Paul Weller / The Jam Tribute Bands; Paul Weller (born John William Weller May 25, 1958 in Woking, Surrey, England, UK) is a British singer / songwriter who has been one of the biggest influences on British popular music for more than a quarter of a century, fronting two highly successful bands, The Jam and The Style Council. In the UK, he is recognised as something of a national institution, yet because much of his songwriting is rooted in British culture, he has remained essentially a national rather than an international star. Weller first burst onto the national music scene in 1977 with his first band, The Jam, which he had formed four years earlier as a teenager in Woking with his friends Rick Buckler (drums) and Bruce Foxton (bass). Weller himself took lead vocal duties and was a talented lead guitarist. 1977 was the year after the first wave of punk bands such as The Sex Pistols, The Buzzcocks and The Clash had arrived in the public eye. Although The Jam's music had much of the fire and the passion of those bands, in terms of song writing ability and lyrical content, The Jam were more in the mould of the so-called 'new wave' bands who came later on. Also, being just outside of London rather than in it, they were never really part of the tightly-knit and resentful punk clique, perhaps inspiring Weller's lines in The Jam's very first single In The City: "In the city there's a thousand things I want to say to you, but every time I approach you, you make me look a fool." Nonetheless, The Clash were suitably impressed by The Jam to take them along as the support act on their White Riot tour of 1977. Politically, Weller was inspired by the left-wing stance of the senior band's Joe Strummer and Mick Jones. The Jam went on to be far more successful, at least in terms of the singles charts, than The Clash in the UK. In The City took The Jam into the Top 40 for the first time in May 1977, although it would take another two years and eight singles before they were sufficiently engrained in the British national consciousness for The Eton Rifles to break the Top 10, hitting the No. 3 spot in November 1979. From then on their blend of pop tunes and politically-aware lyrics made them hugely popular, and in 1980 they hit No. 1 for the first time with what many believe to be the 'definitive' Paul Weller song - Going Underground, which was to become in effect the band's signature tune. A popular story has it that Going Underground hitting the charts at all was in fact an accident - allegedly, it was supposed to be only the B-side to Dreams of Children, a less-remembered song, but a mistake at a French pressing plant meant both songs were given 'A' status on the label so they had to be released as a double A-side. Whether this is true or apocryphal is unknown, but whatever the case, after Going Underground, The Jam - and Weller in particular - were UK superstars. Weller was strongly influenced by 1960s bands such as The Kinks and The Who, both great favourites of his whose presence can be felt in much of The Jam's material. However, that did not mean that he was averse to finding inspiration in the works of many other artists: the Jam's second No. 1 single, Start! borrows heavily from The Beatles' Taxman, for example. The group's third No. 1, Town Called Malice, which has more recently found renewed fame on the Billy Elliot soundtrack, has a driving bass line very reminiscent of The Supremes' You Can't Hurry Love. In the early 1980s, The Jam were possibly the biggest band in Britain. They even had one single, That's Entertainment, that reached No. 21 in the UK charts despite not even being released in that country - it got there purely on the strength of the huge number of people buying import sales of the German single release. Weller, however, was eager to explore other musical avenues he felt he could not go down with The Jam. Later Jam songs such as The Bitterest Pill (I Ever Had To Swallow) - often described by critics as "a Style Council song pretending to be a Jam song" - showed that he longed to write in a perhaps more melodic, soulful style. He felt had taken The Jam as far as he could and was eager to move on. Thus in late 1982, Weller shocked fans and the press - as well as his bandmates Buckler and Foxton - by announcing that The Jam were to disband at the end of the year. Their final single, Beat Surrender, became their fourth chart topper, going straight in at No. 1 in its first week, which was still very rare at the time, and their farewell concerts at Wembley Arena were multiple sell-outs. The Style Council At the beginning of 1983, The Jam were no more and the press and public wondered what was next for Weller. The answer emerged in the form of a collaboration with his friend, keyboard player Mick Talbot, to form a new group called The Style Council. A very different band to The Jam, the Style Council played a whole range of varying musical styles, from outright pop to jazz, soul and the occasional ballad. Weller and Style Council back-up vocalist Dee C. Lee (ex-Wham! back-up singer) formed a romantic relationship during this period and later married. However, the Style Council were not completely untouched by the spirit of The Jam - indeed, one of their early singles A Solid Bond In Your Heart was originally written and recorded during The Jam era, and this earlier version later turned up on that band's Extras compilation. And as The Bitterest Pill (I Ever Had to Swallow) is