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Our Favourite Shop

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Our Favourite Shop
Studio album by
The Style Council
Released8 June 1985
RecordedDecember 1984 to March 1985
GenreSophisti-pop
Length49:01
LabelPolydor
Producer
The Style Council chronology
Café Bleu
(1984) 		Our Favourite Shop
(1985) 		Home and Abroad
(1986)

Our Favourite Shop (released as Internationalists in the United States) is the second studio album by English band the Style Council. Recorded ten months after the band's debut, Café Bleu, it was released on 8 June 1985 on Polydor. It features guest vocalists including Lenny Henry, Tracie Young, and Dee C Lee. The album includes "Come to Milton Keynes", "The Lodgers", "Boy Who Cried Wolf", and "Walls Come Tumbling Down!", which were all released as singles (with corresponding music videos). The three singles released in the UK all reached the top 40 on the UK charts. The track listing was reconfigured for the U.S. release.

The Style Council's most commercially successful album, it was an immediate commercial and critical success, and remained at the top of the charts for one week, displacing Brothers in Arms by Dire Straits. The album was the Style Council's only number one album in the UK. According to the BPI, the record sold over 100,000 copies and was certified gold.

The multigenre album incorporates diverse stylistic influences, including soul, rap, jazz and rock styles. Recording was completed in March 1985. The cover, depicting the band posing inside a shop, was designed by Paul Weller and British artist Simon Halfon.

Contents

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"I had a total belief in the Style Council. I was obsessed in the early years. I lived and breathed it all. I meant every word, and felt every action. Our Favourite Shop was its culmination." — Paul Weller, 2006[1]

The album features fourteen original compositions (eight by Paul Weller, four co-written by Weller and Mick Talbot, and one co-written by Weller with Steve White), with one instrumental from Talbot, in its original British form.

Lyrical targets include racism, excessive consumerism, the effects of self-serving governments, the suicide of one of Weller's friends and what the band saw as an exasperating lack of opposition to the status quo. All of this pessimism is countered with an overarching sense of hope and delight that alternatives do actually exist—if only they can be seen. They also took a more overtly political approach than The Jam in their lyrics, with tracks such as "Walls Come Tumbling Down", "The Lodgers", and "Come to Milton Keynes" being deliberate attacks on 'middle England' and Thatcherite principles prevalent in the 1980s. "A Man of Great Promise" was Weller's eulogy to his school friend and early Jam member - Dave Waller - who had died from a heroin overdose in August 1982.[2]

The track "With Everything To Lose", featuring a political lyric written by Steve White, used the backing track of the then unreleased song "Have You Ever Had It Blue" which had been written for the soundtrack to the film Absolute Beginners.[3] Re-recorded with the original lyric and released as a single in 1986, "Have You Ever Had It Blue" charted in the top 20 in the UK and top 10 in Ireland.[citation needed]

Release

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The majority of the album's material was released (with different sequencing and packaged with an entirely different cover design) in the USA as Internationalists by Geffen Records (which has been a sister label to Polydor Records, the band's UK label, since 1998, under Universal Music Group).

Included on the UK, US, and Canadian pressings, most countries omitted the track "The Stand Up Comic's Instructions"[4] as it was believed that its ironic satire of racist attitudes would be misunderstood. The guest vocalist was the black British comedian, Lenny Henry imitating comedians such as Bernard Manning and Jim Davidson.[1]

Critical reception

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Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[5]
Mojo[6]
Q[7]
Record Collector[8]
Record Mirror4/5[9]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[10]
Sounds[11]
Spin[12]
Uncut9/10[13]
The Village VoiceB+[14]

While receiving some mixed reviews on its release in 1985, it was widely considered to be the band's best work by contemporary critics.[15]

In his "Consumer Guide" column for The Village Voice, Robert Christgau wrote: "One reason Paul Weller's rock and roll never convinced non-Brits was his reedy voice, which he has no trouble bending to the needs of the fussy phonographic cabaret he undertook so quixotically and affectedly after retiring the Jam. I'm sure the move has cost him audience, but the new format suits the specifics of his socialism."[14]

Retrospectively, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic wrote that Our Favourite Shop "was still quite eclectic, but it didn't seem as schizophrenically diverse as Café Bleu", praising it as a "more cohesive and stronger" album.[5]

Track listing

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All songs written by Paul Weller, except where noted.

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."Homebreakers" (Mick Talbot, Paul Weller)5:04
2."All Gone Away"2:13
3."Come to Milton Keynes"3:02
4."Internationalists" (Talbot, Weller)3:04
5."A Stones Throw Away"2:15
6."The Stand Up Comic's Instructions"1:28
7."Boy Who Cried Wolf"5:04
Side two
No.TitleLength
1."A Man of Great Promise"2:30
2."Down in the Seine"2:41
3."The Lodgers (Or She Was Only a Shopkeeper's Daughter)" (Talbot, Weller)3:54
4."Luck" (Talbot, Weller)2:32
5."With Everything to Lose" (Steve White, Weller)3:45
6."Our Favourite Shop" (Talbot)2:52
7."Walls Come Tumbling Down!"3:11

Later CD issues included "Shout to the Top!" (Vision Quest Version) as a bonus track.

