Let’s set the scene, because context is everything. It’s the spring of 1979. The United Kingdom is literally falling apart at the seams. The “Winter of Discontent” has just finished turning the country into a frozen, miserable wasteland. The dead aren’t being buried and the rubbish is piled higher than a double decker bus. Margaret Thatcher is unpacking her bags at Number 10 Downing Street, and the original punk explosion the movement that was supposed to burn the establishment to the ground has largely fizzled out into a parade of posers wearing safety pins they bought from a boutique in Chelsea.
Enter The Clash.
They’re in a weird spot. They’ve survived the slightly over produced, stadium rock sheen of their second album, Give ‘Em Enough Rope, but they haven’t quite reached the world conquering majesty of London Calling yet. They need a bridge. They had to clear their throats.
So, what do they do? They release an EP. Now, historically, the Extended Play format is an absolute scam. That’s usually reserved for bands trying to squeeze a final fifteen quid out of their fans by slapping a rubbish B side and a terrible live recording onto a piece of plastic. But The Clash didn’t do filler, they used the EP format to drop four tracks of absolute, undiluted perfection. The Cost of Living EP is a 33 RPM hand grenade that proves they were the only band that mattered.
Let’s drop the needle, crack open a lukewarm tin of lemonade, and go track by track.
1. I Fought The Law
If you’re going to do a cover version, you’ve a moral obligation to either destroy the original or improve it. Drastically enough so that the original artist has to publicly apologise for their inferior work.
Originally written by Sonny Curtis and made famous by the Bobby Fuller Four in the 1960s. “I Fought The Law” was a charming, bouncy little ditty you could imagine playing on the jukebox while teenagers drank milkshakes. Legend has it Joe Strummer and Mick Jones heard it in San Francisco, looked at each other, and decided to nick it.
What they did to this song borders on actual grievous bodily harm. From the exact millisecond Topper Headon launches into that iconic, machine gun drum intro, the track grabs you by the lapels and pins you to the wall. Topper doesn’t just play the drums here; he beats them like they owe him money. The guitars don’t jangle; they roar like a stolen getaway car tearing down the motorway.
And then there’s Joe. He sings the opening lines with such feral, spitting intensity that he turns a slightly sad lyric about breaking rocks in the hot sun into a furious, anti establishment war cry. Meanwhile, Paul Simonon is treating his bass like a blunt instrument, anchoring the chaos with a groove so heavy it could sink a battleship. The Clash didn’t just cover this song; they committed theft, signed their name on the deed, and walked away laughing. It’s the definitive version. Period.
2. Groovy Times
Right, you’ve just melted the face off every punk purist in the country with track one. What is the logical follow up? Break out the acoustic guitars, obviously.
The title “Groovy Times” is perhaps the most sarcastic two words in British musical history. There’s absolutely nothing “groovy” about late 70s Britain, unless your idea of a good time was queuing for a loaf of bread in the pouring rain. The Clash knew this, and they wrapped a bitterly bleak, observational lyric inside a jaunty, almost campfire friendly melody.
It’s a brilliant Contrast. Mick Jones drives the track with a frantic acoustic strum that sounds like Bob Dylan busking outside a closed down factory in Croydon, backed by this surprisingly mournful harmonica. It’s the sound of a band entirely bored by the limitations of three chord punk. They’re stretching their legs, showing the world that they can write proper, sophisticated folk rock without losing a single ounce of their street credibility.
Strummer’s lyrics are razor sharp. He’s describing the concrete tower blocks, the rising unemployment, and the utter desperation of the working class. Delivering lines that cut straight through the bone. You find yourself tapping your foot to a song about absolute societal collapse. It’s genius. It’s the musical equivalent of a bloke in the pub laughing about his impending bankruptcy because crying would ruin his pint.
3. Gates of the West
Flip the record over. It’s time for Mick Jones to step up to the microphone and show off his swagger.
If Joe Strummer was the snarling, political conscience of the band, Mick Jones was the romantic rock and roll heart. “Gates of the West” is his love hate letter to the United States. Having toured America, the band were completely intoxicated by the sheer, terrifying scale of the skyscrapers, and the capitalist excess. A mythology, but they were also inherently cynical working class blokes who could spot a con job a mile off.
This track is absolutely colossal. It sounds like a stadium anthem, complete with soaring, melodic guitar riffs and a genuinely triumphant chorus, but it’s filtered through the damp, grey reality of London. Mick’s vocal delivery has this brilliant, arrogant strut to it, like he knows exactly how good he is. Underneath it, Joe is shouting backing vocals like a frantic hype man who’s had too much coffee.
It’s a song about ambition, looking across the Atlantic and wondering if the grass really is greener, or if it’s just astroturf. If an indie band released this exact song today, the music press would declare them the saviours of guitar music, hand them a Mercury Prize, and immediately retire. For The Clash, it was just the third track on an EP. Let that sink in.
4. Capital Radio
We close out the EP with a track born entirely out of pure, unadulterated spite, which is the exact fuel that powers all the best rock and roll.
A few years prior, The Clash had given away a shorter version of this song (called “Capital Radio One”) on a free NME promotion. Because it was rare, absolute chancers and bootleggers started selling it secondhand for extortionate prices, ripping off the very working class kids the band were playing for. The Clash were absolutely furious. So, they did the most wonderfully petty thing imaginable: they went back into the studio, re recorded the song, made it faster, louder, and longer, and chucked it on this EP so anyone could buy it for cheap and the touts would lose their money.
The resulting track, often referred to as “Capital Radio Two”, is an unhinged, frantic assault on commercial broadcasting. It’s an exorcism of corporate boredom. Even today, if you’ve ever had to endure a long car journey listening to local radio play the same mind numbing pop song punctuated by adverts for double glazing, this song is your therapy.
The band sounds like they are physically vibrating. The tempo is pushed to the absolute breaking point, teetering on the edge of total collapse. By the outro, Strummer is just losing his mind, screaming over a chaotic, descending bassline and a wall of feedback. It is loud, it is fast, and it is a massive two fingered salute to the music industry establishment.
The Final Verdict
The Cost of Living EP clocks in at roughly eleven minutes. In that time, you could arguably boil a kettle and make a slightly complicated sandwich. But in those same eleven minutes, The Clash lay out a blueprint that completely destroys the boundaries of punk rock and sets the stage for the greatest double album of all time.
It’s aggressive, it’s intelligent, it’s cynical, and it sounds absolutely massive. It captures a band in the exact moment they realise their own terrifying potential. If you claim to like rock music and you don’t own this record, you’re lying to yourself. Buy it, play it at a volume that actively annoys your neighbours, and remember what it sounds like when a band actually means it.
Verdict: 8.5 / 10
To read more of my album reviews read here.
