; there's nothing in it about a train."
The song appears on the album London Calling, but you won't find the title on the original releases. Mick Jones explained the reason why to MTV:
"The real story on "Train in Vain" is that originally we needed a song to give to the NME for a flexi disk that NME was going to do. And then it was decided that it didn't work out or decided the flexi disk didn't work out so we had this spare track we had done as a giveaway. So we put it on London Calling but there wasn't time because the sleeves were already done."
That makes "Train in Vain" a hidden gem, and the song that finally opened the American market to "the only band that ever mattered".
On March 13, 1980 The Clash's movie Rude Boy made its world premiere at Prince Charles Cinema in London's Leicester Square. Filmed between 1977 and 1979, the movie stars Ray Gange playing an ex-Clash roadie who used to work in a porn shop. His accent is indecipherable but we understand the word "fuck' is said 96 times.
The movie is awful but the concert footage is brilliant.
Here's a scene you didn't come to this post to see, featuring Joe Strummer and Gange talking socialist politics over beer that ends with Gange asking to be the band's roadie.
Here's an extremely short clip of the Clash getting ready to rehearse.
Finally, here's Gange explaining that the film mirrors his own experiences as a roadie for The Clash. Gange would not make a career out of acting. That's something that will not surprise anyone who sees the movie. He did, however, become romantically involved with Wayne's World director Penelope Spheeris .
On March 2, 1980 the English punk band UK Subs entered the UK charts at #42 with "Warhead", one of the year's most anxious nuclear war songs. In the midst of the Cold War, we were all living with the possibility that a nuclear war could break out at any moment. The evening news reported escalating tensions between Russia and the United States, especially after Russian invaded Afghanistan. There were new countries with nuclear capabilities. The weapons were more powerful than ever. With its lyrics "Bye bye planet let alone your nation", "Warhead" would peak at UK#30, but it is far from the only song of the year to deal with nukes.
Top 10 Anxious Nuclear War Songs of 1980
1. UK Subs "Warhead"
While the heads of state are having their fun
Are they ready?
We're looking at the world through a barrel of a gun
Are we ready?
You stand there beating on your little war drum
Are you ready?
And it won't be long before your time has come
Are you ready?
2. The Sound "Missiles"
Missiles cause damage
And make an eerie sound
Missiles leave carnage
Where there once was a town
Who the hell makes those missiles?
3. Peter Gabriel Games Without Frontiers
If looks could kill, they probably will
In games without frontiers, war without tears
4. The Police : When the World Is Running Down, You Make the Best of What's Still Around
Plug in my M.C.I
To exercise my brain
Make records on my own
Can't go out in the rain...
When the world is running down
You make the best of what's still around
5. The Clash : Ivan Meets G.I. Joe
He wiped the Earth clean as a plate
What does it take to make a Ruskie break?
But the crowd are bored and off they go
Over the road to watch China blow
6. XTC : Living Thru Another Cuba
Russia and America are at each other's throats
But don't you cry
Just on your knees and pray, and while you're
Down there, kiss your arse goodbye
7. Kate Bush : Breathing
We've lost our chance
We're the first and the last, ooh
After the blast
Chips of plutonium
Are twinkling in every lung
8. The Specials : Man at C + A
Warning, warning, nuclear attack
Atomic sounds designed to blow your mind
World war three - nuclear attack
Rocking atomically - this third world war - atomic sounds
9. OMD : Enola Gay
These games you play, they're gonna end in more than tears someday
Uh huh Enola Gay, it shouldn't ever have to end this way
10. Data Fallout
You'd better run for shelter, and put yourself in a
Fallout suit
You'd better get yourself used to, just living in a
Fallout suit
A satellite clockwork information, is going to give you
The duration
Of the fallout
1979 was a remarkable year for albums and singles. I don 't think we've witnessed a year like that since. In the same year we got The Clash's London Calling, Pink Floyd's The Wall, Gang of Four's Entertainment!, Talking Heads's Fear of Music, Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures and Armed Forces by Elvis Costello and the Attractions. Over the course of the year my admiration for some albums increased, especially Unknown Pleasures, Wire's 154, Pil's Metal Box, Fleetwood Mac's Tusk and The Beat's debut which I wasn't familiar with at the start of the year. Other great discoveries included Tangerine Dream's Force Majeure and Gary Numan's Pleasure Principle, Joe Egan's Out of Nowhere, and the Toms album.
Fave Albums 1979
The Clash London Calling
Gang of Four Entertainment!
