Paul Weller Biography

English singer-songwriter and musicianFor other people named Paul Weller, see Paul Weller (disambiguation).

Musical artist

Paul John Weller (born John William Weller; 25 May 1958) is an English singer-songwriter and musician. Weller achieved fame with the band the Jam in the late-1970s. Following the dissolution of the Jam in 1982, he changed musical style and had further success with the Style Council (1983–1989), before establishing himself as a solo artist with his eponymous 1992 album.

Despite widespread critical recognition as a singer, lyricist, and guitarist, Weller has remained a national—rather than international—star, and much of his songwriting is rooted in English society. Many of his songs with the Jam had lyrics about working cl* life. He was the principal figure of the 1970s and 1980s mod revival, often referred to as the Modfather, and an influence on Britpop bands such as Oasis. He has received four Brit Awards, including Best British Male three times, and the 2006 Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music.

Early life (1958–1975)

Weller was born on 25 May 1958 in Woking, Surrey, England, to John and Ann Weller (née Craddock). Although born John William Weller, he became known as Paul by his parents.

Weller's father worked as a taxi driver and a builder and his mother was a part-time cleaner. He started his education at Maybury County First School. His love of music began with the Beatles, then the Who and Small Faces. When Weller was eleven he moved up to Sheerwater County Secondary school and had started playing the guitar.

Weller's musical vocation was confirmed after seeing Status Quo in concert in 1972.He formed the first incarnation of the Jam in the same year, playing b* guitar with his best friends Steve Brookes (lead guitar) and Dave Waller (rhythm guitar). Weller's father, acting as their manager, began booking the band into local working men's clubs. Joined by Rick Buckler on drums, and with Bruce Foxton soon replacing Waller on rhythm guitar, the four-piece band began to forge a local reputation, playing a mixture of Beatles covers and a number of compositions written by Weller and Brookes. Brookes left the band in 1976, and Weller and Foxton decided they would swap guitar roles, with Weller now the guitarist.

Weller became interested in 1960s mod culture in late 1974, particularly after hearing "My Generation" by the Who. As a result, he began riding a Lambretta scooter, styling his hair like Steve Marriott and immersing himself in 1960s soul and R&B music. At his instigation, the Jam began wearing mohair suits onstage and he and Foxton began playing Rickenbacker guitars (as favoured by the Who and the Beatles in the mid-1960s). He has been a committed mod ever since, declaring in a 1991 interview that, "I'll always be a mod. You can bury me a mod".

The Jam (1976–1982)

Main article: The Jam

The Jam emerged at the same time as punk rock bands such as the Clash, the Damned, and Sex Pistols. The Clash were early advocates of the band, and added them as the support on their White Riot tour in May of 1977.

Paul Weller (left) performing with the Jam in Newcastle, 1982

The Jam's first single, "In the City", took them into the UK Top 40 in May 1977. In 1979 the group released the political "The Eton Rifles" and first broke into the Top 10, hitting the No.:3 spot in November. The increasing popularity of their blend of Weller's barbed lyrics with pop melodies eventually led to their first number one single, "Going Underground", in March 1980.

The Jam became the first band since the Beatles to perform both sides of the same single ("Town Called Malice" and "Precious") on one edition of Top of the Pops. They also had two singles, "That's Entertainment" (1981) and "Just Who Is the 5 O'Clock Hero?" (1982), reach No.:21 and No.:8 respectively in the UK singles chart despite not being released as singles in the UK—on the strength of import sales of the German single releases. At that time, "That's Entertainment" was the best-selling import-only single to date in the UK charts.

"Before the Jam split up, I just felt it was time for me to move on, just artistically and creatively. I needed to find something different and different kind of avenues to make music, and a different way of making music."

Weller, reflecting on his decision to end the band, in a 2007 interview with Billboard.

Having already told Buckler and Foxton that he was leaving the band, in October 1982 Weller announced that the Jam would disband at the end of that year. Although Weller was determined to end the band and move on, the action came as a surprise to Foxton and Buckler who both felt that the band had scope to develop further professionally. Their final single, "Beat Surrender", became their fourth UK chart topper, going to No.:1 in its first week. Their farewell concerts at Wembley Arena were multiple sell-outs; their final concert took place at the Brighton Centre on 11 December 1982.

The Style Council (1983–1989)

Main article: The Style Council

In 1983, Weller teamed up with keyboard player Mick Talbot to form a new group called the Style Council. Weller brought in Steve White to play drums, as well as singer Dee C. Lee, who later became Weller's girlfriend and then wife. She also had previously been a backing singer with Wham!

Free of the limited musical styles he felt imposed by the Jam, under the collective of the Style Council Weller was able to experiment with a wide range of music, from pop and jazz to soul/R&B, house, and folk-styled ballads. The band was at the vanguard of a jazz/pop revival that would continue with the emergence of bands like Matt Bianco, Sade, and Everything but the Girl, whose members Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt contributed vocals and guitar to the 1984 Style Council song "Paris Match".

Many of the Style Council's early singles performed well in the UK charts, and Weller would also experience his first success in North America, when "My Ever Changing Moods" and "You're the Best Thing" entered the US Billboard Hot 100.

Weller appeared on 1984's Band Aid record "Do They Know It's Christmas?" and was called upon to mime the absent Bono's lyrics on Top of the Pops. The Style Council was the second act to appear in the British half of Live Aid at Wembley Stadium in 1985.

In December 1984, Weller put together his own charity ensemble called the Council Collective to make a record, "Soul Deep", to raise money for striking miners, and the family of David Wilkie. The record featured the Style Council plus a number of other performers, notably Jimmy Ruffin and Junior Giscombe. In spite of the song's political content, it still picked up BBC Radio 1 airplay and was performed on Top of the Pops, which led to the incongruous sight of lyrics such as "We can't afford to let the government win / It means death to the trade unions" being mimed amid the show's flashing lights and party atmosphere.

As the 1980s wore on, the Style Council's popularity in the UK began to slide, with the band achieving only one top ten single after 1985. The Style Council's death knell was sounded in 1989 when its record company refused to release its fifth and final studio album, the house-influenced Modernism: A New Decade. With the rejection of this effort, Weller announced that the Style Council had split. It was not until the 1998 retrospective CD box set The Complete Adventures of the Style Council that the album would be widely available.

Solo career (1990-present)

Early solo career (1990–1995)

In 1989, Weller found himself without a band and without a recording deal for the first time since he was 17. After taking time off for most of 1990, he returned to the road late in the year, touring as "The Paul Weller Movement" with long-term drummer and friend Steve White and Paul Francis (session b*ist from the James Taylor Quartet). After a slow start playing small clubs with a mixture of Jam and Style Council cl*ics, as well as showcasing new material such as "Into Tomorrow", by the time of the release of his 1992 LP, Paul Weller, he had begun to re-establish himself as a leading British singer-songwriter. This self-*led album saw a return to a more jazz-guitar-focused sound, featuring samples and a funk influence with shades of the Style Council sound. The album also featured a new producer, Brendan Lynch. Tracks such as "Here's a New Thing" and "That Spiritual Feeling" were marketed among the emerging acid jazz scene.

Buoyed by the positive commercial and critical success of his first solo album, Weller returned to the studio in 1993 with a renewed confidence, recording most of the tracks on his next album in one take. Accompanied by Steve White, guitarist Steve Cradock and b*ist Marco Nelson, the result of these sessions was the triumphant Mercury Music Prize-nominated Wild Wood, which included the singles "Sunflower" and "Wild Wood".

His 1995 album Stanley Road took him back to the top of the British charts for the first time in a decade, and went on to become the best-selling album of his career. The album, named after the street in Woking where he had grown up, marked a return to the more guitar-based style of his earlier days. The album's major single, "The Changingman", was also a big hit, taking Weller to No.:7 in the UK Singles Chart. Another single, the ballad "You Do Something To Me", was his second consecutive Top 10 single and reached No.:9 in the UK.

