Duff Review: The Clash & Ranking Roger "Rock the Casbah" b/w "Red Angel Dragnet"

Editor's note: On May 20, 2022, Sony/BMG is releasing an limited edition, picture sleeve 7" single of "Rock the Casbah" b/w "Red Angel Dragnet" that features The Beat's Ranking Roger (RIP) toasting over these cuts. Previously, these tracks only have been available as bootlegs, one of which I reviewed back in 2013. So, I'm reposting this review for anyone who may be interested in picking up the legit version. I should also mention that an expanded 3xLP and 2XCD version of The Clash's Combat Rock with a few unreleased cuts is being issued at the same time.

Ska Boots Series
2013
Fuschia vinyl 7" record (with Go Feet paper label)

(Review by Steve Shafer)

God, if these two tracks had seen the light of day back in 1982--say on a 12" single, which were all the rage in the 80s--my head probably would have exploded from the sheer euphoria of experiencing this union of The Clash and The English Beat (two of my favorite bands, both then and now). Truth be told, I didn't even know that these demos existed until I read about them in the Marco on the Bass blog last summer. But it makes complete sense that some sort of collaboration was inevitable between these bands, as they both loved and successfully mined similar musical territory in ska and reggae.

Whether due to some wonderful cosmic coincidence or a brilliant pairing concocted by an unusually savvy promoter, The Clash and The Beat shared the stage for seven shows in Paris at the Theatre Mogador in September 1981 and the bands got on so well that The Clash invited Ranking Roger to toast during their covers of Willie Williams' "Armagideon Time" and Junior Murvin's "Police and Thieves" for the duration of the Paris residency (and a few years later, Mick Jones joined Dave Wakeling's and Ranking Roger's post-Beat group, General Public, though he almost immediately departed to form Big Audio Dynamite with Don Letts). When it came time to record The Clash's follow-up to the extraordinary Sandinista, Strummer and Jones invited Ranking Roger to toast on two of their new cuts, "Red Angel Dragnet" and "Rock the Casbah." Initially, the title for this post-Vietnam War-obsessed double album was Rat Patrol from Ft. Bragg and Mick Jones handled all of the producing and mixing. However, when the rest of the band heard the results, they were less than thrilled--and classic rock pro Glyn Johns, who had produced albums for The Who, The Rolling Stones, and The Eagles, amongst others, was brought it to finish the job (with only Strummer at his side). In the process, the double album was culled down a single LP and retitled Combat Rock (and the Rat Patrol mixes were later repeatedly bootlegged and now can be found, of course, on the internet).

The unnamed Brits behind the Ska Boots series (which has released ska and reggae covers/tracks by Joe Strummer, Amy Winehouse, The Specials, Madness, Lily Allen, No Doubt, Billy Bragg, Ian Dury, The Pogues, Jools Holland, Eddie Vedder, and a pre-Madonna Madonna) have released Mick Jones' demo mixes of the sweet, dubby extended versions of "Red Angel Dragnet" and "Rock the Casbah" with Ranking Roger toasting over these cuts. While the sound quality is what you would expect for a demo--and Roger's vocals aren't fully integrated into the mix of these songs, they're riding on top--I doubt most Clash/Beat fans will mind, since it's so cool to have these versions in such a nice, tangible package. (Cheeky of them to use the Go Feet paper label for this bootleg, but it works well and in plays out a crossover fantasy that I'm sure exists in many a fan's mind.)