Talking Heads Fear of Music
Joy Division Unknown Pleasures
Elvis Costello Armed Forces
Wire 154
PiL Metal Box
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers Damn the Torpedoes
Graham Parker Squeezing Out Sparks
Fleetwood Mac Tusk
XTC Drums and Wires
The Beat
Joe Jackson Look Sharp
The Specials
Sparks No 1 Song in Heaven
Tangerine Dream Force Majeure
Robert Fripp Exposure
The Cars Candy O
Gary Numan Pleasure Principle
The B 52's
Fave Singles
Joy Division Transmission
The Clash London Calling
Wire Outdoor Miner
The Cure Boys Don't Cry
Buzzcocks Everybody's Happy Nowadays/Why Can't I Touch It
XTC Making Plans for Nigel
The Specials Gangsters
Talking Heads Life During Wartime
The Pop Group She is Beyond Good and Evil
The Ruts Babylon's Burning
Undertones Teenage Kicks
Blondie Heart of Glass
Nick Lowe Cruel to be Kind
Prince I Wanna Be Your Lover
Squeeze Up the Junction
Gary Numan Cars
Michael Jackson Don't Stop Til You Get Enough
Chic Good Times
Sugarhill Gang Rappers Delight
Sparks The Number One Song in Heaven
On Social Media
Promoting this page on Twitter has been fun this year with retweets, likes and responses from Graham Parker, Eric Idle, The Mekons, Gang of Four, Bebe Buell, Mark Stewart of The Pop Group and these two, from Cher and Feargal Sharkey.
For four nights, from December 26-29 of 1979, some of the biggest names in rock and roll performed at the Hammersmith Odeon in London to raise money for the victims of war-torn Cambodia. The shows, billed as the Concerts for the People of Kampuchea, featured Queen, The Clash, The Who, Elvis Costello, The Pretenders, and the last show by Wings. A double album recorded during those evenings would finally be released in March of 1981. My high school band The Geeks performed our own version of the single from that album, "Little Sister", with lyrics changed to make fun of teachers.
The first night, on Boxing Day, featured a 28-song set by Queen just as their UK#2 single "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" began dropping out of the Top 30. They were the only band playing that night.
Ian Dury and The Blockheads performed 11 songs on the second night, followed by the British reggae band Matumbi.
Then came The Clash, just weeks after releasing London Calling in the U.K. Seven of the 16 songs they played came from the new album. Here they are playing "Armagideon Time", the B side of their single "London Calling" which had just entered the U.K. Top 30 at #29.
The Pretenders kicked off night three followed by The Specials and The Who. Their debut album was still a week of two away.
The Who's set featured 25 songs and their new drummer, Kenney Jones.
Elvis Costello and the Attractions opened up the final night. Rockpile came on next with a short set highlighted by the surprise appearance of Robert Plant. Finally Wings took the stage , playing 20 songs including Beatles numbers "Fool On The Hill" "Yesterday" and "Got To Get You Into My Life".
It all ended with a four song set by Rockestra, a thirty musician supergroup.
In January of 1980 some American bands, The Beach Boys, Grateful Dead, and Jefferson Starship , would perform at a benefit concert at Oakland Coliseum for the people of Kampuchea.
Graham Parker and The Rumour win the annual Village Voice Pazz and Jop critics poll. Robert Christgau sums up the results in this way :
Especially if allowances are made for Nashville and Denver and Omaha and New Orleans, it's hard to imagine any other album cracking this year's top five: Armed Forces, by last year's overpowering winner, Elvis Costello; Fear of Music, by Talking Heads, up from fifth in 1978; the confusing American version of The Clash, which in its 1977 English edition showed up on a lot of best-of-the-decade lists; Rust Never Sleeps, generally regarded as Neil Young's best album since Tonight's the Night; and this year's model, Squeezing Out Sparks, by Graham Parker and the Rumour, who placed their first two albums at two and four in the 1976 poll but haven't made much noise among the voters since.
By clicking a link on the albums you can find my own reviews from this year.
5. Elvis Costello: Armed Forces (Columbia) 619 (55)
6. Van Morrison:Into the Music(Warner Bros.) 474 (41)
7. The B-52s: The B-52s (Warner Bros.) 371 (37)
8. Tom Petty Heartbreakers:Damn the Torpedoes(Backstreet/MCA) 340 (31)
9. Pere Ubu: Dub Housing(Chrysalis) 334 (28)
10. Donna Summer: Bad Girls (Casablanca) 330 (30)
On December 14, 1979 The Clash released London Calling in the U.K. Joe Strummer was excited, telling a Smash Hits reporter
"We're still digging our reggae ditch but what we've added to that is Motown. It's that kind of thing, but as a simple four piece group plus two tablespoons of organ and half a pint of horn. To me, it's a feeling that just comes out naturally, so you try to choke it off a bit and tense it up so it comes out sounding ever harder.