Weller found himself heavily *ociated with the emerging Britpop movement. Noel Gallagher (of Oasis) is credited as guest guitarist on the Stanley Road album track "I Walk on Gilded Splinters". Weller also returned the favour, appearing as a guest guitarist on Oasis' hit song "Champagne Supernova".

The Modfather (1996–2007)

Weller performing in the early 2000s

Heavy Soul, the follow-up to the million-selling Stanley Road, was a 'rootsy', 'stripped-down' change in Weller's musical style, compared to its predecessor. The first single "Pea* Suit" reached No.:5 in the UK Singles Chart, in 1996 and the album reached No.:2 in 1997. Success in the UK charts also came from compilations: "Best Of" albums by the Jam and the Style Council charted, and in 1998 his own solo collection, Modern Cl*ics, peaked at No.:7.

In 2000, while living in Send, Surrey, he released his fifth solo studio album, Heliocentric. Once again finding himself without a record contract, Weller's Days of Speed worldwide tour provided him with the opportunity to view his works as one back catalogue, giving rise to a second successful live album in 2001. Days of Speed contained live acoustic versions from the world tour of the same name, including some of his best-known songs from his solo career and the back catalogues of his Jam and Style Council days.

There were rumours at the time that Heliocentric would be Weller's final studio effort, but these proved unfounded when he released the No.:1 hit album Illumination in September 2002. Co-produced by Noonday Underground's Simon Dine, it was preceded by yet another top 10 hit single "It's Written in the Stars". Weller also appears on the 2002 Noonday Underground album called Surface Noise, singing on the track "I'll Walk Right On".

In 2002, Weller collaborated with Terry Callier on the single "Brother to Brother", which featured on Callier's album Speak Your Peace. In 2003, Weller teamed up with electronic rock duo Death in Vegas on a cover of Gene Clark's "So You Say You Lost Your Baby", which featured on their Scorpio Rising album.

In 2004, Weller released an album of covers en*led Studio 150. It debuted at No.:2 in the UK charts and included Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower" as well as covers of songs by Gil Scott-Heron, Rose Royce and Gordon Lightfoot, amongst others.

Weller's 2005 album As Is Now featured the singles "From the Floorboards Up", "Come On/Let's Go" and "Here's the Good News". The album was well-received, though critics noted that he was not moving his music forward stylistically, and it became his lowest-charting album since his 1992 debut.

In February 2006 it was announced that Weller would be the latest recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award at the BRIT Awards. Despite a tendency to shun such occasions, Weller accepted the award in person, and performed four songs at the ceremony, including the Jam's cl*ic "Town Called Malice". In June 2006, another double live album *led Catch-Flame!, featuring songs from both his solo work and his career with the Jam and the Style Council, was released. In late 2006, the album Hit Parade was released, which collected all the singles released by the Jam, the Style Council and Weller during his solo career. Two versions of this album were released: a single disc with a selection from each stage of his career, and a four-disc limited edition, which included every single released and came with a 64-page booklet. Weller was offered appointment as a Commander of the Order of British Empire in the 2006 birthday honours, but rejected the offer.

In 2007 Weller was guest vocalist on the album issue by the folk musical project the Imagined Village.

Critical success (2008–present)

Weller and band line-up in Cardiff in 2008

The double album 22 Dreams was released on 2 June 2008, with "Echoes Round the Sun" as the lead single. Weller had parted company with his existing band before the recording this album, replacing everyone except guitarist Steve Cradock with Andy Lewis on b*, Andy Crofts of the Moons on keys and Steve Pilgrim of the Stands on drums. This album saw Weller move in a more experimental direction, taking in a wide variety of influences including jazz, folk and tango as well as the pop-soul more *ociated with his Style Council days. Weller also featured on two songs from the Moons' album "Life on Earth", playing piano on "Wondering" and lead guitar on "Last Night on Earth".

Weller was the surprise recipient of the 2009 BRIT award for "Best Male Solo Artist", which resulted in controversy when it was discovered that a suspiciously high number of bets had been placed for Weller to win the award, for which James Morrison was T4's favourite. It was reported that the bookmakers had lost £100,000 in the event, and that as a result would not be taking bets for the awards in the future.