Of the two cuts here, the "Taxi Driver"/Guardian Angels/Jack the Ripper mash up "Red Angel Dragnet" works better; there's more menace in Roger's chatting and vocal effects--and it's far more effective than Kosmo Vinyl's Travis Bickle imitation (though here I miss his recitation of "One of these days, I'm going to get myself organizized" that appears right before the end fade of the Combat Rock version of this song). Also, the loping song structure of "Red Angel Dragnet"--somewhere between reggae and rockabilly, courtesy of Paul Simonon's songwriting--lends itself better to a dub version and gives Roger the space to do his thing. I've always had a soft spot for this deep album cut, as it taps into and reflects the seamier, lawless, and dangerous side of New York City in the early 80s (and celebrates a movie that revels in it) that was very real to me. I was seeing Curtis Sliwa's red windbreaker and beret outfitted Guardian Angels (the police shooting of Guardian Angel Frank Melvin inspired Strummer's lyrics for this song) who were citizen patrolling the grimy and decrepit (but sometimes stunning) subways I had been riding alone since fifth grade beneath the burning South Bronx, back and forth between Manhattan and Yonkers, and I had survived my infrequent, but unpleasant and nerve-wracking trips through Times Square, which was packed with porno theaters and heavily populated with con artists, drug dealers, and pimps and prostitutes--all of whom were depicted pretty accurately in Martin Scorcese's vigilante movie "Taxi Driver."

Lyrically, Ranking Roger's toasting in "Red Angel Dragnet" makes reference to the horrifying January 14, 1983 London Metropolitan Police ambush and shooting of Stephen Waldorf, whom they thought was escaped prisoner David Martin (it should be noted that Combat Rock was released in May of 1982--so this track could not have been part of the pre-Glyn Johns Mick Jones mixes). Roger also refers to the very real threat of the Cold War and nuclear annihilation in the early 80s (a few years earlier, the UK government had disclosed that American cruise missiles with nuclear warheads were being stored on British air force bases and could be launched against the Soviets from British soil; this, of course, made England an obvious target for the Russians in the event of a nuclear exchange between the superpowers): "Di Russian, di American/Dem both have a plan/and if we no careful/They involve a England/So what's the worry?/It's the cruise missile/Cause if we not careful/We end up in a pile." Not surprisingly, Roger makes a plea for "love and unity" at the end of the song, which was a repeated (and very much worthwhile) theme during his tenure with The Beat (see "Stand Down Margaret").

Mega-hit "Rock the Casbah" (The Clash's only top 10 single in the USA)--music by Topper Headon, lyrics by Strummer that were inspired by Iran's new(ish) religious fundamentalism that severely cracked down on popular music, amongst many other things--is almost too tightly wound of a pop/dance song for Ranking Roger's toasting; the backing track is too busy and dense. Having said that, it's still a great version of this song that should have been further developed (like "Red Angel Dragnet") and released back in the day. The audience was there and eager for this kind of experimentation, though the band (Strummer, in particular) was more focused on making a more mainstream hit album that would generate the financial reward and true fame in the USA that had eluded them (see Tony Fletcher's "The Clash: The Music That Matters"). I cringed when I learned that they were opening for classic rock dinosaurs The Who at Shea Stadium in Queens on the Combat Rock tour and didn't even try to go see them because of it. It's too bad that The Clash couldn't split the difference between Strummer's rock star ambitions and Jones' desire to further explore musical avenues in hip hop and reggae (and that Topper Headon couldn't quit the drugs and rejoin the band). They should have realized both the hit pop album and released Jonesie's more experimental dub/alternate versions as related singles--and maybe this might even have kept the band together long enough to release one more great Clash album with (most of) the original band (instead, we had to settle for Big Audio Dynamite's good to great Strummer/Jones collaboration in No. 10, Upping St. in 1986).

+ + + + + 

Duff Review: "Joe Strummer 001"!

Ignition Records
3xLPs and 1x12" single /2xCD
2018

(Review by Steve Shafer)

