The Jam were the band that defined a generation – and they changed my life

Telegraph

19-02-2025

The Jam were a band with a perfect career arc: from explosive beginnings to a thrilling imperial phase followed by an extraordinary act of creative harakiri, disbanding at the height of their power and popularity. They didn't even fall out, they just bowed out, after six albums and 18 consecutive hit singles, including four number ones.
Despite the yearnings of disconsolate fans and, indeed, a couple of their members, they were one the precious few bands who never even countenanced a nostalgic reunion, and now we know they never will. The death of drummer Rick Buckler at the age of 69 brings to an end any last lingering hopes that the Jam might ever unleash that incredible power and fury again.
Buckler was a fantastic drummer, hard hitting and inventive, forming a lean, mobile rhythm section with audacious, nimble bassist Bruce Foxton. They were the backbone of a perfectly balanced power trio, filling out and offsetting the inventive rhythm and lead work of guitarist, vocalist and songwriter Paul Weller, who would, of course go onto many more great things.
Affectionately known as the Modfather, Weller has been a constant presence in our pop landscape for approaching 50 years. A man of ever-changing creative moods, Weller emerged from Woking in Surrey in the punk storm of the Seventies and spearheaded a Mod revival before indulging in the playful agit-pop of the Style Council in the Eighties, tuning into the Britpop revival of the Nineties and moving into the 21 st century as a revered singer-songwriter constantly exploring a wide array of rock, soul and jazz fusions.
Yet the affection and loyalty Weller still inspires was all rooted in the Jam, a generational band still revered as one of the most vital and life-changing rock groups Britain has ever produced. Well, by me anyway. Because one of the lives they changed was mine.
I was 16 when The Jam's debut album In The City came out, just a couple of years younger than the wiry, driven frontman with a Rickenbacker guitar and sharp suit. I already identified with punk and was in the midst of a tumultuous teenage engagement with music. I fell hard for the Jam. There were two thunderous albums in a row in 1977 and some electrifying appearances on Top of The Pops, all jerky movement, sharp style and fierce songcraft.
The Jam's third album, 1978's All Mod Cons, was the game changer. Like so many other young rock fans of my era, I loved the cool pose of the cover and was enraptured by the thoughtful, philosophical, politically engaged lyricism set to elegant melodies and carefully layered arrangements. The epic closing track Down In The Tube Station at Midnight was devastating, its narrative of skinhead violence delivered like a Play for the Day set to Bruce Foxton's intricately propulsive bass line and Rick Buckler's racing percussion.
The album displayed a depth and variety unusual in punk. There were dreamily romantic love songs (English Rose, Fly), pastoral elegies (The Place I Love) and an anthemic cover of a forgotten Kinks B-side David Watts. For Weller and the Jam, punk had never been year zero in music. He was a fan of The Beatles and The Who, and covered Motown and Northern Soul songs. The pun of the album title connected to his devotion to Mod style.
As The Jam's popularity exploded, a new wave of Mod took root in Britain, as young men and women donned Harrington jackets and turned up jeans, Ben Sherman shirts and suede loafers, and took to riding motor scooters in badge-covered parkas.
The Jam weren't just a pop sensation, they were a pop education. Weller started his own poetry fanzine and praised Liverpool poets Roger McGough, Brian Patten and Adrian Henri, whose Tonight At Noon he adapted into a song. He printed Percy Bysshe Shelley's The Mask of Anarchy on the cover of 1980 album Sound Affects. He talked about George Orwell and William Blake as enthusiastically as he spoke about music and clothes. He guided fashion choices through his meticulous Mod dress code. They were a group who inspired incredible devotion but who rejected any concept of separation from their fan base. If you were in the Jam army, you were all in it together.
I only saw The Jam live once, an explosive set at the Top Hat Ballroom in Dublin in October 1978, the only time they played in Ireland. By the time I turned 18, I had formed a band called The Modulators; I wore skinny lapel jackets and paisley shirts, and I was bound on my own musical adventures. The Jam's popularity was expanding, and from 1980 they had a succession of number one singles including monumental political anthems Eton Rifles, Going Underground and Town Called Malice.
Then in 1982, at the height of their success, on the back of a number one album, The Gift, and number one single, Beat Surrender, Weller announced the end of The Jam, bowing out with a final tour including five nights at Wembley Arena. I was devastated, as much as I tried to accept it as a statement of poetic completion. Weller felt he had taken that musical setup as far as he could, and it was time to move on.
I met Weller shortly after that, in 1983, and fondly recall an afternoon drinking cappuccinos al fresco at a West End café. I was 22. He was 25. 'It was a good time for The Jam to stop,' he insisted. 'I used to think 'what if this goes on forever? Could we actually be playing when we are 30 and balding?' It's so undignified.'
Well, he's 66 now, still got his hair, still writing songs that express his inner world, still out there playing. He has expressed his sadness and shock at the death of his old bandmate, even though the two never interacted after the end of the Jam. Buckler frequently pronounced himself baffled by Weller's decisions to end the band at their height. There was no falling out, just a growing apart.
But Weller's deeply romantic ideas of rock music meant that he held a very high store by the notion that a band should never reform for reasons of nostalgia or money. He said he would rather go back to playing in pubs than with the Jam. For years, he would rarely even play a Jam song in his live sets, though that self-censure relaxed in recent decades. And whenever he does throw a Jam classic into his set, the venue is guaranteed to explode in delirious ecstasy. Those songs still carry a lot of magic and power.
Though he went on to play in a couple of other groups (Time UK and The Highliners), Buckler never graced the charts again and eventually retrained as an artisan carpenter. He wrote some books about the Jam, and engaged with their loyal fan base, where he had a good guy reputation for down to earth frankness and geniality. Between 2007 and 2009, he reunited to play with Foxton in From The Jam, covering some of their famous songs. Buckler spoke of it as 'an itch I wanted to scratch' particularly regarding performing material from the final Jam album, 1982's The Gift, but he quit when he felt they were in danger of turning into their own tribute band.
Foxton (who has remained on friendly terms with Weller, and appears on a few Weller solo recordings) had a more successful post Jam career, playing with Still Little Fingers for 15 years, releasing solo records and performing with From the Jam. He has announced that he will be retiring following a final From the Jam tour this year.
Although for some it is sad that the trio never reunited, that refusal to turn back the clock has become part of their legend, confirming a particular sense of integrity and fierce youthful idealism. The Jam were of their moment. And what a moment it was.
'I'm not the greatest drummer in the world,' Buckler once admitted. 'But I did take a leaf out of Ringo Starr's book. He realised that the song is the star, right? None of us were really outstanding musicians in a lot of ways, but we were trying to be as inventive as we possibly could, so that we worked well together as a band. And that's what bands are about, it's not individuals, it's actually working together, which makes that sound which makes it work. You can put the same cake together with different ingredients, and it isn't the same cake. It is the sum of the parts that makes The Jam. There's no other way of doing it.'