Free download: tribute to The Clash's Sandinista!

A few years ago, writer Jimmy Guterman produced The Sandinista Project, in which 36 performers each covered one song from the Clash's Sandinista! Jimmy writes to tell us he's doing something with it online today:

"It's Joe Strummer's birthday, a good day to give Clash fans a present. The Sandinista Project didn't set any sales record and of course the number of copies shared on the Net was greater than the number we sold. We didn't undertake the project to make ourselves any money (it was a charity record) so I didn't mind that it was available everywhere for free. But it did bother me that so many of the torrented versions sounded like crap.To rectify this situation, for one day only, we're offering, without charge,the full record in good quality, as well as one bonus cut and PDFs of the CD booklet and packaging. And hurry up: this is a 24-hour offer. At midnight Pacific Time tonight, it's gone."

The Sandinista Project: free for one day only!

• [Phikus]

  GretaGretchen: Happy Birthday!

• [Anonymous]

  Unbelievably cool

• [Anonymous]

  Just downloaded my copy!

• [Anonymous]

  Awesome

• [pAULbOWEN]

  “The Sandinista Project didn’t set any sales record”
  Probably because the original is a bloated self-indulgent mess.

  Anon @ 23 – pleeeease tell me your kidding?! It wasn’t even close to the best album of 1980 (Closer? Ace of Spades?) let alone all time.

  The Clash are grotesquely overrated; the first album is glorious, as are the early singles; London Calling, properly edited, could have been a great EP. That’s it.

• [Boinkology]

  Is that cover art by John Langford? Looks like it.

• [Boinkology]

  Oops, thats Jon Langford.

• [DeWynken]

  I am at 97% of the direct download. Hope its good.
  He’s requesting someone make a torrent of it.

• [DeWynken]

  sound quality is excellent and some really neat covers! Check it check it out.

• [alicebt]

  ..Where have you gone Joe Strummer a nation turns it’s lonely eyes to you…… appologies to Paul Simon, but Joe Strummer is missed.

• [MrJM]

  Would someone please post this as a torrent?

  Otherwise I will have to pay for a copy — and that goes against the fundamental nature of… well… my cheapness.

  – MrJM

• [remmelt]

  Sharing this for 24 hours to keep the guterman.com server from exploding: http://www.mininova.org/det/2873339

• [remmelt]

  Good grief, I distinctly remember posting that as anonymous, captcha and all. My account must have been hacked!

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    Yeah. That’s a problem. I occasionally try to post anonymously to test something. The system knows who I am but pretends that it doesn’t.

• [Anonymous]

  Thank you. One great album doing justice to one of the Greatest Albums of all time.

• [Anonymous]

  pls post a torrent, my download keeps crashing, and it’s really slow.

• [Kimmo]

  Most of this is leaving me distinctly cold, I’m afraid

• [Anonymous]

  anyone else getting this error when trying to unzip

  End-of-central-directory signature not found. Either this file is not a Zip file, or it constitutes one disk of a multi-part Zip file.

• [Mr Brown]

  what exactly is wrong with a hillbilly tribute to sandinista? i think thats a great title, descriptive and a good thing. the cover of “ivan meets GI Joe” is even better than the orig, imnsho.

  the question of how to follow london calling is a good one. sandinista may be a bit bloated, but combat rock is fantastic, and the mescaleros are the true continuation of the clash, anyway.

  everytime i hear the opening chords to london calling (song), i flash back to my youthful self, pumping and screaming “I live by the river!” and getting ready to destroy something, since i didnt have any swing, except for the ring of the truncheon thing.

• [dderidex]

  Well, I wouldn’t call it “FREE”, when he’s being quite clear it’s still an illegal copy you’d “still be stealing” to download.

• [Anonymous]

  Oddly enough, I bought Sandinista! this week!
  But am not familiar enough with it yet to care about covers of the songs.

• [MrJM]

  DDERIDEX @6

  If you want, you can pay money for it here:http://www.amazon.com/Sandinista-Project-Various-Artists/dp/B000OZ2CVG/vineyarddevelopmA

  – MrJM

• [mack]

  Downloaded, and enjoying.

  Only up to the start of Disc 2 (yeah, I once owned it on vinyl) and it’s already pleasing the living hell out of me. Thoroughly excellent.

• [gretagretchen]

  What a lovely present! For it is my birthday today as well!!!

• [angusm]

  @boinkology

  Yes, the accompanying booklet says that the cover painting is by the multi-talented Mr Langford. Langford and Sally Timms (backed by Langford’s “Ship and Pilot” band) also have a track on the album.

• [engwar]

  I love the Clash but I have to admit that Sandinista is one of my least favorite of their albums.

  I’ve tried multiple times to listen to it but always end up wondering what the fuss was about.

  They put out one of the greatest albums ever with London Calling and then… something happened. They lost their edge. Like the Stones after Exile on Main Street.

  Three disks on vinyl and I feel there’s *maybe* one disk worth of quality on it.

  Not just being negative here but truly don’t get it. I’ll have to give it another try. I want to like it…

• [iMatthew]

  I agree with Kimmo. A press quote notes this tribute has an “intriguing crew of artists [who] fulfill the original album’s wide-ranging musical ambitions.” Absolute hogwash. The range of musical styles on this tribute is amazingly narrow, spanning nothing more than alt-country to indie rock with a folk bent, with a couple of Western Swing or Le Jazz Hot (highly melodic, pre-1940 jazz (especially with banjos!) seemingly the only type of jazz white indie kids can appreciate) thrown in for variety. If this was billed as a dub side of the moon type, narrow genre interpretation, that would be fine (A Hillbilly Tribute to Sandinista!). But to claim this is true to the wide ranging musical ambition of the Clash’s project is ridiculous.

  I’ll give this tribute one thing: If the goal was “let’s make Sandinista sound AS WHITE AS POSSIBLE! — mission accomplished.

• [Secret_Life_of_Plants]

  I think it is a tribute to my AT&T / SBC DSL connection that it only took AN HOUR AND A HALF to DOWNLOAD this !

• [MichaelRN]

  This is an incredible tribute. Looks like Jon Langford did more than just the album cover.