The story goes that after Joe Strummer's death (in 2002 at age 50 from a heart attack), a huge cache of his writings and recordings was discovered in a barn in his backyard, which ultimately yielded the 20,000 items that now comprise the Joe Strummer Archive (apparently he was quite the pack rat-documentarian). The new compilation Joe Strummer 001 is the first batch of freshly buffed material to emerge from the archive, much of it somewhat obscure/hard-to-find (see LP #1) or never released (LP #3 and the 12" single) and will be eagerly consumed by Clash and Strummer fans. But LP #2--containing readily available recordings of Strummer with The Mescaleros, Jimmy Cliff, and Johnny Cash (plus his contribution to Chef Aid: The South Park Album, the Buddy Holly pastiche "It's a Rockin' World")--is a bit at odds with rest of this set, as its seems to be more about re-shaping/re-claiming Strummer's post-Clash legacy than yielding unheard musical gems or rarities. (For instance, they could have swapped out LP #2 out for a cleaned up version of some/all of The Clash Mark II's Out of Control demos (AKA the 1983 Lucky 8 demos) or their legendary live benefit performance for striking coal miners at The Academy in Brixton on December 6, 1984, since that excellent, unheralded band was really more of Joe Strummer solo enterprise anyway. For proof of their greatness before manager Bernie Rhodes' machinations mucked it all up, read Mark Andersen and Ralph Heibutzki's "We Are The Clash" and listen to Crooked Beat Records' Recutting the Crap Volumes I and II. Also anyone looking for a fantastic comp of Joe Strummer and The Mescaleros' music should pick up their Live at Acton Town Hall, which we reviewed a few years ago).

Strummer's so-called "wilderness years"--between the disintegration of The Clash Mark II in 1986 and his finally regaining solid footing again with The Mescaleros in the late 1990s--were filled with a series of short-lived groups and one-off collaborations (and the not-so-great solo album Earthquake Weather); acting in and recordings cuts for art house and Hollywood film soundtracks; a drawn-out legal dispute with Sony; subbing for Shane McGowan in The Pogues; and DJing on the BBC World Service. (In Chris Salewicz's "Redemption Song: The Ballad Of Joe Strummer," he posits that during this period Strummer was clinically depressed--and episodes about the demise of The Clash Mark II in "We Are The Clash" support this assertion.)

The aforementioned unreleased/hard-to-find tracks on LPs #1, #2, and the 12" single have precious little reggae (disappointing, really--and the cover of The Tennors' "Ride Your Donkey" from Earthquake Weather is surprisingly meh) and there's a bit too much Americana for my taste, but the punk, rock, and worldbeat songs are pretty terrific. If you followed Strummer in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, you've likely encountered some of this lesser-known material (on LP #1), like "Love Kills" from the "Sid and Nancy" soundtrack, "Trash City" from the "Permanent Record" OST, and "Generations" from the A Punk Look at Human Rights comp (with punk supergroup Electric Dog House, made up of members of The Ruts DC and The Damned). But I've never heard the prime cuts "Afro-Cuban Be-Bop" with The Astro-Physicians (AKA The Pogues, which give this left-field Latin-y/Irish mash-up its Celtic flavor) from the "I Hired A Contract Killer" indie film soundtrack and the rabble-rousing cover of the anti-fascist Spanish Civil War song "15th Brigade" with The Latino Rockabilly War, the b-side to the "Island Hopping" Earthquake Weather single. Oddly, "Sandpaper Blues" with Radar is replicated almost note-for-note on The Mescalero' debut Rock Art and the X-Ray Style (is it the same recording?).

Of LP #2's previously unreleased songs, only "When Pigs Fly" (which nicks a bit of The Supremes' "You Can't Hurry Love") and "Rose of Erin" (both from the indie film soundtrack "When Pigs Fly"), the lounge-y "The Cool Impossible" (think "Broadway"), the Clash Mark II demo of "Pouring Rain" (ragged and impassioned!), and the absolutely stellar rocker "London's Burning" (which was released as a 7" vinyl single that we reviewed recently) are essential additions to the Strummer canon. It's definitely interesting to hear the reggae-ish "Czechoslovak Song/Where is England" demo, though the version from the Lucky 8 sessions--retitled as "This is England"--has much more kick to it (and it should be noted that the UK 12" of this last great Clash single includes two other legitimately good Clash Mark II tracks, "Do It Now" and "Sex Mad Roar"). And then there are other songs from the vault that take up space that could have been devoted to more vital material which was left on the shelves--like the cleaned-up, zydeco-y second take on "Pouring Rain" and the "Sid and Nancy" outtakes (with Mick Jones on guitar) "Crying on 23rd" (a straight-up blues track) and "Bullets" (a country-western cut with Pearl Harbor--AKA Pearl E. Gates--on vocals who, at one point, was spouse to Paul Simonon).

