Deep Album Cuts Vol. 375: The Jam
Rick Buckler, drummer for The Jam, passed away on Monday, so I thought I'd take a look back at their brief but prolific run.
2. Here Comes The Weekend
3. Ghosts
4. Set The House Ablaze
5. Away From The Numbers
6. Thick As Thieves
7. Running On The Spot
8. English Rose
9. The In Crowd
10. Boy About Town
11. I've Changed My Address
12. Life From A Window
13. Carnation
14. But I'm Different Now
15. I Got By In Time
16. Smithers-Jones
17. Don't Tell Them You're Sane
18. Mr. Clean
19. Private Hell
20. London Traffic
21. Art School
21. Art School
22. To Be Someone (Didn't We Have A Nice Time)
23. Pretty Green
24. The Gift
25. Burning Sky
26. Man In The Corner Shop
Tracks 5, 11, 15, and 21 from In The City (1977)
Tracks 2, 12, 17, and 20 from This Is The Modern World (1977)
Tracks 1, 8, 9, 18, and 22 from All Mod Cons (1978)
Tracks 6, 16, 19, and 25 from Setting Sons (1979)
Tracks 4, 10, 14, 23, and 26 from Sound Affects (1980)
Tracks 3, 7, 13, and 24 from The Gift (1982)
I grew up listening to a lot of the British punk and new wave bands of the late '70s and early '80s, so The Jam were a band I always read about and heard about, but never actually heard much. Even their most famous song, "Town Called Malice," I feel like I only encounter once in a blue moon. "Ghosts" was the first Jam song I got really into, I checked out the original after enjoying Ted Leo's cover, it kind of surprised me that was never a single because that's a great song. And when I heard "Away From The Numbers," it was very clear to me within seconds that it was the primary inspiration for one of my favorite Ted Leo deep cuts, "Some Beginner's Mind."
On paper, The Jam's career in the UK resembles that of The Police: 6 albums, each one more commercially successful than the last, a long string of Top 40 hits that included four #1 singles. Of course, in America, they didn't have much of a pop profile at all -- they never made the Hot 100, and only their last three albums charted modestly in the U.S. And like The Police, I think The Jam probably broke up at the right time, The Gift has some great songs but it feels like the band was starting to turn into something else and Paul Weller was ready to move on. If I had to pick a favorite Jam album, it'd probably be Sound Affects (which Weller also called their best) or All Mod Cons, but In The City has some really strong songs too. Buckler was a pretty excellent drummer who gave a lot of their best songs a charge of energy, some of my favorite performances of his on this playlist are "All Mod Cons," "Running On The Spot," "Carnation," and "But I'm Different Now."
"English Rose," an acoustic track the band never played live, is easily the band's most popular non-single on Spotify, that and "Ghosts" are the only deep cuts that have as many streams as some of their hits. I really like how "English Rose" and "The In Crowd" go together on All Mod Cons so I kept that sequence intact on the playlist. "Private Hell," "Pretty Green," "To Be Someone (Didn't We Have A Nice Time)," "Boy About Town," "Mr. Clean," and "Ghosts" were among the deep cuts the band played live the most.
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