sometimes labelled as a Style Council song pretending to be a Jam song, so 1985's Walls Come Tumbling Down is often compared to a Jam song, hiding under Style Council colours. Although the Style Council were never as successful chart-wise as The Jam had been - they never had a No. 1 single, for instance - that didn't stop the mid-1980s from being possibly the peak of Weller's high profile in the UK. He appeared on 1984's famous Band Aid record Do They Know It's Christmas? (although his major contribution was probably to mime the unavailable Bono's part on the Top of the Pops performance of the song) and the Style Council were the second act on in the British half of Live Aid at Wembley Stadium in 1985. Despite this success at home, the Style Council were little more successful internationally than The Jam had been, with My Ever Changing Moods providing them with their one and only single to ever make the US Billboard Chart's Top 40. As the 1980s wore on, the Style Council's popularity in the UK itself began to slide, with none of their singles even reaching the Top 20 any more. For the first time in Paul Weller's career, he found himself somewhat in the shade, and the death-knell of The Style Council was sounded in 1989 when their record company refused to even release their fifth and final album, Modernism - a New Decade, although this did eventually have a limited vinyl run and appeared on The Complete Adventures of the Style Council, retrospective box set. Solo career In the early 1990s, Weller disbanded the Council and went quiet for a few years, before returning to prominence as one of the major influences behind the mid-1990s 'Britpop' movement that gave rise to such bands as Oasis and Blur, both of whom were heavily influenced by The Jam in particular. Weller even appeared as a guest guitarist and backing vocalist on "Champagne Supernova" of Oasis's seminal 1995 album (What's The Story) Morning Glory?, perhaps the defining moment of Britpop . In particular, Weller was an important influence in the development of Ocean Colour Scene, and members of that band, particularly guitarist Steve Cradock, often played in Weller's backing band. However, his role was not purely that of a mere influence: his own 1995 album Stanley Road (allegedly named after the street in Woking where he had grown up, although there is no Stanley Road in or near to Woking as of 2005) took him back to the top of the British charts, and went on to become the best selling album of his entire career. It marked a return to the more guitar-based style of his earlier days, albeit with a more grown-up mature edge than the sheer adrenaline rush The Jam had provided. The album's major single, The Changingman, was also a big hit, taking Weller back into the Top 10 of the singles charts. (Weller's detractors, however, noted that the song's descending guitar riff bore a strong resemblance to the one used on the Electric Light Orchestra's debut single, 10538 Overture). His influence over the 1990s generation of British guitar bands, coupled with his love of 1960s Mod-era music, had earned him the affectionate nickname 'The Modfather', and the late 1990s saw him cement his position as one of Britain's major musical figures. In 1996 he collaborated with Oasis's guitarist / songwriter Noel Gallagher and none other than Paul McCartney to form the 'super group' Smokin' Mojo Filters, releasing a version of The Beatles' hit Come Together. New Jam and Style Council 'best of' albums took his earlier career back into the charts, and his own solo 'best of' collection Modern Classics was a substantial success in 1998. The year 2000 saw the release of his fifth solo studio album and seventh solo effort overall (as well as the Modern Classics compilation, there had also been the 1994 live album Live Wood), called Heliocentric. There were rumours at the time that this was to be his final studio effort, but these proved unfounded when he released the No. 1 hit album Illumination in September 2002, preceded by yet another top ten hit single It's Written in the Stars. Between these two albums he had also released a second successful live album, 2001's Days of Speed, on which he performed acoustic versions of some of his best-known songs not just from his solo career but from The Jam and Style Council back catalogues as well. His most recent album is Studio 150, a collection of cover versions of songs including a cover of the classic Bob Dylan song, "All Along The Watchtower". On July 18 2005, Paul Weller released his most recent single "From The Floorboards up" to be featured on the new album "As is now" due out October 10, 2005. Legacy Proving that interest still remained in his seminal days of the 1970s and 80s, no less than three of his songs - two Style Council numbers and a Jam song - turned up on the soundtrack of 2001's hit British movie Billy Elliot, bringing him a whole new generation of fans to discover his music. Evidence of his continued popularity was provided by a poll run by British national radio station Virgin Radio in December 2002 to find the Top 100 British Artists of all time. More than 25,000 listeners voted, and in the final results revealed on 31st December, The Style Council came in at No. 97, Weller as a solo artist at No. 21 and The Jam at No. 5 - ahead of such acts as The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, The Clash and Weller's own heroes such as The Who and The Kinks. On September 14th, 