Lastly, the 12" (one-sided) single offers an unreleased Strummer/Jones Big Audio Dynamite composition "U.S. North" (for the indie film "Candy Mountain") that must have been recorded around the time of BAD's No. 10, Upping Street (which Strummer co-produced with Jones; they co-wrote "Ticket" on that album, too). It's a decent song (though far too long at 10+ minutes) and may be the only instance where Strummer sang and played guitar on a BAD recording.

If you're unfamiliar with Joe Strummer's post-Combat Rock years, this compilation does a pretty spectacular job of filling in the blanks. But it may leave the more zealous Strummer/Clash fans less satisfied and hoping that subsequent releases from Strummer's recorded archive will reveal even greater finds.

+ + + +

Duff Review: V/A "Recutting the Crap, Volume 2" and "The Future Was Unwritten" (RSD 2018 Release)

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Editor's note: Before delving into my review of "Recutting the Crap, Volume 2" and its companion piece "The Future Was Unwritten," a read through of The Duff Guide to Ska write up of last year's "Recutting the Crap, Volume 1" is in order, as it provides vital background and context for these releases...

Various Artists, Recutting the Crap, Volume 1 (Heavyweight vinyl LP, Crooked Beat Records, 2017): I first heard The Clash's Cut the Crap back in 1985 after devouring Big Audio Dynamite's This is Big Audio Dynamite (both were released within months of each other) and was profoundly disappointed to find that while Jones and company had taken the Sandinista and Combat Rock musical gumbo (punk, hip-hop, dance rock, reggae/dub) to the next evolutionary level, Strummer had made u-turn back toward 1977 punk (at manager Bernie Rhodes' urging), but had been t-boned by Rhodes' god-awful musical direction/production (replete with session musicians, synthesizers, programmed drums, and football terrace-like shouted choruses) and several profound life experiences Joe was dealing with at the time that distracted him from the task at hand (the deaths of both of his parents and the birth of his first child). History has not been kind to Cut the Crap (generally it's not considered canonical by fans and band members alike), but in many cases the acts on Recutting the Crap have revealed in their versions that there were some seriously decent-to-great songs buried under Rhodes' dreck--Strummer's tunes were solid at the core. The Scotch Bonnets' terrific, stripped-down reggae take on the anti-nuclear war cut "Are You Red...Y" alone is worth the cost of this LP. Other notable tracks (all from DC-area bands, where Crooked Beat Records--named after that Sandinista track--is based) include The Violets' ska-ified "Cool Under Heat," Dom Casual's ska-jazz-punkabilly "Sex Mad Roar," Basnji's "Dirty Punk" is loads more faithful to the Clash's '77 sound than the original (Too Much Joy's version of the cringe-y "We Are The Clash" is a valiant effort in this category, too), and Winterdrinks' "Play to Win" sounds like a deep cut from Sandinista. There are even a few covers of demos for Cut the Crap (which was originally titled Out of Control before Rhodes unilaterally renamed it)--I particularly liked Sussed Out with Sol Roots' raucous cover of "Backwoods Drive." A second volume of Recutting the Crap is slated for 2018, which presumably will include the last good and legit Clash single, "This Is England."

Various Artists, Recutting the Crap, Volume 2 and The Future Was Unwritten (2 x heavyweight, color vinyl LPs, Crooked Beat Records, 2018): Volume 2 continues to mine/reclaim the post-Mick Jones/Topper Headon Clash legacy (namely, the Out of Control demo and Cut the Crap album), while The Future Was Unwritten explores the "would have been Clash songs" had things worked out differently--the Strummer/Jones collaborations on Big Audio Dynamite's No. 10, Upping Street, as well as several Strummer cuts written for several film soundtracks in the late 1980s.

The original intent of The Clash Mark II (Strummer, Paul Simonon, Nick Sheppard, Vince White, and Pete Howard) was to revert to a back-to-basics '77 punk sound (unfortunately shedding much of the reggae influence in the process)--as evident on their 1983 Out of Control demo and 1984 tour--and had Clash manager Bernie Rhodes not perverted it all (and instead paired the band with the right producer in the studio, instead of doing an atrocious job himself), the final Clash album might have been pretty damn good.