In 2009, Weller guested on Dot Allison's 2009 album, Room 7½, co-writing "Love's Got Me Crazy". November and December also saw him on tour, playing shows across the country.

On 24 February 2010, Weller received the Godlike Genius Award at the NME Awards. His 2010 album, Wake Up the Nation, was released in April to critical acclaim, and was subsequently nominated for the Mercury Music Prize. The album also marked his first collaboration with Jam b*ist Bruce Foxton in 28 years. In May 2010, Weller was presented with the Ivor Novello Lifetime Achievement award, saying "I've enjoyed the last 33 years I've been writing songs and hopefully, with God's good grace, I'll do some more."

On 19 March 2012 Weller released his eleventh studio album Sonik Kicks. The album entered the UK Albums Chart at number 1. On 17 December 2012 Weller released the Dragonfly EP, a limited edition vinyl run of 3000 copies. Weller provided vocals on the Moons' 2012 single Something Soon. In December 2012, Weller headlined the Crisis charity gig at the Hammersmith Apollo, where he performed with Emeli Sande, Miles Kane and Bradley Wiggins. On 23 March 2013, Paul Weller played drums on stage with Damon Albarn, Noel Gallagher and Graham Coxon, playing the Blur track "Tender". This was played as part of the Teenage Cancer Trust concerts curated by Noel Gallagher.

In 2014, Weller wrote "Let Me In" with Olly Murs for Murs's fourth album Never Been Better.

Weller performing at the First Direct Arena in 2015

In 2015, Weller made a West Coast Tour of the US to promote the Saturn's Pattern album. The tour ran from 9 June to 9 October. In January 2017 he made a cameo appearance in "The Final Problem", the final episode of series four of the BBC TV series Sherlock. On 8 March 2019, audio and video versions of Other Aspects,:Live at the Royal Festival Hall was released. It is the second of two shows and was recorded in October 2018 at London's Royal Festival Hall with an orchestra.

Weller's fifteenth solo album, On Sunset, was released 3 July 2020 and debuted atop the UK Albums Chart, giving Weller UK number-one albums spanning five consecutive decades. He joins John Lennon and Paul McCartney in having the distinction. His number-one albums: The Gift, as part of the Jam (1982). Our Favourite Shop, as part of the Style Council (1985), and solo albums Stanley Road (1995), Illumination (2002), 22 Dreams (2008), Sonik Kicks (2012), and On Sunset (2020). Weller's sixteenth solo album, Fat Pop (Volume 1), was released to critical acclaim on 14 May 2021, and entered the charts at number 1. On 15 May 2021 Weller recorded live symphonic renditions of songs from his catalogue at the Barbican Centre in London with Jules Buckley and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. A live album of the recording session, An Orchestrated Songbook, was released in December 2021.

On 28 October 2022, Weller released a B-sides and rarities album Will Of The People. He collaborated on the songs with Richard Fearless, Young Fathers, Straightface and Stone Foundation.

In early 2024, Weller announced that his next studio album, 66, would be released in May, the day before Weller's 66th birthday. Recording took three years in Weller's Surrey studio Black Barn. The album will reportedly include collaborations with Dr. Robert of the Blow Monkeys, Richard Hawley, Erland Cooper, Max Beesley, Suggs, Noel Gallagher, and Bobby Gillespie, with string arrangements by Hannah Peel. The album's first single, "Soul Wandering", was released on 23 February 2024.

Influences

Since boyhood, Weller has been inspired by a broad range of artists, records and musical styles. Formative influences that have remained relatively constant include the Beatles, the Who, Small Faces, the Kinks, Tamla Motown, Stax and mid-late 1960s soul, R&B and pop music in general.

During the Jam years, Weller was influenced by early punk bands, including the Sex Pistols and the Clash, and later post-punk acts such as Gang of Four, the Undertones and the Skids. During the final part of the Jam's career, he became more interested in contemporary soul and funk acts, such as Pigbag and Shalamar, as well as 1970s soul and funk artists — most notably Curtis Mayfield.

