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Media Type: CD
Artist: CLASH
Title: COMBAT ROCK
Street Release Date: 01/25/2000
Domestic
Genre: ROCK/POP | | | Product Details: | | | Audio CD Release Date:
| January 25, 2000 | | Studio:
| Epic/Sony | | Number Of Discs:
| 1 | | Format:
| Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 145 reviews |
| | | Track Listing: | | | 1. | Know Your Rights | | 2. | Car Jamming | | 3. | Should I Stay Or Should I Go? | | 4. | Rock The Casbah | | 5. | Red Angel Dragnet | | 6. | Straight To Hell | | 7. | Overpowered By Funk | | 8. | Atom Tan | | 9. | Sean Flynn | | 10. | Ghetto Defendant | | 11. | Inoculated City | | 12. | Death Is A Star | |
| | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 145 customer reviews )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
48 of 56 found the following review helpful:
 amazingJul 21, 2005
By race_of_doom
I usually hate it when people cry "underrated!!" like it's going to do anything, but I feel that "Combat Rock" (as well as "Sandinista") deserve the complaint.
The first Clash record I seriously fell in love with was "Sandinista." It was wildly experimental, fun, and almost always consistently interesting. It was after that album that I started listening to their more appreciated work (the two albums -- you know which ones).
What stopped me from listening to this album was the surplus of negative reviews and opinions attached to it. People seem to like it even less than "Sandinista," and there are a lot of people who find that triple album repulsive.
But I finally gave it a listen. "Know Your Rights" sounds like a tossed off one-note experiment at first. I was a bit disappointed. But by "Car Jamming," something happened.
I really, really liked it! It's so catchy and weird at the same time. In fact, that goes for the entire album, minus the more "normal" hits -- catchy and absolutely weird. (Sell out? Pfft.) Take the last track for example. "Death Is a Star." Does that even sound like the Clash?
No, not really. In fact, not at all. But for what it is, it's not half bad! That's the beauty of The Clash circa "Sandinista!" and "Combat Rock" -- they tried so many genres and almost always succeeded in some various way. And if they didn't, it was at least an interesting failure.
This one is like "Sandinista!" edited down to a single disc, making it an extremely cohesive album. In fact, it's probably their most cohesive album. Even more so than the perfection of "London Calling."
Hell, even the hits ("Should I Stay or Should I Go" and "Rock the Casbah") are great. They're not as overplayed as some on here make them out to be.
Every single song has something to offer. "Inoculated City" is perfect pop, "Overpowered by Funk" is The Clash doing (good) disco, "Ghetto Defendant" is an interesting mess of tense drumming, seemingly computerized voices and tight rhythms.
And last but certainly not least, we get "Straight to Hell" on here. What's not to like?
31 of 36 found the following review helpful:
No Sell-outDec 03, 1999
If I read any more ignorance about this being The Clash's "Sell-out" record I'm going to go mad. Listen, selling out is putting out the same record 10 times and being afraid to take chances. The Clash were way ahead of their time with this experimental album, and while there are a few missteps ("Should I Stay", "Overpowered By Funk"), there is also absolute brilliance on this album: "Ghetto Defendant", "Straight To Hell", "Inoculated City", and yes even "Rock The Casbah". "Death Is A Star" has out of tune vocals which somehow almost makes it avant-garde. I put this album up there with "The Clash" and "London Calling". Remember, "selling out" is someone deciding what is, and is not, punk. Punk is someone deciding for themself they're not afraid to take chances, even if they might fail. The Clash, here, try and succeed. Buy this.
23 of 26 found the following review helpful:
I'll take this over the Offspring anyday...Oct 28, 1999
Is it their finest hour? No, but Combat Rock far surpasses the third rate, so-called 'punk rock' of recent years. I'll never forget the teenage me watching the Clash on late-night live tv playing 'Should I Stay Or Should I Go'; I was completely in awe---fatigues? A mohawk? I didn't even have cable, this was unbelievably exciting stuff. Today, when I hear 'Rock the Casbah' on the radio during one of those insidious 'remember the eighties' hours, sandwiched between one-hit wonder novelty nonsense, I'm angered that the Clash aren't acknowledged in their proper context---a British punk rock band who wrote brilliant pop songs, introduced reggae music and culture to white kids, and changed my life for the better.
11 of 13 found the following review helpful:
THE CLASH'S WORST ALBUM ... PURE GENIUSAug 02, 1999
By adamess
"adrock8082000"
Why do so many people think that the Clash sold out with this record? Because a few of the songs became Top 40 hits? Gimme a break. "Combat Rock" is probably the band's worst offering ("Cut the Crap" has been officially excommunicated from the band's discography, so we won't count that), and is still an incredible feat. The production on this album is stunning to say the least, and it blows away anything else that was released in 1982. The band's two "sell-out" singles, "Rock the Casbah" and "Should I Stay or Should I Go?" are absolutely marvelous. "Straight to Hell" is quite possibly the most haunting song that the band has ever recorded (it ranks right up there with "Rebel Waltz"). The band derives dialogue from the screenplay for "Taxi Driver" in "Red Angel Dragnet," which also shows that they have excellent taste in movies. The album's shorter tracks, like "Atom Tan" and "Inoculated City," are catchy as hell and some of the liveliest work the band has ever done. Do yourself a favor and buy this gem. The Clash are STILL the only band that really mattered, and are STILL one of the most influential bands of the past half-century.
8 of 9 found the following review helpful:
The avant-garde in disguiseJun 18, 2005
By A. Chiseler
What other band's "sell-out" album features spoken-word contributions from Allen Ginsberg, guitar from Tex-Mex troubador Joe Ely, doleful musical treatises on colonial fallout and the decaying American cityscape, and homages to Scorsese and the Guardian Angels and a journalist who disappeared in the Cambodian jungle during the Vietnam war? What other band would try to tackle all of that while synthesizing Duane Eddy, Dr. Alimantado, The Funky Four Plus One, The Last Poets and The Who?
This record also happened to include two humonguous radio hits, "Rock the Casbah" and "Should I Stay or Should I Go?" As a result, rock nerds have deemed it uncool for the last quarter century. Listen to them at your own peril.
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![London Calling [Vinyl]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ep1P8eKBL._SL75_.jpg "London Calling [Vinyl]")