All of the DC bands on Recutting the Crap, Volume 2 further strengthen this series' case that Strummer could still deliver the goods. Highlights inspired by the Out of Control demo include Indio Bravo's four-on-the-floor, straight-up rock take on "In the Pouring Rain" (a great live version of the original from 1984 can be found on the Julien Temple documentary The Future is Unwritten soundtrack); Space Giants' fantastically rollicking "Rock n Roll City"; Tall Ship's brash, punker-than-the-original "Glue Zombie"; and The Delarcos' nice rockabilly-ish take on "Jericho" (also known as "Ammunition"). Other notable Clash II-era cuts versioned here are Geisha Hit Squad's excellent XTC-sounding "Shouting Street" (eventually released on Strummer's disappointingly meh Earthquake Weather); Ignore Alien Orders' awesome sound collage using Strummer's pre-Clash nickname "Woody," as in Guthrie, for its title (with snippets of The Clash II playing "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais" and "White Riot" while busking, a bit of "Street Parade" from Sandinista, Strummer from his show on the BBC World Service, and more); Daly Combat (one of Crooked Beat owner Bill Daly's two bands here) does a bang-up job on this superb reggae instrumental cut "Astroturf" (from a Jones/Headon demo, naturally); and Basenji's faithfully ace, but somewhat muted (appropriate, given the economic inequality of our times) "Bottom Line" (which Mick Jones had been working on as a Clash tune when he was fired from the band). Silveradio transforms the Cut the Crap opener "Dictator" into a much better ska-rockabilly track and, in what may be the best cover on the album, Insurgence DC (the other Bill Daly band) unleashes a phenomenally powerful and majestic "This Is England," a truly great Clash song made even better here--whose lyrics still pack a wallop:

"I hear a gang fight on a human factory farm
Are they howling out, or doing somebody harm?
On a catwalk jungle, somebody grabbed my arm
A voice spoke so cold, it matched the weapon in her palm

This is England
This knife of Sheffield steel
This is England
This is how we feel

Time on his hands, the freezing mohawk strolls
He won't go for the carrots
Been beaten by the pole
Some sunny day confronted by his soul
His eye will see how fast you can grow old

This is England
That I'm supposed to die for
This is England
Never gonna cry no more

Black shadow of the Vincent
Falls on a Triumph line
I got my motorcycle jacket
But I'm walking all the time
South Atlantic wind blows
Ice from a dying creed
I see no glory
And when will we get free?

This is England
We can chain you to the rail
This is England
We can kill you in a jail

Hey, British boots go kick Bengali in the head
Police sit watching
The newspapers being read
All deaf to protests
And after the attacker fled
Out came the batons and
The biggest one then said...

This is England
The land of illegal dances
This is England
Land of one thousand stances
This is England
This knife of Sheffield steel
This is England
This is how we feel"

Strummer's and Jones' post-Clash songs from the late '80s are (unsurprisingly) looser and freer, as they no longer felt confined/burdened by the mantle and mass of conflicting ideals and expectations that defined The Clash (and, obviously, gave them the space to collaborate again, whenever the mood or Muse struck)--but a lot of them could have been combined to make a great Clash album, had Strummer, Jones, Simonon, and Headon reunited (as The Future Was Unwritten posits). Too Much Joy serve up a stellar hard-edged and ballsy "Trash City" (from the soundtrack to "Permanent Record"; this band, Joe Strummer and The Latino Rockabilly War, featured Joey Altruda and Willie MacNeil from Jump with Joey!); it's hard to imagine that this was a Strummer/Jones outtake from BAD's No. 10, Upping Street, but "Dog in a Satellite" (apparently inspired by The Mighty Sparrow's "Russian Satellite") as interpreted by Don Zientara becomes a lovely, heartfelt rock ballad (really!); and "Euroshima," an eerie, nuclear dread 1983 Mick Jones song for Top Risk Action Company (T.R.A.C.), his pre-BAD band with Topper Headon and Leo Williams from Basement 5, sounds kind of gothy (like latter-day Damned) in Sunshine Feels' cool version. Daly Combat's "Love Kills" (Strummer's title track for the Alex Cox film "Sid and Nancy"; Jones played guitar on the original recording) packs even more crunch than the source; Winterdrinks turn "Dum Dum Dub" ("Dum Dum Club," also from "Sid and Nancy") into intriguingly good, X-sounding reggae-punk; and El Quatro successfully rework the Strummer/Jones BAD track "Sightsee MC" into an amazing cover The Plugz or Circle Jerks might have done (and it's got a great Western reggae break in there, too).

