This generously packed best-of offers a handy overview of what made the Jam one of the most important bands of the postpunk period. It shows them drawing on punk, 1960s mod pop, and power pop to create a style all their own. Early songs like “In the City” and “The Modern World” tend towards a scrappy, aggro sound, but they show an already emerging tendency towards melancholy as well (“Away from the Numbers,” “English Rose”). Later the trio would delve more deeply into soul (“Town Called Malice”) and funk (“Precious”), but frontman Paul Weller’s sharp and sometimes acerbic social and political commentary would be a constant defining element lending a serrated edge to even their poppiest songs.