(You have to remember that they were like 18 when they broke, so they probably had a good share of cocky youthful arrogance.) When they didn’t get the reaction from the small tours they did in second-tier markets, they gave up trying to crack the US. From what I read Paul Weller assumed that the success they had in the US would somehow carry over to success in the US without much effort. There was no easy way to get big in the US in the late ’70s/early 80’s if you were a punk(ish) band, not only did you have to get in good with the critics (which The Jam mostly did here in the US), but you had to do legwork.īands like The Police and The Clash went out on the road continuously in the States, hitting up radio, generating word of mouth. The US is a huge country with the music magazines (at the time Rolling Stone and Creem would be the biggest) coming out less frequently and were much less influential. So it was easier for a band to get known around the country much faster. The line-up consisted of Paul Weller on bass and lead vocals with various. Paul Weller is a great musician and I listen to these two. The Jam formed at Sheerwater Secondary School in Woking, Surrey, England, in 1972. The UK is (obviously) a smaller country, and with a weekly music press who worked to hype the next big thing. I really like Paul Weller & The Jam (the last Weller CD is wonderful), but The Clash is the only band that matters, simple but true. But I remember reading something awhile back (so I may be flubbing a few facts) that The Jam/Paul Weller weren’t that into “putting the work” to break America, so it didn’t happen. I don’t know for sure why The Jam never “broke” in the US and got to a level of success like The Police or even The Clash. Weller was merely 18 when they released their debut album In The City, and when they released their final album, The Gift, in 1982, Weller was still only 23. The most unusual aspect of The Jam’s tenure was how young they were. They never made much impact in the USA, however, perhaps hindered by Weller’s thick English accent. The Jam broke up at the height of their success, selling out a five-night stand at Wembley Arena in twenty minutes. Like a lot of British bands, The Jam’s six albums don’t tell the complete story – non-album singles like ‘Going Underground’, ‘The Dreams of Children’, and ‘When You’re Young’ are some of their best, while b-sides like ‘Liza Radley’ and ‘The Butterfly Collector’ are also impressive. Later Jam material includes the pastoral prettiness of ‘That’s Entertainment’, the terse post-punk of ‘Funeral Pyre’, and the Northern Soul of The Gift. Weller was supported by bassist Bruce Foxton and drummer Rick Buckler, who coped admirably keeping up with Weller’s diverging musical interests. Subsequent albums showed a heavy influence from mid-1960s bands like The Who and The Kinks, as leader Paul Weller developed as an excellent songwriter.
Emerging from Woking, on the outskirts of London, the three-piece band were fast and aggressive enough to initially be considered as punk. The Jam were huge in the UK during the punk era, scoring four top ten albums and four number-one singles.
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