In the City by The Jam

In the City, the Jam's debut album, came out on Polydor in May 1977, and while the rest of the punk class of that year were busy spitting, this Woking trio showed up with a head full of mod. Paul Weller writes and sings nearly everything and slashes away at his Rickenbacker, Bruce Foxton's bass lines do half the melodic heavy lifting and throw in backing vocals, and Rick Buckler rounds out the trio. Vic Coppersmith-Heaven produced, keeping it lean, loud and in a hurry.

The title track, their first single, is the manifesto: short, urgent and loud. Elsewhere they tip their hats to their vintage heroes with a cover of "Slow Down" and a tear through the Batman theme, a tune the Who, the Kinks and Link Wray had all taken for a spin already. It climbed to No. 20 on the UK Albums Chart, the first step toward far bigger things.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.