A recent post on Boing Boing linked me over to Cover Lay Down, a music blog that posts only covers. Interesting concept. The entry in question had a bunch of singer/songwriter/folky covers of The Clash’s “Straight to Hell,” a brilliant song off 1982′s Combat Rock. I’m not going to link to them here, cuz it’s easy enought to click and find them yourself, but it got me listening to Combat Rock again.

I remember finding The Clash when I was a kid (I got to them a few years too late) and how important London Calling and Sandanista! were to my developing musical tastes. Punk, but not really punk … just amazing.

Combat Rock was, of course, most famous for the banger-turned-party-choon, “Should I Stay or Should I Go,” which I kneejerkily hated because of its popularity (listening to it this week and I’m still sort of sick of it. Way too many bar mitzvahs, I guess), and the straight ahead punk, political call-to-arms “Know Your Rights,” probably more relevant today than it was then.

But the slower, more melanchoic tunes stayed with me. I didn’t really get them at the time. And I still found myself this morning going to wikipedia to look them all up. Who was Sean Flynn, anyway?

Enjoy your weekend!

StraightToHell.mp3 / 5:32 / 256 kbps / 10.2 mb

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GhettoDefendant.mp3 / 4:45 / 256 kbps / 8.7 mb

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SeanFlynn.mp3 / 4:32 / 256 kbps / 8.3 mb

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InoculatedCity.mp3 / 2:15 / 256 kbps / 4.1 mb

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