2004, Paul Weller released an album of covers entitled "Studio 150." It debuted at No. 2 on the UK charts. THE JAM History Formation (1972-1976) The Jam formed out of Woking, Surrey, England in 1972. The line-ups were very fluid at this stage, consisting of guitarist and lead vocalist Paul Weller and various school mates. The line-up began to solidify in the mid '70s with Weller, guitarist Steve Brookes, drummer Rick Buckler, and bassist Bruce Foxton. Through their early years, their sets consisted of early American rock and roll covers by the likes of Chuck Berry and Little Richard. They continued in this vein until Weller discovered The Who's "My Generation" and became fascinated with mod music and lifestyle. As he said later, "I saw that through becoming a Mod it would give me a base and an angle to write from, and this we eventually did. We went out and bought black suits and started playing Motown, Stax and Atlantic covers. I bought a Rickenbacker guitar, a Lambretta GP 150 and tried to style my hair like Steve Marriott's circa '66". [1] Eventually Brookes left the band, and was not replaced, inviting Weller to develop a combined lead/rhythm guitar style heavily influenced by The Who's Pete Townshend. The line-up of Weller, Foxton, and Buckler would persist until the end of The Jam's career. They were managed by Weller's father, John Weller, who continues to manage Paul's music career to this day. Around 1976, Weller had another stylistic revelation after seeing The Sex Pistols. He recalled later, "The Pistols' noisy garage band racket and Rotten's youthful amphetamined arrogance. I loved it! It was so YOUNG and EXCITING, and of course, there were NO FLARES - one of the most hideous fashion creations ever!" [2] In the following two years, the Jam gained a small but loyal following around London from playing minor gigs, becoming one of the new lights on the nascent punk scene. In many ways, however, they stood out oddly from their punk peers. Though they shared a youthful outlook, short hair, crushing volume, and lightning-fast tempos, The Jam wore neatly tailored suits where others wore ripped clothes, played professionally where others were defiantly amateurish, and betrayed clear influences in 1960's rock where others were disdainful of the past. Indeed, they were tagged by some journalists as "revivalists". That criticism notwithstanding, they were signed to Polydor Records in early 1977. Early recordings (1977) Polydor released their debut single, In the City, which scraped the very bottom of the Top 40 in England. In early May, the band released their debut album of the same name. The album, like those of the Clash and the Sex Pistols, was comprised of fast, loud, and to-the-point songs. What set it apart was its clear influences in vintage rock and roll. They covered early American rock and roller Larry Williams' "Slow Down" (as also covered by The Beatles) and the "Batman" theme, which was something of a standard for bands in the '60s. Their originals revealed the influence of Motown, The Beatles, and most noticeably The Who. Many punk records at the time had some political overtones. The Jam were not as overt, preferring instead to stick with moddish celebrations of British youth such as "Sounds from the Street", "Non-Stop Dancing", and "Art School". However, they did condemn police brutality ("In the City") and expansionist development ("Bricks & Mortar"). The most openly political song, "Time for Truth", bemoaned the decline of the British Empire, eviscerated police brutality, and expressed disparaging sentiments about 'Uncle Jimmy' in no uncertain terms ("Whatever happened to the great Empire?"). These pro-Empire sentiments and ostentatious displays of the Union Jack (as mod icongraphy particularly influenced by The Who) began to earn the group the "Conservative" tag. When Weller also announced that The Jam intended voting Tory in the approaching general election, that status solidified further; this statement would cause them much embarrassment and would dog them throughout their career. Weller insisted that he was merely trying to irk "trendy left-wingers" and, still in 1977, bemoaned how the group had garnered the "Conservative" label and expressed disgust with Margaret Thatcher. The misunderstanding of The Jam's position by elements of the music press stemmed from Weller's lyrical perspective. Rather than openly mocking British tradition and calling for destruction like The Sex Pistols, or calling for a progressive change like The Clash, Paul Weller's lyrics reflected a deep affection for the British lifestyle, even as he pointed out wrongs and demanded changes, much in the style of The Kinks' Ray Davies. Although the allegations of far-rightism quickly cleared, Paul Weller's distinctly British perspective would persist through the group's career. After the non-LP single "All Around the World" nearly reached the UK top 10, The Jam, having achieved a notable following in such a short time, was hard pressed to produce more material. Their sophomore album This Is the Modern World arrived later in 1977, their second full LP of the year. Modern World was criticized as poor and vastly inferior to their debut. Despite displaying more stylistic variety, including some ventures into introspective pop, critics pointed to its unfinished ideas, poor songwriting, and uninspired performance and production. Tellingly, bassist Bruce Foxton contributed two songs to this