Fucking Long Innit? The Sandinista Poll

Extra weird, that one I know of.

I am more obsessed with this album than I have been with a "classic" album in a long time. I've had rotating songs bouncing in my head for weeks now, currently Rebel Waltz and Something About England. I just got a supposedly near-minty copy of it at the local record store. My preamp is being serviced and probably will be for another month so I have intentionally stopped streaming it so I can listen to the vinyl afresh when I get the preamp back.

It's so fucking long it's really hard to digest, but there is great stuff on here that's as good as any of their other albums and if you paired it down to a single or double it would be amazing. But what to cut?!

Jones is kind of right about his "Arctic stations" joke - if you've got a lot of time to fill, like a long-ass car ride or day-long chore, it's pretty fucking great having this play in the background. I never tire of it in that context. But for active listening, it gets to be a chore in spots, especially towards the end. Adapted from what I have on iTunes/my phone, I'd prefer this double LP:

DISC ONE

Side A:
The Magnificent Seven 5:25
Hitsville U.K. 4:17
Junco Partner 4:49
Ivan Meets G.I. Joe 3:12
The Leader 1:32
Something About England 3:40

Side B:
Rebel Waltz 3:22
Kingston Advice 2:34
Charlie Don't Surf 4:52
Somebody Got Murdered 3:27
One More Time 3:30
The Street Parade 3:25

DISC TWO

Side C:
Lightning Strikes (Not Once But Twice) 4:48
Up In Heaven (Not Only Here) 4:25
Corner Soul 2:40
Lets Go Crazy 4:20
If Music Could Talk 4:33
The Sound Of Sinners 3:57

Side D:
Police On My Back 3:14
Midnight Log 2:07
The Equaliser 5:45
The Call Up 5:15
Washington Bullets 3:48
Broadway 5:47

and then a bonus 45 of "Lose This Skin"/"Career Opportunities" (the kids remake)

With the rest (mostly dubs), I'd like to hear them together as a separate album - I imagine it being a fine LP for someone to toast over.

I think the full on flow and sprawl (dubs and versions included) is essential to appreciation of the record as intended, that being said the sequencing there is very nice

It's long, but it's only maybe 10 minutes longer than "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below."

It's long, but it's only maybe 10 minutes longer than "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below."

In similar fashion (if I listen to Speakerboxxx then The Love Below), it gets to be a chore for me in the back half. I LOVE that album (or those albums?) but Big Boi's half is pretty tight, maybe the best work he's ever done, while The Love Below is REALLY uneven to me. I want to say if they cut it down to one CD, it would've been a tremendous, stone-cold masterpiece, but it would probably make Big Boi's work less cohesive if you drop in the handful of gems from The Love Below.

I can attest - it really is fucking long.

Best track: Police on My Back
Worst track: Career Opportunities

It's not fucking long enough.

the dubby production ends up flattening out all the stylistic variety, it doesn't really do the album many favours

dubby production ends up making everything dubby and awesome

Yeah, the production sucks. Back in the day, I had the cassette version. It sounded so muddy.

oh i love the way this record sounds

cf. "up in heaven" the greatest song ever made

it's muddy and echoey and weird but in a way that gives it character

The Black Star liner sank at the docks

*White

yeah its weird how the production does flatten everything out into this limited sonic palate, which hurts a lot of the songs but makes it cohere better as an album. i kinda feel like if the individual songs were all better produced it would ironically end up feeling like a weaker and more haphazard collection, in a way.

I have no idea what critics of the sound are talking about, but I have the remaster from the recent (2013) 5 Studio Albums CD box set, which sounds great. (It should be noted that the music is split up the way it would be on LPs, so Sandinista! is a 3CD set and London Calling is a 2CD set.)

I just looked on eBay and the box is now pretty expensive, which is too bad.

The streaming version on Apple sounds clearer than the cassette did. Of course, it could have been my shitty speakers. But, as someone else said, there is a certain remoteness or flatness to the sound. It's kind of like the cover photo: you can tell it's them, but the details are kind of hard to make out.

What's really remarkable about this album is that it was made by the same band that made The Clash three years earlier. It's a transformation on par with that of the Beatles.

Does anyone else feel a bit like this transformation is willed, somewhat forced, when listening to this record? Like they decided they wanted to be the type of band that puts out a triple LP, rather than having 36 songs worth of things to say?