Both volumes of Crooked Beat Records' Recutting the Crap strive hard and largely succeed in redeeming Strummer's Clash II legacy (and all of those lost years in the wilderness before finding his mojo again with the Mescaleros). Fans of The Only Band That Matters will find a lot to like here and can rest easy in knowing that these bands have done Joe proud.

+ + + +

Life's Little Victories: Record Collecting #5 (The Slits' "Typical Girls" 7")

Over the summer, while rummaging through the bins at my favorite (and undisclosed!) used record shop, I came across the 12" version of The Slits' 1979 debut single ("Typical Girls" b/w "Heard It Through the Grapevine") for $15. For whatever stupid reason (wasn't feeling flush with cash that day?), I didn't grab it, but when I got back to work, I listened/watched videos of both tracks--and was particularly taken with their ragged, punky-reggay-ish cover of Marvin Gaye's hit (where Ari Up sometimes sings: "I heard it through the bass line..."). So, I checked Discogs and found that picking up a copy of this single (and I wanted the 7" version) from any US sellers would cost a pretty penny (let's just say that the $15 price at my favorite record haunt was very reasonable).

I now very much wanted this record.

I ended up being outbid on two separate eBay auctions, but finally stumbled upon a mint (!) copy of the 7" single that I was able to "Buy Now" for $20 (including shipping!)--which has a sleeve that folds out into a poster of Pennie Smith's photo that was used for The Slits' debut album, Cut (Smith also shot the cover of this single).

To be honest, I really didn't take to The Slits back when I was first introduced to them through Jon Savage's incredible and absolutely essential 1992 book "England's Dreaming: Anarchy, Sex Pistols, Punk Rock, and Beyond" (which led me to discover and buy albums from dozens of punk and post-punk bands) and catching the punk segments of the surprisingly good 1995 PBS/BBC documentary series "Rock and Roll: An Unruly History" (watch part of the punk segment that highlights roots reggae's relationship to 1970s UK punk rock and features interviews with Johnny Rotten, Paul Simonon, Don Letts, Mick Jones, Ari Up, Bunny Wailer, Mikey Dread, and Lee "Scratch" Perry here and here). But I get them now.

I'm in the midst of reading Slits' guitarist Viv Albertine's superb and brutally honest autobiography "Clothes Clothes Clothes Music Music Music Boys Boys Boys" (watch a recent interview with Albertine from Britain's Channel 4 here). One of the many great bits of info she shares is how her final break-up with Mick Jones of The Clash, whom she had dated on and off for years, led Jones to write "Train in Vain," which turns out to be an answer record to The Slits' "Typical Girls" (The Slits: "Typical girls stand by their man"; The Clash: "You say you stand by your man/Tell me something, I don't understand/You said you loved me and that's a fact/And then you left me, said you felt trapped/Well some things you can't explain away/But the heartache's in me till this day/You didn't stand by me/No, not at all/You didn't stand by me/No way"). Of course, "Typical Girls" lists all the "acceptable" behaviors imposed on women by 1950s and 1960s Western societies (and reinforced by their media)--and was everything that The Slits were defying and attempting to obliterate in the late 70s. It's smart, cheeky, and ironic feminist commentary, as well as an apt Slits mission statement--and it's made somehow all the more stinging and poignant by Jones' wounded reply to it. He wanted/expected the stereotypical 1960s girlfriend, but got one of the original riot girls instead.

It's very much worth it to check out the lyrics to this song--as, 35 or so years on, our male-dominated world still holds many of these same attitudes towards women...