LP; considered an inferior songwriter to Weller, Foxton only has two songs on the other five Jam LP's, including one instrumental. It remains one of the least regarded LP's of the group's career. Weller later admitted a temporary lack of interest. All Mod Cons (1978) Following the release of This Is the Modern World and the non-LP single "News of the World" (written and sung by Foxton), The Jam spent much of the next two years touring. They were not very successful with their U.S. shows, for some of which they were the opening act for arena-rockers Blue Öyster Cult, but they did better with their U.K. performances. As they went back into the studio to record a third album of primarily Foxton contributions, the songs were dismissed by producers as poor and held off recording an album in hopes that Weller would once again find inspiration. Returning to his hometown of Woking, Weller spent much of his time listening to albums by The Kinks and coming up with new songs. They released their next single, the double A-side "David Watts" b/w "'A' Bomb in Wardour Street". "David Watts" was a cover of the bouncy Kinks' classic; Weller and Foxton trade lead vocals throughout the song. "'A' Bomb in Wardour Street" was a Weller original. One of their hardest and most tense tracks, Weller venomously spat out lines cursing the violent thugs that now plagued the punk scene over a taut two-chord figure. The single, and "'A' Bomb" in particular, was hailed as a return to form and became their most successful 7" since "All Around the World". But it wasn't until their next single, "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight", that The Jam erased doubts from critics' minds. "Tube Station", an intricate first-person tale in which the narrator gets beaten, presumably to death, by thugs who smelled of "pubs and wormwood scrubs and too many right-wing meetings", was a story seemingly ripped from contemporary headlines of skinhead violence. Alternating quiet verses and loud choruses and propelled by Foxton's tense bassline, "Tube Station" again channels the atmosphere of fear and violence that was afflicting Britain in the late '70s. Aside from Weller's markedly more mature and sophisticated songwriting, another key shift in the group's sound was introduced by Foxton's adoption of the Fender Precision Bass after the recording of Modern World. [3] The P-Bass did not have the mod image of Bruce's old Rickenbacker, but it gave his melodic basslines a fuller, richer sound evocative of the most famous purveyor of the P-Bass, Motown's James Jamerson. A richer tone for Bruce was necessary for the group's progression as he carried the melody much of the time. The Jam released their third LP, All Mod Cons in 1978. The band was able to disguise the arduous process of creating the album by including three previously released tracks among the twelve in total: "David Watts", "'A' Bomb in Wardour Street", and "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight". (It also contained two songs Polydor had previously rejected for single release, the manic "Billy Hunt" and the acoustic ballad "English Rose".) Despite having only nine all-new songs, All Mod Cons is considered by many to be the band's masterpiece. Going Underground, and into the 80s (1979-1981) After the successful non-LP singles "Strange Town" and "When You're Young", the band released "The Eton Rifles" in advance of their new album. It became their most successful single to date, peaking at #3 on the UK charts, their first Top Ten hit. November of 1979 brought about Setting Sons, another massive U.K. hit, and their first chart position in the U.S., albeit at 137 on the Billboard 200. The album began life as a concept album about three childhood friends, though in the end many of the songs did not relate to this theme. Many of the songs had political overtones; "The Eton Rifles" was inspired by scuffles between demonstrators on the TUC's Right To Work March and pupils from Eton College; "Little Boy Soldiers" was an anti-war multi-movement piece in the vein of Ray Davies. Another notable song from the album was Bruce Foxton's "Smithers-Jones," originally a b-side to "When You're Young". The song is almost unanimously considered to be his greatest contribution to the Jam; the song was given a complete makeover, including a strings arrangment, for the album release. Early next year, The Jam's popularity would reach even greater heights upon the release of their first U.K. #1 hit, "Going Underground". Some sources dictate the single's success to be accidental, and that the song, a quintessential Jam track, was originally planned as the b-side to the psychedelic "The Dreams of Children". This rumor remains unconfirmed. 