Jazz became a major influence on Weller's work during the early Style Council years, and he has been a big fan ever since, citing artists such as Lee Morgan, Jimmy Smith, John Coltrane, Alice Coltrane, and Rahsaan Roland Kirk as favourites.

In the late 1980s, his tastes became increasingly eclectic as the Style Council's later releases were influenced by music as diverse as Claude Debussy and American house music.

During the 1990s, Weller's work began being influenced by late 1960s and early 1970s artists such as Van Morrison, Neil Young, Nick Drake, and Traffic. He also became a big fan of many of the Britpop bands he had influenced, including Oasis, Blur, the Charlatans, Supergr*, and many others. This taste for stripped-down rock music led to Weller's music being dismissed as "dad-rock" by sections of the music press, most notably NME, during the late 1990s, who cast Weller as a miserable, angry old man — a 1997 front cover of the paper *led an interview with Weller "Let's Get Ready to Grumble".

Despite telling Mojo magazine on 2000 that he did not "make music with fuzzy radios or electric spoons", from the late 2000s onwards, Weller began incorporating more and more experimental influences into his music, citing the likes of Neu! and Broadcast as influential. He also embraced the influence of David Bowie, despite having once said that all but three of his records were "pish".

Among the many albums that Weller has cited as all-time favourites are Odessey and Oracle, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, What's Going On, Innervisions, Low, Journey in Satchidananda, The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society, the Small Faces eponymous 1967 album, Traffic's eponymous 1968 album, McCartney, Down by the Jetty, and My Generation. Other songs he has nominated as favourites include the Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows" and "Strawberry Fields Forever", the Small Faces' "Tin Soldier", James Brown's "Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine", Declan O'Rourke's "Galileo (Someone Like You)", the Kinks' "Waterloo Sunset" and "Days", and Pharrell Williams' "Happy".

In 2012, Weller invaded a live radio interview with singer-songwriter Gilbert O'Sullivan to praise his songs "Alone Again (Naturally)" and "Nothing Rhymed" as "two of my favourite songs, great lyrics, great tunes".

He has curated numerous playlists and CDs for magazines over the years. In 2003, a compilation called Under the Influence was released, featuring 15 tracks chosen by Weller. In 2009, he picked 13 "real R&B and soul" tracks for a compilation called Lost & Found.

During the Jam and early Style Council years, Weller worked various literary influences into this work, most notably George Orwell, romantic poet Percy Shelley, and poet friends Dave Waller and Aidan Cant.

His favourite film is A Clockwork Orange.

Personal life

Between the summer of 1977 and around August 1985, Weller was in a relationship with Gill Price, a fashion designer from Bromley. She and their relationship inspired several Jam songs, including "I Need You (For Someone)", "Aunties & Uncles", "English Rose", "Fly", and "Happy Together". She worked in the Jam's offices, contributed to Weller's fanzines, and frequently toured with them—she can be seen in various behind-the-scenes photos. She appeared on the sleeve of the final Jam single, 'Beat Surrender', and along with Weller's sister Nicky, she also had a cameo in the video for the Style Council's "My Ever Changing Moods".

At the height of the Style Council's success, Weller and Dee C. Lee, the Style Council's backing singer, began a romantic relationship. The couple married in 1987 and divorced in 1998. They have a son and a daughter.

Weller has another daughter with make-up artist Lucy Halperin.

Weller became involved with Samantha Stock whilst he was recording at the Manor studio, later having two children together.

In October 2008, Stock and Weller broke up and Weller moved in with Hannah Andrews, a backing singer on his 22 Dreams album, who has also toured with his band. They first met in New York in 2005 and married in September 2010 on the Italian island of Capri. The couple have twin boys who were born in 2012, and a daughter, born in 2017.

In April 2014, Weller won £10,000 in damages from *ociated Newspapers after "plainly voyeuristic" photographs of his family out shopping were published on MailOnline.

On 24 April 2009, John Weller, Paul Weller's father and long-time manager since the days of the Jam, died from pneumonia at the age of 77.

Weller has been sober since 2010.

