NEXT week, Cardiff’s Globe will be pounding the sound of 1978 as The Jam’s bass player Bruce Foxton and his band From The Jam play a sell-out gig performing the classic album ‘All Mod Cons’ in its entirety. The gig is part of a three month tour that celebrates the 35th anniversary of the release of The Jam’s third album All Mod Cons.

Although 35 years has elapsed since All Mod Cons it really doesn’t feel that long to Bruce, “It was the same when we did the In The City anniversary tour,” he says, “it didn’t seem like all those years ago. When we’re back on stage it still sounds fresh and I still get as excited as I did in '78!”

Among the tracks to be performed from All Mod Cons will be The Jam classics Down in the Tube Station at Midnight and A Bomb In Wardour Street. The band will also be playing Billy Hunt, Mr Clean, David Watts (originally penned by Ray Davies of The Kinks) and Fly.” It's exciting, I don’t think The Jam ever played Fly live,” says Bruce, “We’re also doing a slightly different version of English Rose and I can’t wait to get out there and perform and hopefully get a good reaction.”

The Jam consisting of Paul Weller, Bruce and Rick Buckler exploded onto the punk scene in 1977 with two albums In The City and This Is The Modern World.

All Mod Cons was released in 1978 and could easily have been make or break for the band as Bruce remembers, “It was a very creative time for us, different styles different tracks. It was the third album from The Jam and if it wasn’t going to be a success then that would have meant the record label would have dropped us. There was quite a bit of pressure on us but we kept writing and recording songs that we thought were great and good enough. We kept our heads down and recorded basically what we wanted. We kind of knew this was going to be great. You hope they’re going to love it and thankfully they did.”

The Jam would continue with greater success over the next five years topping the UK charts on four occasions with hits such as Start!, Going Underground, Beat Surrender and A Town called Malice. The band called time in 1982 to concentrate on solo projects.

Bruce’s latest release Back in the Room was released to great acclaim last year and fans will also get a chance to hear some of his new material next week too. “It's great going out playing all those Jam classics,” he says, “I’m very proud to be able to do that, but its also very nice to have new material to offer. We’re putting new songs in as we move along throughout the year from Back In The Room although the backbone of the set will always be Jam songs.”

I comment on the spontaneity and freshness of Back in the Room (which coincidentally was recorded at Paul Weller’s studio) and ask him how he has managed to retain that fresh approach to his music. “The bulk of it was recorded live,” says Bruce, “which is very much what The Jam did with the In the City album. That was our live set when we got signed up so it took just ten days to record and put it out very quick. You’ve got to be careful with technology as long as the song captures excitement that’s what it’s about. We don’t mess about with it too much.”

The Bruce Foxton and From The Jam Cardiff Globe gig on September 21 has now been sold out although a Bristol date on December 7 is soon to be announced.