Punk's death knell had already been called, but London Calling found The Clash fighting a heroic rear guard battle. Having shelved the no-frills heads-down thunder of The Clash and Give 'Em Enough Rope, London Calling was an extravagant benchmark. Ostensibly about the ideological and real struggles that rent British society asunder at the end of the 1970s, London Calling was couched in the language of revolutionary desperadoes. Influenced by reggae and ska, and augmented by the Irish Horns, the result was one of the most heady, celebratory rock & roll records to have come out of the punk movement. For every traditional rabble-rouser like "Rudie Can't Fail" or "Revolution Rock", though, there was a starker truth to London Calling found in "Guns Of Brixton", or a shred of poignancy in "Lost In The Supermarket" that confirmed The Clash's ideological importance to a generation. Seldom, if ever, had punk sounded so gloriously righteous, but so damn right. --Louis Pattison

Bursting at the seams with creative energy, the Clash's stunning 1979 double album more than made up for the artistic and commercial disappointment of its predecessor, '78's tried-too-hard Give 'Em Enough Rope. With ex-Mott the Hoople producer Guy Stevens harnessing their sound as never before, the band yielded what proved to be the best work of their career. Bouncing from hard-rock (the apocalyptic-vision of the title track) to rockabilly ("Brand New Cadillac") to reggae ("Rudy Can't Fail") to pop (the Top Forty hit, "Train in Vain"), the Clash knocked down all musical walls and, in the process, ended the argument over punk's viability in the U.S. --Billy Altman

London Calling is actually not as consistently great as "Sandinista!" (see my ratings on that album)
London Calling 9;Brand new cadillac 5;Jimmy Jazz 8;Hateful 6;Rudi can't Fail 8;Spanish Bombs 9;The Right Profile 9; Lost in the Supermarket 5;Clampdown 8; Guns of Brixton 10;Wrong 'em Boyo 6 Koka Kola 5;Death or Glory 6;The Card Cheat 9;Lovers Rock 5;Four Horsemen 7;I'm not Down 7;Revolution Rock 7;Train in Vain 9

I'm not a massive fan of punk as i'm more into metal, but my sister and dad are massive fans of the clash so i decided to give this a listen their are some pretty kick ass songs on here the first 6 tracks are wicked and i like Lost in The Supermarket i havn't really listend to this fully my favourite would have to be Hateful i love that song. This is a good album to start off with the clash they are a great band.

Listening to this album makes me think of one word...inconsistent

The album has too many songs and a lot of them aren't that good. In my opinion this album would of been much better if it was just 12 songs long.

Tracks like "London Calling", "Rudie Can't Fail", "Lost In A Supermarket", "The Guns of Brixton", "Death or Glory" and "Train In Vain" are all classic songs. "Hateful", "Spanish Bombs", "Clampdown", "The Card Cheat", "I'm Not Down" and "Revolution Rock" are all great songs too. However the rest are not that good, songs like "Jimmy Jazz", "Wrong 'Em Boyo" and "Four Horseman" just sound uninspired at best and really should of never been included on the album.

However, despite this album's flaws it has to be said that it is indeed a classic album and one everyone should own. And in this day and age of computer playlists, one can remove the several weaker songs from the album and have a classic 5 star album that's just 12 songs long.

To my mind this was the creative peak of the Clash where their fondness for trying as many musical styles as possible was at its most successful. From the title track to the final "Train in Vain" there isn't a dud here. I also think this is where the Clash seem most together as a band, with everyone making telling contributions. Some of Jones best vocals are here and on songs like "Spanish Bombs" the Jones / Strummer duet seems telepathic. Highlights for me are "Brand New Cadillac", "Rudi Can't Fail", "Wrong `Em Boyo", "Card Cheat", "Revolution Rock" and the title track, but because of the different styles of songs there is probably a different favourite for everyone.

This paved the way for "Sandanista!" but to my mind the editing process was a bit stronger here, although I like the follow up there is a bit of filler on it, here there is none.

Each to his own but I can't believe some of the reviews here, somebody has counted and ranked the number of tracks, counting most as "poor" but they seem to think there's only 12 tracks on the album. Maybe if they heard the other 7 songs they would add a star (or maybe take one off!)

If you haven't ripped it up with this you are either too old or regretably too young! The finest Rock and Roll since Elvis and The Beatles.