In 1983, at age eleven, I was more of a “singles” guy than an “album” guy. Albums seemed pretty useless. I wanted only to hear the hits.
Nevertheless, I had three albums in my possession (they were probably my sister’s): Men At Work’s Business As Usual, The Stray Cats’, Built For Speed, and The Clash’s Combat Rock. I’d cue up the needle to where each respective “single” was found; this meant I was looking for “Who Could It Be Now,” “Stray Cat Strut” or “Rock This Town,” and “Rock the Casbah,” the third track on side one, respectively. Eleven-year-old aim being what it was – let’s not discuss the toilet seat aim in those days – I’d inevitably end up hearing a snippet of the previous song. The snippet ran anywhere from 10 – 30 seconds, depending on the aim. On Combat Rock, the snippet was of track 2, a song called “Car Jamming”; strangely, hearing the same sample of the end of “Car Jamming” over and over didn’t make me want to know the song any better. I guess I wasn’t particularly musically adventurous back then.
Anyway, as reluctant as I was to hear more than I had to of “Car Jamming” and eager as I was to Rock The Casbah, I never remotely considered going back to track one, “Know Your Rights.” The song scared the crap out of me anyhow. I mean, the guy was angry. He wasn’t really singing, and he was talking about “getting killed” and all that sort of stuff. I just wanted to hear my happy little Clash song.
Much later, I got totally obsessed with the Clash’s London Calling (1979) album for about a year. Within that context, I went back to Combat Rock and got really into “Know Your Rights.” Coming on the heels of the 3-LP Sandinista! album, which I barely paid attention to, “Know Your Rights” (and even “Car Jamming”) sounds succinct and downright tasty. In a way, it’s the ultimate Joe Strummer song: angry, up-tempo, funky, retro in an early-60s surfer-vibe kind of way, and absolutely riveting. Sandinista!–era excesses are gone, as are London Calling–era attempts at sounding overly polished: sounds like one take was all it TOOK.
I barely have any of London Calling left on my iPod because I overplayed it, but this one remains handy, always, if I ever have trouble recalling my, um, rights.
Album info: Combat Rock (1982)
Live in 1983:
