Big Audio Dynamite

This release took everyone by surprise in 1985. Mick Jones, late of the Clash, revealed an astute pop ear and tasteful magpie tendencies by combining rock, early techno and name-them-if-you-can movie clips into a genuinely innovative whole. Nothing else (aside from the genius Colourbox) sounded anything like this at the time, and Jones' snarling swagger bathed every release in PiL-period Lydon credibility. "Medicine Show" remains a breath of fresh air to this day, and always will.

There was a time when The Clash embodied all that was noble about punk. They
understood the difference between apocalypse and mere antistyle and, as songwriters,
singer-guitarists Joe Strummer and Mick Jones had the gift of grab. The reggae-rap-pop
Esperanto of the band's epic productions, London Calling and Sandinista!, was a blueprint
for the Eighties black-white crossover to come; those records also anticipated t... More >

Because he sang both their pop hits, Mick was always slotted as the Clash's loverboy, but that was just his vocal cross to bear--he was really the intellectual, which is why he now specializes in what the handout calls "humor particularly irony." Though "A Party" and "The Bottom Line" are wordy enough for Ellen Foley, their anger would surface instantly if Joe were spitting them out. He might even make something of the Nippophobic "Sony" and the loverboy's lament "Stone Thames." But as it is, only "E = MC2," laid down across cosmic keyb chords, lives up to Jones's goofily internationalist spirit. (Grade - B-)