
Comparison to the mods (a youth faction that, like the Teddy Boys, isn't a part of American cultural literacy) is inevitable, yet the Jam were far from a mod cover band, they were a punk reflection of it, and All Mod Cons (AM7) and Setting Sons (AM6) are exposes on a troubled Thatcher-era London. All Mod Cons, in particular, is a frightening album of urban decay and decline, an atmospheric trip around the forsaken midnight city streets told through punk and pop, acoustic and mod influences. This was the modern world.
Behind me/ Whispers in the shadows, gruff blazing voices/
Hating, waiting/ "Hey boy" they shout,/ "have you got any
money?"/ And I said, "I've a little money and a take away curry,/I'm
on my way home to my wife./She'll be lining up the cutlery,/You know she's
expecting me/Polishing the glasses and pulling out the cork"/ And I'm down
in the tube station at midnight.
Two lovers kissing amongst the scream of midnight./ Two lovers missing the tranquility of solitude./ Getting a cab and traveling on buses,/ Reading the graffiti about slashed seat affairs … That's entertainment...
Haven't heard The Jam, check these out first: "The Modern World," "English Rose," "David Watts" (Kinks cover), "Down in a Tube Station at Midnight," "Going Underground," "Start," "That's Entertainment" and "The Bitterest Pill." But why haven't you? Doesn't even make any sense.