Political views and activism

Weller has a long *ociation with British politics. In the Jam's first NME interview in May 1977, he famously announced that the band would vote Conservative at the next election, something he has long since stated was a joke.

From late 1980, he became increasingly interested in CND, often being pictured wearing a CND badge (as in the video for "Town Called Malice") and playing rallies with both the Jam and the Style Council. In tandem, he became more vocally socialist in interviews, and between around 1982 and 1987, his songwriting also became increasingly politicised, most notably on "Trans-Global Express", "Money-Go-Round", "The Big Boss Groove", 'Soul Deep' and the majority of Our Favourite Shop.

In late 1984, Weller took part in Band Aid and then put together his own benefit record for the UK miners' strike, which was called "Soul Deep" and credited to the Council Collective. The 12" of the single featured interviews with striking miners, although half of the money raised went to the widow of David Wilkie, a taxi driver who was killed whilst driving strike-breaking miners to their shift. During the 1980s, Weller was also vegetarian and concerned with animal rights. As a result, he wrote the song "Bloodsports", which was included on the B-side of the Style Council's 1985 single, "Walls Come Tumbling Down". Royalties from the track were donated to a defence fund for two hunt saboteurs then on remand in Bristol Prison.

From the latter half of 1985, Weller was highly involved in the formation of Red Wedge, a left-wing collective of musicians and actors etc. who aimed to "bring left-wing ideas to other people". However, from around 1988 onwards, he became less politically vocal, ultimately stating during the 1990s that he no longer particularly believed in any politics.

In 2008, after then-Conservative Party leader and former Eton pupil David Cameron chose the Jam's "The Eton Rifles" as one of his Desert Island Discs, Weller expressed disgust, saying, "It wasn't intended as a * jolly drinking song for the cadet corp." When asked about it again in 2015, he told Mojo magazine: "The whole thing with Cameron saying it was one of his favourite songs ... I just think, 'Which bit didn't you get?" Weller also began playing the song live again for the first time since 1982.

During the mid-2010s, Weller made a brief return to the political arena, being vocally supportive of then-Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and even playing a 'Concert for Corbyn' in December 2016.

Recognition and influence

In 2007, the BBC described Weller as "one of the most revered music writers and performers of the past 30 years". In 2015, Pete Naughton of The Daily Telegraph wrote, "Apart from David Bowie, it's hard to think of any British solo artist who's had as varied, long-lasting and determinedly forward-looking a career."

In 2012, he was among the British notables selected by the artist Peter Blake to appear in a new version of his most famous artwork—the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover—to celebrate the British social figures of his life.

Discography

Main article: Paul Weller discographySee also: The Jam discography and The Style Council discography

Studio albums

  • Paul Weller (1992)
  • Wild Wood (1993)
  • Stanley Road (1995)
  • Heavy Soul (1997)
  • Heliocentric (2000)
  • Illumination (2002)
  • Studio 150 (2004)
  • As Is Now (2005)
  • 22 Dreams (2008)
  • Wake Up the Nation (2010)
  • Sonik Kicks (2012)
  • Saturns Pattern (2015)
  • A Kind Revolution (2017)
  • True Meanings (2018)
  • On Sunset (2020)
  • Fat Pop (Volume 1) (2021)
  • 66 (2024)

References

    Further reading

    • Hewitt, Paolo (1983). The Jam: A Beat Concerto - The Authorised Biography. Omnibus Press. ISBN:9780711903937.
    • Weller / Hellier, Paul / John (2020). Here Come The Nice - A Small Faces Song Book. Wapping Wharf. ISBN:978-0-9956-5334-4.
    • Reed, John (2002). My Ever Changing Moods: Fully Revised and Updated. Omnibus Press. ISBN:978-0-7119-8866-8.
    • Munn, Iain (2008). Mr Cool's Dream: The Complete History of the Style Council. Wholepoint Publications. ISBN:978-0-9551443-1-8.

    External links

    Wikimedia Commons has media related to Paul Weller.Wikiquote has quotations related to Paul Weller.
    • Official website
    • Paul Weller at IMDb
    Paul Weller