1983 Singles # 14 Style Council

 

Paul Weller folded The Jam and mounted up and set off again on a horse of a different colour with the Style Council, much to the bewilderment of Bruce Foxton and Rick Buckler and a thousand teenage and early twenties fans who felt they'd been completely betrayed. I wasn't particular enamored with The SC at the time. There seemed to be a requirement that you loved the things that Weller loved, particularly Mod things and I didn't particularly. The whole Mod revival seemed like something that didn't particularly need to happen to me, even if Quadrophenia was great.

Another thing I didn't particularly like about The Style Council was that they seemed to want to have their cake and eat it. To be at one and the same time incredibly earnest and serious and angry and uptight, and also loose and funky and cool and have this incredibly wry and wicked humour that you had to be in on the joke to get. I never really did. And the whole affair seemed to hinge on The Kinks, The Small Faces, great 60s Soul records, moccasins, sweaters, slacks and faintly ridiculous haircuts. I didn't want to look like that. I wanted to listen to music that had a broader perspective than that, great as much of it was. I wanted to wear clothes like Peter Buck of R.E.M. and though I was fascinated with the Sixties, it was a different part of the Sixties. Weller was never completely my thing, even when he did things I liked and respected.

Now I'm in my late fifties and care much less about the fine details and can appreciate Weller's talent which has always been pretty considerable.  I can see how great some of the records were. Particularly the singles. Paul Weller was very good at singles. He knew how much they meant to people because they had meant so much to him growing up. This was the band's first and seemed to be in the charts forever, with the video of the band partying on top of an open topped bus played on TOTP every fortnight for a season. I thought it was weak and directionless at the time because I was more interested in Echo & the Bunnymen. I was completely wrong.