"Typical Girls"

"Don't create
Don't rebel
Have intuition
Can't decide

Typical girls get upset too quickly
Typical girls can't control themselves
Typical girls are so confusing
Typical girls, you can always tell
Typical girls don't think too clearly
Typical girls are unpredictable, predictable

Typical girls try to be
Typical girls very well
Typical girls try to be
Typical girls very well, well

Typical girls are looking for something
Typical girls fall under spells
Typical girls buy magazines
Typical girls feel like hell
Typical girls worry about spots, fat
And natural smells, stinky fake smells

Typical girls try to be
Typical girls very well, well

Don't create
Don't rebel
Have intuition
Don't drive well

Typical girls try to be
Typical girls very well
Can't decide what clothes to wear

Typical girls are sensitive
Typical girls are emotional
Typical girls are cruel and bewitching
But she's a femme fatal

Typical girls stand by their man
Typical girls are really swell
Typical girls learn how to act shocked
Typical girls don't rebel

Who invented the typical girl?
Who's bringing out the new improved model?
And there's another marketing ploy
Typical girl gets the typical boy

Who invented the typical girl?
Who's bringing out the new improved model?
And there's another marketing ploy
Typical girl gets the typical boy, typical boy

The typical boy gets the typical girl
The typical girl gets the typical boy
The typical boy gets the typical girl
The typical girl gets the typical boy"

Duff Review: The Clash featuring Ranking Roger - "Red Angel Dragnet" b/w "Rock the Casbah"!

Ska Boots Series
2013
Fuschia vinyl 7" record (with Go Feet paper label)
Available in the US through Jump Up Records

(Review by Steve Shafer)

God, if these two tracks had seen the light of day back in 1982--say on a 12" single, which were all the rage in the 80s--my head probably would have exploded from the sheer euphoria of experiencing this union of The Clash and The English Beat (two of my favorite bands, both then and now). Truth be told, I didn't even know that these demos existed until I read about them in the Marco on the Bass blog last summer. But it makes complete sense that some sort of collaboration was inevitable between these bands, as they both loved and successfully mined similar musical territory in ska and reggae.

Whether due to some wonderful cosmic coincidence or a brilliant pairing concocted by an unusually savvy promoter, The Clash and The Beat shared the stage for seven shows in Paris at the Theatre Mogador in September 1981 and the bands got on so well that The Clash invited Ranking Roger to toast during their covers of Willie Williams' "Armagideon Time" and Junior Murvin's "Police and Thieves" for the duration of the Paris residency (and a few years later, Mick Jones joined Dave Wakeling's and Ranking Roger's post-Beat group, General Public, though he almost immediately departed to form Big Audio Dynamite with Don Letts). When it came time to record The Clash's follow-up to the extraordinary Sandinista, Strummer and Jones invited Ranking Roger to toast on two of their new cuts, "Red Angel Dragnet" and "Rock the Casbah." Initially, the title for this post-Vietnam War-obsessed double album was Rat Patrol from Ft. Bragg and Mick Jones handled all of the producing and mixing. However, when the rest of the band heard the results, they were less than thrilled--and classic rock pro Glyn Johns, who had produced albums for The Who, The Rolling Stones, and The Eagles, amongst others, was brought it to finish the job (with only Strummer at his side). In the process, the double album was culled down a single LP and retitled Combat Rock (and the Rat Patrol mixes were later repeatedly bootlegged and now can be found, of course, on the internet).

The unnamed Brits behind the Ska Boots series (which has released ska and reggae covers/tracks by Joe Strummer, Amy Winehouse, The Specials, Madness, Lily Allen, No Doubt, Billy Bragg, Ian Dury, The Pogues, Jools Holland, Eddie Vedder, and a pre-Madonna Madonna) have released Mick Jones' demo mixes of the sweet, dubby extended versions of "Red Angel Dragnet" and "Rock the Casbah" with Ranking Roger toasting over these cuts. While the sound quality is what you would expect for a demo--and Roger's vocals aren't fully integrated into the mix of these songs, they're riding on top--I doubt most Clash/Beat fans will mind, since it's so cool to have these versions in such a nice, tangible package. (Cheeky of them to use the Go Feet paper label for this bootleg, but it works well and in plays out a crossover fantasy that I'm sure exists in many a fan's mind.)