I believe it is true that Strummer wanted to put out a triple album to piss off Columbia.

yeah its weird how the production does flatten everything out into this limited sonic palate, which hurts a lot of the songs but makes it cohere better as an album.

― nobody like my rap (One Eye Open), Friday, January 21, 2022 2:21 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

i agree with this

I do think the Clash did it because they could, but that sort of oneupmanship seemed common in the '80s. "The River" was a double inspired by "London Calling." "Double Nickels on the Dime" was a double because of "Zen Arcade" ("Take that, Huskers!"). Were there more like this? The Clash I know also made a point of pricing it cheap, too, which was also a thing; they charged $14.98, which was about the price of a double (and coincidentally or not I guess a dollar cheaper than "The River"). This was also the era when Tom Petty, who refused to release "Hard Promises" at MCA's requested price, which I think was a dollar per LP increase.

The record doesn't sound like they made it that long for the money, but as a quixotic gesture (and almost to confuse the audience, giving them so much information it challenges interpretation).

The best quote about its length:

Mick Jones said, "I always saw it as a record for people who were, like, on oil rigs. Or Arctic stations. People that weren't able to get to the record shops regularly."

They definitely didn't do it for the money; iirc, they agreed to be paid royalties as if it were a single in order to get the record company to agree to the triple.

yes, exactly

I love the sound on this record fwiw

I think I voted for "Charlie Don't Surf" in this poll (uh, 15 years ago, wow). Would probably pick "Magnificent 7" now. Besides the groove it has some of Joe's best one-liners.

Why a triple album? “I don’t care about all the artistic reasons,” Joe Strummer told Rolling Stone in 1982. “That’s all bullshit. We were having a joke because everyone said we were mad to release London Calling as a double and then Springsteen put out The River as a double. So we thought, ‘Right, Bruce. Suck on this!’”

The only sane response would have been for Bruce to put out Nebraska as a 4 LP box.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlS298gEQaE

It's incredible to me how well they clean up for the studio.

Sounds great to me.

their "Police on My Back" >> Eddy Grant's. It sounds like the world's collapsing and I'm glad Jones sings it cuz he sounds terrified

i love all the weird noises that weave through the background in it, like alarms and hissing steam or something(?)

yeah its weird how the production does flatten everything out into this limited sonic palate, which hurts a lot of the songs but makes it cohere better as an album.

i think its kinda the opposite of this idk, the production is fine on a lot of the tracks individually (especially the strongest material) but it flattens out the eclecticism across the whole album which does it as a whole no favours

I've never had a problem with the production, but I've not had a problem with the production of "Exile on Main Street," either, and people have always held that one up as rough or erratic or sonically dubious. Not coincidentally, "Sandinista!" has a sort of similar backstory, iirc, with the studio reportedly running 24-7 and rarely more than a couple of the guys in there working together at once. Same thing went down with "Combat Rock."

their "Police on My Back" >> Eddy Grant's

I need to listen to this album again. My favourite songs on it are mostly the more "punky" songs like Somebody Got Murdered, and I suppose that's one of the songs on it that I would like to hear a 1977 Clash do. But it's years, probably over a decade since I actually listened to this thing, other than sticking random songs off it on mixes

only about 1/4 of it is really very compelling at all, the rest is just curiosities

possibly. I have a high tolerance for the Clash though, I even like some of Cut The Crap

I've grown to love Sandinista! immensely, but then again, I've only listened to the edited version I posted above, which is still about 90 minutes long.

Reportedly Paul and Topper wanted a double LP but were overruled by Joe and Mick...I wonder what that would have been like? It's possible my sequence would have been close since I didn't shake up the order much and I mostly dropped the dubs (the main thing they recorded/added to make the triple LP possible), but I also dropped "The Crooked Beat" and I imagine they would have kept it just so that all four members get at least one lead vocal.

xxp hard disagree, 3/4 is compelling to me

Cut the Crap is a cautionary tale.

In the sense that they should have had the balls to go all-out and hire Trevor Horn to produce it, yes.

Worst track: Career Opportunities

Fuck that. It's the definitive version.

Yeah, I enjoy that track, but I guess more as a novelty. Still I love the concept - if you can forget the familial relationship, how awesome would it be to see some random school kids singing Clash songs like that?

They didn't really move in the weird/creepy direction too often. Triple-LP time seemed right for it.

It's a brilliant concept and realization.

It shows how capitalism has seeped down to the "Another Brick in the Wall" level.