1979.

In 1979, The Clash were experiencing some pressure. Whether they wanted it or not, punk rock had become their responsibility. In New York, the Ramones had come up with the musical idea of reducing rock to three chords, doubling the volume, and accelerating songs until they sounded like Morse code. In London, the Sex Pistols had turned disgust into an ideology and made punk a historical moment, inspiring teen-agers across England to start bands. But by March of 1979 the Ramones had become more interested in being themselves than in changing the world, the Sex Pistols had disbanded, and The Clash, feeling burned out, had fired the manager who helped put the band together, in 1976. Yet they still owed CBS a record.

The Clash were able to fit more music and faith through the keyhole of punk than anyone else. Their debut album, "The Clash," was a brick in flight, fourteen songs, half of them under two minutes long. The lyrics talk about the riots the band members want to start, the American imperialism they want to stop, and England's general lack of "career opportunities." It is an act of political resistance and pure pleasure. Their second album, "Give 'Em Enough Rope," was criticized for having an allegedly American sheen, but you'd have trouble hearing that now. The music is hard and echoey, barking but sweetly melodic. Actually, no--the hierarchy is more specific than that. Someone is singing sweetly way in the back, behind the loud guitars, and there's a very loud singer in the front who sounds like he's going to die if he doesn't get to sing right now. The one in the back is Mick Jones, the guitarist, who wrote most of The Clash's music, and the one in the front is Joe Strummer, who wrote and sang most of the lyrics, if singing is the right word. Strummer delivered words as if there were no such things as amplification and he would have been willing to run around town singing through a tube if he had to.

Strummer's moral authority, coupled with Jones's ability to synthesize decades of rock music without seeming too clever, made people care about The Clash, personally, intensely, and totally. When the band, not yet a year old, signed with CBS in 1977, the London fanzine writer Mark Perry said, "Punk died the day The Clash signed to CBS." Perry was only taking the band as seriously as they took themselves. Strummer, especially, believed that punk should be available to all, and felt inherently hostile to authority. Paradoxically, it was the corporate paymaster CBS that eventually ran ads for The Clash with the tagline "The only band that matters." In March of 1979, everyone, including The Clash, knew that the hype might be more than hype. But how could a rock band possibly live up to those expectations?

By releasing "London Calling," sixty-five minutes of rock music that never goes wrong. Without self-importance, the music covers huge amounts of ground. The stories hang together with the weight of commandments and the serendipitous grace of a pile of empty bottles. Montgomery Clift becomes a folk hero ("The Right Profile"), the myth of Stagger Lee is resurrected for a new audience ("Wrong 'Em, Boyo"), and London burns. Nothing sounds forced or insincere, not the breezy cover of an obscure English rockabilly song ("Brand New Cadillac") or fantasies of being a Jamaican bad boy ("Revolution Rock"). Hyperbole itself cannot diminish this record. Each of us is invincible when it's playing.

Now reissued in a new boxed set, "London Calling" comes with a bonus CD of rehearsals and a DVD documentary about the making of the album and original promo clips. This generosity would have pleased Strummer, who died in 2002, but he likely would have been less thrilled that the set lists for $29.98. When the album was originally released, as a two-LP set, the band felt that their records had to be priced for punks and insisted that CBS sell it for $9.98.

The documentary and the rough rehearsal demos make the same point: The Clash worked fiendishly hard to ...