The Jam: All Mod Cons [POLYDOR]

Why you'll love it

This Polydor reissue is on 180g vinyl with a heavy printed inner sleeve. All Mod Cons reached No. 6 in the UK, NME ranked it the second best album of 1978, and Q placed it at No. 50 among the greatest British albums.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Printed inner sleeve
• Pressed in the EU
• Download card included
• Lyrics included

About the album

The title is estate-agent speak, short for "all modern conveniences," and the cover shows the band in a bare room, which is the first sign Paul Weller was in a playful mood. After a hard American tour supporting Blue Öyster Cult, he went home, went back to the drawing board and wrote a fresh set of songs about class, ambition and London life.

Producer Vic Coppersmith-Heaven captured Weller, Bruce Foxton and Rick Buckler at their sharpest. "To Be Someone (Didn't We Have a Nice Time)" sends up hangers-on, "Mr. Clean" sketches a commuter on the train to Waterloo, "English Rose" is a tender acoustic ballad Weller left off the original sleeve, and the cover of The Kinks' "David Watts" tips a hat to the British Invasion. "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight," which Weller nearly binned before Coppersmith-Heaven rescued it, became one of their biggest hits.

NME's Charles Shaar Murray said it would catapult the Jam into the front rank of international rock, and it sits in 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. It also comes with all mod cons, as advertised; the bare room is your own business.

Also at Kops: more The Jam on vinyl · browse Punk

Tracklist

Listen

On Polydor, a reissue of the 1978 album.