Additional track listing

Personnel

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The Style Council
Guest vocalists
Session musicians
  • Camille Hinds – bass
  • Stewart Prosser – trumpet; flugelhorn
  • David DeFries – trumpet; flugelhorn
  • Mike Mower – flute; saxophone
  • Chris Lawrence – trombone
  • Clark Kent – contra bass
  • Gary Wallis – percussion
  • John Mealing – orchestration; string arrangement
  • Anne Stephenson – violin
  • Charlie Buchanan – violin
  • Jocelyn Pook – viola
  • Audrey Riley – cello
  • Peter Wilson – keyboard Sequencing
  • Patrick Grundy-White – French Horn
  • Steve Dawson – trumpet
  • Billy Chapman – saxophone
  • Kevin Miller – bass
  • Helen Turner – piano

Charts

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Weekly charts

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Chart (1985) Peak
position
Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)[16] 5
Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria)[17] 23
Canada Top Albums/CDs (RPM)[18] 53
Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[19] 11
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[20] 23
Japanese Albums (Oricon)[21] 18
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)[22] 6
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[23] 30
UK Albums (OCC)[24] 1
US Billboard 200[25] 123

Year-end charts

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Chart (1985) Position
Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)[16] 25
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)[26] 20

Certifications

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Region Certification Certified units/sales
United Kingdom (BPI)[27] Gold 100,000^

^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

References

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  1. ^ a b Wilson, Lois (2006). "The Style Council". Mojo. Archived from the original on 4 July 2012. Retrieved 19 July 2012.
  2. ^ "Dave Waller". 18 August 2015.
  3. ^ Paolo Hewitt Paul Weller The Changing Man, page 219
  4. ^ "The Stand up Comic's Instructions". YouTube. 9 January 2019.
  5. ^ a b Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Our Favourite Shop – The Style Council". AllMusic. Retrieved 23 July 2017.
  6. ^ Harris, John (March 2007). "The Style Council: Our Favourite Shop". Mojo. No. 160. p. 112.
  7. ^ Quantick, David (September 2017). "Vogue Trader". Q. No. 376. p. 118.
  8. ^ Wilson, Lois; Shirley, Ian (June 2020). "The Changing Man". Record Collector. No. 506. pp. 78–88.
  9. ^ Levy, Eleanor (25 May 1985). "The Style Council: Our Favourite Shop". Record Mirror. p. 16.
  10. ^ Coleman, Mark (2004). "The Style Council". In Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian (eds.). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th ed.). Simon & Schuster. p. 789. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.
  11. ^ Brown, Glyn (25 May 1985). "Marx 'n' Sparks". Sounds.
  12. ^ Duerden, Nick (July 2008). "Discography: Paul Weller". Spin. Vol. 24, no. 7. p. 88. Retrieved 2 November 2017.
  13. ^ Troussé, Stephen (October 2017). "The Style Council". Uncut. No. 245. pp. 42–44.
  14. ^ a b Christgau, Robert (7 January 1986). "Christgau's Consumer Guide". The Village Voice. Retrieved 14 February 2012.
  15. ^ Steve Malins Paul Weller. The Unauthorized Biography Virgin Books, 1997, p.140
  16. ^ a b Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992 (illustrated ed.). St Ives, N.S.W.: Australian Chart Book. p. 299. ISBN 0-646-11917-6.
  17. ^ "Austriancharts.at – The Style Council – Our Favourite Shop" (in German). Hung Medien. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  18. ^ "Top RPM Albums: Issue 0559". RPM. Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  19. ^ "Dutchcharts.nl – The Style Council – Our Favourite Shop" (in Dutch). Hung Medien. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  20. ^ "Offiziellecharts.de – The Style Council – Our Favourite Shop" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  21. ^ Okamoto, Satoshi (2006). Album Chart Book: Complete Edition 1970–2005. Oricon. ISBN 978-4-87131-077-2.
  22. ^ "Charts.nz – The Style Council – Our Favourite Shop". Hung Medien. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  23. ^ "Swedishcharts.com – The Style Council – Our Favourite Shop". Hung Medien. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  24. ^ "Official Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  25. ^ "The Style Council Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved 31 October 2020.
  26. ^ "Top Selling Albums of 1985". Recorded Music NZ. Retrieved 3 February 2022.
  27. ^ "British album certifications – Style Council – Our Favourite Shop". British Phonographic Industry. Retrieved 2 April 2022.
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