1980 also introduced Sound Affects to the Jam's catalogue, a more straightforward release compared to the likes of Setting Sons. Paul Weller said that he conceived the album as a hybrid of The Beatles Revolver and Michael Jackson's Off the Wall. Indeed, most of the songs recall Revolver-era swirling psychedelia, such as "Monday", "Man in the Corner Shop", and the acoustic "That's Entertainment". Weller allegedly wrote "That's Entertainment", a bitter slice-of-life piece reflecting on the struggle of the British working class, in five minutes upon returning from vacation. Despite being only available as an import single, it peaked at #21 on the UK charts, an unprecedented feat. Although it lacks the "distinctive" Jam electric sound propelled by Rick Buckler's energetic drumming, it is now arguably The Jam's most noted song. Despite the group's lack of commercial success in America, the song even made American magazine Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest songs of all time. "Start!", released before the album, became another #1 single, with a bassline very reminiscent of the Beatles' Revolver cut "Taxman". Some contemporary American R&B influence, including Michael Jackson, show up in Buckler's driving beats that power the album (such as on "But I'm Different Now"), and most obviously in Foxton's funky bassline in "Pretty Green". They would soon bring the so-called "Brit-funk" sound to greater fruition. The album also reveals influences of post-punk groups such as Wire, XTC, Joy Division, and Gang Of Four. The album was a #2 hit in the UK and peaked at #72 on the US Billboard charts, their most successful American album. Most fans and critics alike consider the trio of All Mod Cons, Setting Sons, and Sound Affects to be the peak of the group's career. The Gift, dissolution, and epilogue (1981-present) Two non-LP singles, "Funeral Pyre" and "Absolute Beginners", abandoned the psychedelic pop of Sound Affects for a more R&B-flavored sound. "Funeral Pyre" is built around Buckler's drumming, a militaristic tattoo on full fire throughout the entire song, one of the darkest in the band's career with its eerie bassline and chorus of "The weak get crushed as the strong grow stronger!" It is the only song in the group's catalogue which carries a joint Buckler/Foxton/Weller writing credit aside from the instrumental Sound Affects track "Music for the Last Couple". ("Funeral Pyre" and "Music for the Last Couple" are also the only songs on which Buckler receives any writing credit whatsoever.) "Absolute Beginners", named for a cult novel about the late '50s swingin' London scene, was a punchier effort festooned with bouncy horns. Although a commercial success, it is not considered one of Weller's strongest efforts, and it is apparently one of Weller's least favorite Jam songs since the days of This Is the Modern World. 1982's The Gift, the group's last LP, was another massive commercial success, peaking at #1 on the UK charts. Some critics were not fully supportive of the Jam's new direction, and those that were did not find the album to be consistent. Coming full-circle to their R&B roots, The Jam produce several soul, funk, and R&B-stylized songs on The Gift, most notably the #1 hit "A Town Called Malice," with a Motown-style bassline somewhat reminiscent of the Supremes' "You Can't Hurry Love". "A Town Called Malice", another slice-of-life tale of trying to keep joyful in a small, downtrodden English town, is one of Weller's most favored songs among fans and critics alike, and one of the few Jam songs he performs to this day (along with "That's Entertainment", "Man in the Corner Shop", and "In the Crowd"). After the sugary soul ballad "The Bitterest Pill (I Ever Had to Swallow)" peaked at #2, the band followed with yet another #1, "Beat Surrender." After a farewell tour of the UK, the band broke up. Weller, who felt he had done all he could with the Jam, formed the Style Council with Mick Talbot of The Merton Parkas. While The Style Council, a sophisti-pop group relying heavily on synthesized instrumentation, produced some U.K. Top 10 hits early in their career, they did not become nearly as popular as the Jam had been and eventually fell out of commercial and critical favor in the late '80s, to the point where they lost their record deal and broke up. Weller then went on to pursue a solo career; the albums from this period are said to be among the first britpop recordings; the "Modfather," as he had come to be known as, also played lead guitar on Oasis' "Champagne Supernova". He has once again become a critical and commercial success. In Britain, he is still regarded as one of the finest songwriters in recent history. Bruce Foxton released one solo album, which did not achieve much popularity. He then became the bassist for Stiff Little Fingers. Rick Buckler played for Time UK, and is now working as a furniture restorer. Together, they released a history of their experiences in the Jam entitled "Our Story", which harshly criticized Paul Weller - who, of course, achieved much greater fame than either of them ever did. The group's critical and popular stature has not diminished over time. A five-disc box set release, Direction Reaction Creation, featuring all of the group's studio material plus a disc of rarities, peaked at #8 on the UK album charts upon its release in 1997, an unprecedented achievement for a box set. In 2002, Virgin Radio counted down the top 100 British Artists of all-time as polled by listeners; The Jam were #5 on the list. In a testament to Paul Weller's unparalleled popularity in his homeland, he made two other appearances in the poll: as part of the Style Council at #93 and as a solo artist at #21. [4] Though many in Britain still hope for a Jam reunion, lingering bitterness and Weller's continued solo success make that prospect extremely unlikely. As their history stands now, however, the group was a remarkably consistent critical and commercial success from their first record to their last, broke up at the peak of their popularity, and remain one of the most highly regarded and fondly remembered groups in British rock history.
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