IN MY LIFE
He’s the sharp-suited mod who partnered Paul Weller in The Jam and penned the best basslines in punk. Now, as he keeps the classics alive in From The Jam and releases a fantastic new album of originals with Russell Hastings, Bruce Foxton looks back on burying the hatchet, beating tinnitus and why The Beatles can’t sue him for the Start! bassline…
When You’re Young
“Most kids want to be professional footballers or firemen. I just wanted to play music and I thought guitar was a good start – the piano was a bit too big and expensive. My mum and dad, bless them, they saved up their pennies and bought me an acoustic guitar to start the ball rolling. I was a bit clumsy, just dabbling to start with. But if you want to do something good, you’ve got to do it on a regular basis. And I just went on from there.”
Trading Places
“I joined The Jam as rhythm guitarist. They had a lead guitarist in Steve Brookes and Paul [Weller] was on bass. But when Steve left, we auditioned a few players and they either weren’t good musically or we’d have found them hard socially. So Paul said, ‘Let’s try it as a three-piece. You take bass, I’ll take rhythm/lead, see how we go.’ That’s how it finished up. I didn’t mind moving to bass. I wanted to perform live, and if that meant changing instruments, I was prepared for it. The only thing is that if you’re at a party and someone says, ‘Give us a song, Bruce,’ piano or guitar is a lot easier than bass. For me, it’d have to be the Formula 1 intro [Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain] all the time!”
Meeting The Modfather
“I wouldn’t say that Paul and I immediately clicked, but he literally didn’t want to do anything at all, work-wise, other than be a successful musician, and I thought, ‘That sounds good to me.’ That’s what I wanted, to be in a band that was working. Paul was just very determined and committed. He could be prickly, shall we say, in interviews or whatever – and I didn’t envy your job! I think 40 years down the line, he’s probably mellowed.”
Power Trio
“Sometimes you get three musicians and the standard of their playing is okay, but it’s not going to set the world on fire. But when you couple, say, my bass with Rick [Buckler]’s drumming and Paul’s guitar, it was just a formula that worked. I couldn’t play slap bass. I’m not Mark King or one of those players, although I think there’s a couple of twangs here and there on Absolute Beginners. Each to their own. Like Stanley Clarke or whatever – Iappreciate the quality of his playing, but it wouldn’t have suited The Jam, would it?”
In The City
“The working men’s clubs of Woking wasn’t