"To me, music is a feeling, the best there is. The reason I'm in it is 'cause I believe we can get the best feelings and I believe in the people I work with "
That's not how the band felt each other before they began recording. But thanks to the busy routine of two sessions a day, broken up by a soccer game and a jaunt to the pub, The Clash came into their own.
London Calling , priced as a single album, wouldn't reach US shores until January which is why the same album has topped both Best Album of the 70's and Best Album of the 80's polls. It's certainly one of my all time favorites, a synthesis of the band's punk rock roots, reggae, rockabilly and New Orleans R +B. In the Spring of 1980 I would put together The Geeks, a punk rock band, at my boarding school and Vince Taylor's "Brand New Cadillac" would be the second song in our set.
This was the first song the Clash recorded for London Calling, a number the band would warm up with in the studio. Like many songs on the album, it was recorded live. “Vince Taylor was the beginning of British rock and roll,” said Strummer. “Before him there was nothing. He was a miracle.”
There was another miracle involved in the recordings, producer Guy Stevens. Strummer called the wild man who gave both Procol Harum and Mott the Hoople their names "the ultimate cure for musical constipation". The antics of Stevens are legendary: knocking over a mountain of chairs, swinging a ladder at Jones during a solo and pouring beer into a piano.
“Guy is that private thing called an X-factor,” said Strummer in a Record Collector article. “He comes in and grabs me by the throat and says, ‘I deal with emotions,’ and that’s it. He doesn’t deal with knobs or whatever producers deal with. He understands the spontaneity of the moment; priceless. If you can get that moment when you play a song just so in front of a tape machine, you got a million dollars. He understands that.”
Stevens would die in 1981 of an overdose of prescription drugs.
The fight or flight adrenaline rush helped The Clash get its mojo back. London Calling is a double album jammed with great songs. "Lost in the Supermarket" was written by Strummer imagining what life must have been like for Mick Jones to grow up in a basement apartment with his mother and grandmother. Strummer was reading newspapers and listening to the radio all the time. "Spanish Bombs" contrasts the country's tourism trade with its civil war 40 years earlier, sending the band's most dedicated fans to the history books.
There are also the songs that must be played at the highest possible volume: "Clampdown", "Four Horsemen", "Death or Glory". In his 1980 review, Rolling Stone's Tom Carson called the latter the "pivotal song on London Calling":
Over a harsh and stormy guitar riff, lead singer Joe Strummer offers a grim litany of failure. Then his cohort, Mick Jones, steps forward to drive what appears to be the final nail into the coffin. “Death or glory,” he bitterly announces, “become just another story.”...But (it) reverses itself midway. After Jones’ last, anguished cry drops off into silence, the music seems to scatter from the echo of his words. Strummer reenters, quiet and undramatic, talking almost to himself at first and not much caring if anyone else is listening. “We’re gonna march a long way,” he whispers. “Gonna fight — a long time.” The guitars, distant as bugles on some faraway plain, begin to rally. The drums collect into a beat, and Strummer slowly picks up strength and authority as he sings:
We’ve gotta travel — over mountains We’ve gotta travel — over seas We’re gonna fight — you, brother We’re gonna fight — till you lose We’re gonna raise —
TROUBLE! The band races back to the firing line, and when the singers go surging into the final chorus of “Death or glory…just another story,” you know what they’re really saying: like hell it is!
The critics were taken by the album. Even the most dense and contrary knew a masterpiece when they heard it. Robert Christgau gave London Calling the ultra-rare grade of A+, writing:
Here's where they start showing off. If "Lost in the Supermarket," for instance, is just another alienated-consumption song, it leaps instantly to the head of the genre on the empathy of Mick Jones's vocal. And so it goes. Complaints about "slick" production are absurd--Guy Stevens slick?--and insofar as the purity of the guitar attack is impinged upon by brass, pianner, and shuffle, this is an expansion, not a compromise. A gratifyingly loose Joe Strummer makes virtuoso use of his four-note range, and Paul Simonon has obviously been studying his reggae records. Warm, angry, and thoughtful, confident, melodic, and hard-rocking, this is the best double-LP since Exile on Main Street. And it's selling for about $7.50
