It's now over ten years since The Style Council's mysterious sleeve note writer, The Cappuccino Kid, laid his purple prose to rest. A lot has changed in the meantime. For one thing, Paul Weller has gone on to enjoy astonishing success as a solo artist, reportedly selling more albums in the '90's than he did in The Jam and Style Council put together.
In some ways, his recent triumphs have put his two former groups in the shade, true, The Jam have never really gone out of fashion, enjoying a welcome revival during the Britpop years thanks to their widely-acknowledged influence on Oasis and Blur. But The Style Council ... Well, existing in the relatively recent past, they're only just beginning to swing into focus. For, vastly misunderstood though they sometimes were, TSC must rank as one of the most inspired, exhilarating and, lest we forget resolutely political pop-groups ever to emerge from these shores. Many Weller aficionados will tell you that they were finest hour.
Weller formed The Style Council in early 1983, just a few months after splitting The Jam at the height of their success. Everything about his new group was clearly a reaction against the tremendous pressure Paul has experienced as a reluctant "spokesman for a generation" - and against The Jam's crippling workload. (in six years they'd issued 17 singles, six studio albums and played around 500 gigs.)
In fact, it soon transpired that The Style Council weren't really a 'group' at all, more a conceptual pop vehicle based around Paul's love of clothes, film, books, records and '60's French fashions. With friend and confidante Mick Talbot in tow, Weller made it clear that the collective of friends and musicians who made up the band weren't going to tour for a while. Instead, he and Mick projected an image of themselves as coffee-bar sophisticate, listening to jazz and soul records, sipping endless cups of cappuccino and generally living out their Absolute Beginners fantasies.
Their first adventure pretty much summed up the playful, faintly cinematic vibes of those early months: a trip to Boulogne to shoot some promo photos. Decked out in rain macs, shades and expensive loafers, they looked like ambassadors for a New Modernist Europe - or refugees from The Italian Job. It was all wonderfully tongue-in- cheek, hilariously pretentious and, for a generation weaned on the gritty earnestness of the New Wave, joyfully liberating to watch.
Yet behind the ultra-Mod imagery, Weller's horizons as a songwriter and musician continued to expand. Since the last days of his former group, Paul had strived to create a modern. Sophisticated blend of jazz, funk, soul and pop. Teaming up with some of the UK's finest young jazz and funk players, he was now able to realise those ideas.
Recorded at Weller's own Solid Band Studios near Marble Arch, the Council's music evolved with their every release, and no one album manages to define their sound. From the smoky jazz and neatly-crafted summer pop of 1984's Cafe Bleu (My Ever Changing Moods in the States), they moved on to the Latin, funk and singer-songwriter potpourri of Our Favourite shop (1985), to the club soul of The Cost Of Loving (1987) and then the bizarre, Modernist lounge experiment that was Confessions Of A Pop Group (1988).
But as their career progressed, so their fortunes waned, partly due to Weller's uncompromising approach to his music, but also because of his. increasing preoccupation with political protest. The Style Council's birth in 1983 had coincided with the beginning of Thatcher's second term in office, and from the start Paul was outspoken in his criticism of her Tory government - both in interviews and in his lyrics.
In the event, The Style Council became instrumental in making the all-star socialist pressure group, Red Wedge, a real force to be reckoned with in the run up to the 1987 election. Together with the likes of Billy Bragg, Madness and The Blow Monkeys, the Council were unflinching in their evangelical crusade to get more young people to vote and also to promote the good works of CND, Friends Of The Earth and animal rights organisations.
It's a testament to Weller's enduring status as a figurehead that he was also asked to perform on the legendary Band Aid single, 'Do They Know It's Christmas'?' and The Style Council invited to play at the most important fund raising gig in the history of pop music, Live Aid.
In 1987, the Tories were returned to power, dealing a crushing blow to many involved with the Left, the Style Council included. Once their political impetus had evaporated, and their record sales dwindled, the group lost their way, becoming increasingly insular and almost deliberately obtuse. Their outlook was best summed up by the 30-minute film they began work on in 1968, JerUSAIem. It was a colourful, surreal affair, combining the humorous insanity of The Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour (Weller as King Canute?!) With the anti-establishment sentiments of Derek Jarman's Jubilee; it was also virtually unwatchable.
By the time of the Council's last album, Paul and Dee had become man and wife, while Mick too was enjoying domesticity. Weller was by now getting involved in house music, and when he presented his label with the tapes of the next TSC album, a dance- orientated collection titled Modernism: A New Decade, they refused to release it.
Disillusioned, frustrated and lacking their old resolve, the group petered out over the next few months, their last appearance taking place at-the Royal Albert Hall on 4th July 1989.
It was the end of an era of a truly great band, responsible for some of Wellers strongest and most durable songs - 'My Ever. Changing Moods', 'Long Hot Summer', 'Paris Match', 'The Whole Point Of No Return', 'You're The Best Thing'.
Ringo Starr once made the point that The Beatles and their contemporaries were the first generation, this century; which hadn't been sent off to war. Instead, all the young people formed bands. As the sons and daughters of that first post-war generation, many of The Style council's original fans tack it for granted that music had the power to change the world.
A decade later, TSC remain a quintessential symbol of the '80's protest movement. They inspired people to fight for a future where the shadow of the Bomb and rabid individualism were things of the past.
Standing in a muddy field, watching The Style Council bash out their
jazzy protest pop was a nape-chilling experience. Would that the new Millennium
brings with it another group half as courageous, idealistic and talented.
Pat Gilbert - May 1998