London Calling (1979): The Sound of London Drowning in Its Own Cigarette Butts
Imagine if your radio got drunk, listened to reggae, punk, ska, rockabilly, and jazz for 12 hours straight, then started shouting political slogans through a megaphone wrapped in barbed wire. That’s London Calling – the double LP from The Clash that simultaneously predicted the end of the world and made it sound danceable.
Released in 1979, just in time for Thatcherism, mass unemployment and nuclear anxiety to properly kick off, this album was The Clash’s deranged love letter to a collapsing empire. It’s got fury, swagger, wit, and enough basslines to knock your soul loose.
Table of Contents
Background: Punk Grows Up (Then Starts a Riot Anyway)
The Clash started as snarling, leather-jacketed punks who screamed about boredom and unemployment. But by the time London Calling rolled around, they had bigger fish to gut – fascists, corporate greed, corrupt cops, American culture, and basically everyone else who looked vaguely powerful.
Joe Strummer, the band’s gravel-throated preacher, didn’t want to be confined to punk’s 2-minute shout-fests anymore. So, London Calling sprawled. It stretched across 19 songs, multiple genres, and several angry manifestos, like a protest march that stops occasionally to smoke weed and play ska.
The Title Track: Cheerfully Screaming into the Apocalypse
Let’s start with “London Calling.” It opens with the sonic equivalent of an air-raid siren, and it doesn’t get less intense. Joe Strummer barks about nuclear errors, zombie ice ages, and rising tides like a tabloid Nostradamus. He sounds like a man reporting live from the apocalypse while trying to crowd surf.
And yet, somehow, it slaps. It’s an anthem, a panic attack in 4/4 time. Punk journalism at its finest.
The Genre Salad: Punk’s Midlife Crisis Never Sounded Better
What makes London Calling truly brilliant is how much it doesn’t sound like what it’s supposed to. This isn’t just punk – it’s ska, rockabilly, pop, soul and whatever genre drunken jazz musicians invented at 3AM in a Soho bar. The Clash weren’t narrowing their sound, they were breaking it wide open.
- “Rudie Can’t Fail” is a ska-pop singalong about failing spectacularly at life and not caring.
- “Spanish Bombs” romanticises the Spanish Civil War, because of course it does.
- “The Guns of Brixton” is Paul Simonon’s moody dub track about police brutality and paranoia, perfect for dancing while watching society disintegrate.
- “Lost in the Supermarket” is basically an existential crisis in the produce aisle.
There’s even “Train in Vain,” a last-minute pop banger about heartbreak that somehow made the cut like a well-dressed intruder at a punk squat.
Lyrics That Slap and Slap Back
The lyrics across London Calling are alternately angry, poetic, and weirdly hilarious. You can practically hear Strummer waving a cigarette and shouting, “You’re all doomed!” while dancing in your living room.
- “Now war is declared, and battle come down!” (London Calling)
- “If I go there will be trouble, and if I stay it will be double.” (Should I Stay or Should I Go… wait, wrong album, but same chaotic energy.)
- “We’re gonna stand firm in our freedom.” (Clampdown) less a lyric, more a manifesto spray-painted on a brick wall.
It’s a punk sermon, and Strummer is the street-corner preacher trying to save your soul by screaming it into submission.
Reception: Critics Lost Their Minds (In a Good Way)
Upon release, critics didn’t just like London Calling, they practically offered to bear its children. Rolling Stone gave it five stars. The NME exploded with joy. Even the Americans, who usually like their punk with a side of burger, took notice.
Since then, it’s regularly included in Best Albums of All Time lists, right next to The Beatles and Bob Dylan, who probably wept into their harmonicas when they heard it.
Legacy: Still Relevant, Still Raging
More than 40 years later, London Calling still sounds urgent. Whether you’re worried about fascism, capitalism, climate collapse, or the fact that your toaster is connected to the internet, this album is your soundtrack.
Modern bands owe The Clash their entire careers. Rage Against the Machine, Arctic Monkeys, IDLES – they all walked through the door The Clash kicked down.
Even your local indie band with 47 members and a glockenspiel owes something to this record.
My Final Thoughts: An Anarchic Masterpiece With a Heart
London Calling isn’t perfect, it’s too messy, too sprawling, too contradictory. And that’s exactly what makes it immortal. It’s punk growing up, but refusing to act its age. It’s angry but hopeful, chaotic but controlled, funny but deeply sad.
It’s the sound of a city on fire and the band dancing in the flames.
If You Like London Calling, I Recommend These Albums:
Sandinista! – The Clash (1980) – London Calling went on holiday, took too many records, and came back gloriously unhinged.
Entertainment! – Gang of Four (1979) – Politics, funk, and guitars sharp enough to draw blood — London Calling with fewer anthems and more theory.
The Queen Is Dead – The Smiths (1986) – Swap the punk fury for poetic sulk and you’ve still got British discontent in stereo.
London Calling (Remastered)
| # | Track | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| 1 |
London Calling - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:20 |
| 2 |
Brand New Cadillac - Remastered
The Clash
|
02:08 |
| 3 |
Jimmy Jazz - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:54 |
| 4 |
Hateful - Remastered
The Clash
|
02:43 |
| 5 |
Rudie Can't Fail - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:28 |
| 6 |
Spanish Bombs - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:18 |
| 7 |
The Right Profile - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:54 |
| 8 |
Lost in the Supermarket - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:46 |
| 9 |
Clampdown - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:49 |
| 10 |
The Guns of Brixton - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:12 |
| 11 |
Wrong 'Em Boyo - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:11 |
| 12 |
Death or Glory - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:55 |
| 13 |
Koka Kola - Remastered
The Clash
|
01:47 |
| 14 |
The Card Cheat - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:49 |
| 15 |
Lover's Rock - Remastered
The Clash
|
04:03 |
| 16 |
Four Horsemen - Remastered
The Clash
|
02:55 |
| 17 |
I'm Not Down - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:06 |
| 18 |
Revolution Rock - Remastered
The Clash
|
05:33 |
| 19 |
Train in Vain (Stand by Me) - Remastered
The Clash
|
03:14 |
