“Town Called Malice” / “Precious” (Polydor POSP 400) January 1982
The Jam | Town Called Malice | (Polydor) 1982 | How do you stay concerned, credible and uncorrupted while progressing musically, racking up the hits and earning good money?
Alone among the Angry Young Men of ’76, these Fab Three have all the answers.
“Town” is the more familiar Jam sound, where Paul sings of small-town traumas over an early sixties soul beat. “Precious” is largely instrumental and features the tight brass we heard on “Absolute Beginners” over a vicious funk rhythm propelled by sizzling hi-hat.
Hit Of The Week
There’s also a 12 inch available which couples a live rendition of ‘Town’ with an extended ‘Precious’.
Personally, I like but don’t love either songs, and wouldn’t trade any of their four previous singles for this new one. Consequently, though it’s The Hit Of The Week – literally, as there isn’t another in the whole batch I’ve gone through. (Melody Maker, 23/01/82)
The Jam | Town Called Malice | (Polydor) 1982
SINGLE OF THE WEEK | THE JAM: ‘Town Called Malice’/’Precious’ (Polydor).
Definitely the best Jam single for ages, in spite of the fact that both sides are heavily derivative. The first, known around these parts as ‘Motown Called, Alice’ by Martha and the Vanwellas, sounds not unlike the Woking men’s version of ‘Heatwave’, but its sixties-soul style is attractively hard and vigorous for all that.
Precious’ (a reference to PW’s fave stable-mates Orange Juice? Probably not) marries post-Shaft funk guitar with vogueish white-boy dance beat, ie one that’s too fast to really dance to, decorated with some tasteful bass trim.
Abusive letter
Both sides are miles better than the last two Jam 45’s, neither of which had any distinguishing marks whatsoever, and will doubtless add up to their biggest hit for a while.
Now, then, an open letter to Paul Weller: since you saw fit to send me an angry letter last time I reviewed a Jam single (and as abusive letters go, I have to say that in its brevity and its handwriting it far outshone the one Spandau sent me), perhaps the above might prompt you to whip a birthday card in the post? Its only three weeks off, you see, and . . . (Record Mirror, 23/01/82)
Stop before you start, please! Oh no . . . oh yes. “Precious” is The Jam gone all funky; a bit late in the day, wouldn’t you say? Weller takes the “Fave Shirts” / “Chant No. 1” formula (song-brass break-workout) and submerges his lyrics in a stammering, blubbering funk.
What does remain of the stylised Weller syntax is at odds with this would-be sweaty inferno – the protagonist’s angst “on a winter’s morning” doesn’t quite fit. The mix is murky, the pivotal bass line too familiar, and the whole separates into more or less ‘interesting’ parts – it can’t quite raise itself above historical traces.
The feel is rigid rather than relaxed, Weller sounding strained when trying to prise a groovy grimace out of his singing voice (the grunting “Huh!” here and there isn’t at all convincing).
Overall, there’s no sauce or space – it’s funky doggerel, a musicological exercise. And where, I wonder, does this fit into the ’60s recreation sequence? (Food for fans: B-side is “A Town Called Malice” live, December ’81) (NME, 23/01/82)
The Jam | Town Called Malice | (Polydor) 1982 | In which Weller lashes his obsessive ‘suburban’ images – about housewives clutching milk bottles and the like – to a fairly belting backbeat lifted from the early ’60s soul style of the Supremes.
Pity he didn’t nick a tune while he was about it. (Smash Hits, January 1982)
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