Music / Cut the Crap

"Has anybody got a cigarette?"

"This is England,
This knife of Sheffield steel,
This is England,
This is how we feel..."

—"This is England"

Cut the Crap is the sixth and final album by The Clash, released in 1985. It's also the one that the band doesn't like to talk about, and not without good reason: the album was heavily plagued by poor production and a ton of infighting, and frontman Joe Strummer was reportedly depressed and demotivated enough in the wake of its release to call it quits with the Clash in 1986, not long after its release.

Things weren't going well even when the album was being recorded. Almost all of the original lineup had been dropped due to the various problems that dogged them, and Bernie Rhodes had been brought back as the band's manager; Rhodes would ultimately bear the blame for the resulting backlash that the album had, as he was the one that tried to take full control of what the album should be like, let alone its production. Strummer wasn't happy with this power-grasping; the recording sessions were said to have been highly intense, to the point where he planned to name the album Out of Control as a Take That! towards the situation before Rhodes overruled him and stuck Cut the Crap atop the record sleeve. In the end, Strummer ended up writing most of the songs, while Rhodes kept his grip on the album's production.

The album produced two singles: "This is England" and "Are You Red..Y".

Tracklist:

Side One

1. "Dictator" (3:00)
2. "Dirty Punk" (3:10)
3. "We are the Clash" (3:03)
4. "Are You Red..Y" (3:02)
5. "Cool under Heat" (3:22)
6. "Movers and Shakers" (3:02)

Side Two

1. "This is England" (3:51)
2. "Three Card Trick" (3:09)
3. "Play to Win" (3:08)
4. "Fingerpoppin'" (3:25)
5. "North and South" (3:32)
6. "Life is Wild" (2:39)

Principal Members:

• Joe Strummer — vocals, guitar
• Nick Sheppard — vocals on "North and South"
• Bernie Rhodes^note credited as "Jose Unidos", with Word of God suggesting that this was to hide from the backlash — production, drum machines
• Norman Watt-Roy — bass
• Mickey Gallagher — keyboards
• Michael Fayne — drum machines, vocals on "Play to Win"
• Hermann Weindorf — keyboards, synthesizers

But now these are the tropes, howling from your radio!:

• The Band Minus the Face: An Inverted Trope, since Strummer is the only band member who appears on most of the songs.
• Canon Discontinuity: Official sources try to ignore this album as much as possible; the most attention it usually receives is in bitter passing, it was outright excluded from the 2013 Sound System Boxed Set, and it wasn't added to the band's Spotify page until long after the rest of their back catalog had spent a good while being available. "This Is England" is the only song from the album that appears on any compilations, if any ever acknowledge the album.
• Crapsack World: "This is England" is about what the state of society in England had become at the time the album was recorded.
  This is England
  That I'm supposed to die for
  This is England
  Never gonna cry no more
• The Generalissimo: What the lyrics of the song "Dictator" are about.
• Indecipherable Lyrics: "Dictator" features Strummer's vocals buried in the mix, making the lyrics difficult to make out.
• Intentionally Awkward Title: One doesn't name an album Cut the Crap and expect it to be taken innocently.
• Meaningful Name: Averted. Strummer meant the album as a return to roots, but then Bernie Rhodes took over. He wanted to name it Out Of Control in response, but Rhodes refused.
• New Sound Album: Even for a band that refused to be pinned down to any one sound, this album certainly qualifies.
• New Wave Music: The album was made to be this with some elements of Synth-Pop rather than just Punk Rock.
• Packaged as Other Medium: The album cover is designed to resemble a poster stuck onto a corrugated metal wall.
• Radio Voice: Several of these are heard in the background of "Dictator".
• Shout-Out: The infamous title is taken from a line in Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior.
• Singer Name Drop: "We Are The Clash"
• Title-Only Chorus: Most of them.

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