Of the two cuts here, the "Taxi Driver"/Guardian Angels/Jack the Ripper mash up "Red Angel Dragnet" works better; there's more menace in Roger's chatting and vocal effects--and it's far more effective than Kosmo Vinyl's Travis Bickle imitation (though here I miss his recitation of "One of these days, I'm going to get myself organizized" that appears right before the end fade of the Combat Rock version of this song). Also, the loping song structure of "Red Angel Dragnet"--somewhere between reggae and rockabilly, courtesy of Paul Simonon's songwriting--lends itself better to a dub version and gives Roger the space to do his thing. I've always had a soft spot for this deep album cut, as it taps into and reflects the seamier, lawless, and dangerous side of New York City in the early 80s (and celebrates a movie that revels in it) that was very real to me. I was seeing Curtis Sliwa's red windbreaker and beret outfitted Guardian Angels (the police shooting of Guardian Angel Frank Melvin inspired Strummer's lyrics for this song) who were citizen patrolling the grimy and decrepit (but sometimes stunning) subways I had been riding alone since fifth grade beneath the burning South Bronx, back and forth between Manhattan and Yonkers, and I had survived my infrequent, but unpleasant and nerve-wracking trips through Times Square, which was packed with porno theaters and heavily populated with con artists, drug dealers, and pimps and prostitutes--all of whom were depicted pretty accurately in Martin Scorcese's vigilante movie "Taxi Driver."

Lyrically, Ranking Roger's toasting in "Red Angel Dragnet" makes reference to the horrifying January 14, 1983 London Metropolitan Police ambush and shooting of Stephen Waldorf, whom they thought was escaped prisoner David Martin (it should be noted that Combat Rock was released in May of 1982--so this track could not have been part of the pre-Glyn Johns Mick Jones mixes). Roger also refers to the very real threat of the Cold War and nuclear annihilation in the early 80s (a few years earlier, the UK government had disclosed that American cruise missiles with nuclear warheads were being stored on British air force bases and could be launched against the Soviets from British soil; this, of course, made England an obvious target for the Russians in the event of a nuclear exchange between the superpowers): "Di Russian, di American/Dem both have a plan/and if we no careful/They involve a England/So what's the worry?/It's the cruise missile/Cause if we not careful/We end up in a pile." Not surprisingly, Roger makes a plea for "love and unity" at the end of the song, which was a repeated (and very much worthwhile) theme during his tenure with The Beat (see "Stand Down Margaret").

Mega-hit "Rock the Casbah" (The Clash's only top 10 single in the USA)--music by Topper Headon, lyrics by Strummer that were inspired by Iran's new(ish) religious fundamentalism that severely cracked down on popular music, amongst many other things--is almost too tightly wound of a pop/dance song for Ranking Roger's toasting; the backing track is too busy and dense. Having said that, it's still a great version of this song that should have been further developed (like "Red Angel Dragnet") and released back in the day. The audience was there and eager for this kind of experimentation, though the band (Strummer, in particular) was more focused on making a more mainstream hit album that would generate the financial reward and true fame in the USA that had eluded them (see Tony Fletcher's "The Clash: The Music That Matters"). I cringed when I learned that they were opening for classic rock dinosaurs The Who at Shea Stadium in Queens on the Combat Rock tour and didn't even try to go see them because of it. It's too bad that The Clash couldn't split the difference between Strummer's rock star ambitions and Jones' desire to further explore musical avenues in hip hop and reggae (and that Topper Headon couldn't quit the drugs and rejoin the band). They should have realized both the hit pop album and released Jonesie's more experimental dub/alternate versions as related singles--and maybe this might even have kept the band together long enough to release one more great Clash album with (most of) the original band (instead, we had to settle for Big Audio Dynamite's good to great Strummer/Jones collaboration in No. 10, Upping St. in 1986).

+ + + + +