Setting Sons

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The Polydor US LP release in 1979 reversed the sides and inserted the single "Strange Town" as the second song on side two, between "Girl on the Phone" and "Thick As Thieves". Buckler told the Woking News and Mail in 2012: "It was like we were going to be driving over a cliff at the end of the year, and you keep thinking 'Well, maybe he'll change his mind'’. This concept was never fully developed and it remains unclear which tracks were originally intended as part of the story, although it is commonly agreed that "Thick as Thieves", "Little Boy Soldiers", "Wasteland" and "Burning Sky" are likely constituents; extant Jam bootlegs feature a version of "Little Boy Soldiers" split into three separate recordings, possible evidence that the song was intended to serve as a recurring motif, with separate sections appearing between other songs on the album. But when he jumps several steps down the Camelot Wheel to introduce an Eb major (almost a key change within a key change), my blonde brain shorted out and I had to hit the reset button. Both Buckler and Foxton described the experience as bitter, but in later years both expressed understanding, if not complete acceptance.

The Jam had political lyrics, condemning police brutality ("In the City") and expansionist development ("Bricks And Mortar").The omnibus indictment contained two alleged crimes: one, “Heat Wave” was a poor fit in an album filled with socio-cultural themes; and two, The Jam’s version wasn’t all that different than The Who’s take, which appeared on the album A Quick One.

Being a similar age to Paul Weller, this album connected with me strongly when it first came out and I love it even more all these years later. The last verse depicts the father in retirement, but the narrative becomes somewhat ambiguous here—we’re not sure if he’s really “feeling groovy” or wishes he was still on the job (“Work and work you wanna work ’till you die”). The album cover art features a photograph of Benjamin Clemens' bronze sculpture The St John's Ambulance Bearers.

Private Hell” is a painful but truthful depiction of modern ennui and the toll it takes on human mental health. Note that Weller described what he saw as “jeering” and not “fighting” in the quote above; I could find no credible evidence that any fisticuffs took place that day. I finally managed to get the verses down (all chords firmly compatible with the D major key), but when faced with the first key change I ran up against my latent classical training paradigm and had a bitch of a time getting past it.

Maybe the lyrics on this album are more biting, but I think I prefer All Mod Cons because the songwriting here is weaker.The bridge that follows introduces a new melodic variation, introducing Foxton in the role of “participant-observer. When I tried to accompany the band on my guitar, I found it incredibly difficult to suppress the urge to finish the run and leave Bruce to it, so kudos to Weller for achieving the musical equivalent of holding ejaculation when a man is ready to explode.