Joe Strummer, Mescaleros - Streetcore

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Music reviews of Streetcore

Music Review: "You cast a long shadow, and that is your testament..."
Rating: 5 Stars

I was finally able to buy a copy of Streetcore -- the third and final album by Joe and his ever-evolving backup band, the Mescaleros -- a couple days ago. Even if I hadn't found myself in a moment of personal turmoil that day (which I won't go into here), my first listen to this album still would have been a very emotional experience. Just hearing Joe's voice, sounding so strong and vital, on the upbeat, insanely catchy opener "Coma Girl" brought tears to my eyes -- it hit me that Joe would never be making another record. But further spins of the entire album made me realize that, as with any artist's final album, you should just enjoy the music and not torture yourself wondering what more the artist could have given us.

Luckily, even with only 10 tracks, there's plenty to enjoy here. "Coma Girl" ROCKS! It was a great choice for the opening track *and* the lead-off single, and it may be the catchiest thing he's written since his days with the Clash. Joe and company slow it down on "Get Down Moses," the closest this disc comes to pure reggae, but Joe sounds as passionate as ever. "Long Shadow" is a stripped-down folk number originally written for country legend Johnny Cash, but Joe may as well be singing about his own considerable legend: "Crawl up the mountain, to reach where the eagles fly / Sure, you can glimpse from the mountain top where the soul of the muse might rise / And if you put it all together, you won't have to look around / You know you cast a long shadow on the ground." "Arms Aloft" and "All in a Day" are just fun, catchy arena-size rockers. "Midnight Jam," a mostly instrumental track with some spoken voice-overs by Joe ("This is London calling!"), and the spacey, meditative "Ramshackle Day Parade" sound like they could have come from the Clash's experimental epic Sandinista! (1980). The ballad "Burnin' Streets" is a mournful rewrite of the fast-and-furious Clash classic "London's Burning" (1977). Joe's cover of Bob Marely's folk ballad "Redemption Song" is moving and surprisingly beautiful, a tribute to a great man by another great man. Streetcore comes to a close with a sweet, gentle country-style cover of Bobby Charles' "Silver and Gold (Before I Grow Too Old);" it's hard not to be heartbroken when the disc ends with Joe rasping, "Okay, that's a take."

Joe had no way of knowing that Streetcore would be his last record, and in that sense, it's closer in spirit to Kirsty MacColl's Tropical Brainstorm (2001) than to George Harrison's Brainwashed (2002) or Warren Zevon's The Wind (2003). All four albums are excellent, but while Zevon and Harrison got a chance to say goodbye to people, reflect on their lives, and ponder the afterlife (with a few moments of levity, such as Harrison's "Rocking Chair in Hawaii" and Zevon's "The Rest of the Night"), MacColl and Strummer were both cut down suddenly, and their final discs offer only a quick snapshot of where they were in their lives and what sorts of things they were thinking about. In Strummer's case, he was still (as always) passionate yet very thoughtful, and he apparently died a happy, well-adjusted family man.

Kudos to Martin Slattery and Scott Shields, two of Joe's Mescaleros, who produced and arranged this album after his passing, and to Joe's widow, Lucinda Mellor, who helped coordinate the project. (Her brief "thank you" notes are especially touching.) They worked through a great deal of personal grief to put together this final gift for his fans, and I think it embodies everything for which he would have wanted us to remember him. My heart goes out to his wife and daughters, his friends, and his bandmates. Thank you, Joe, for the music!

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