Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Humiliated by Polydor's rejection of the final Style Council album (it remained unreleased until the 1998 box set), Paul Weller retreated from the spotlight, licked his wounds, and redefined his music. He re-emerged with the Paul Weller Movement and the surging trad rock single "Into Tomorrow," a song that may not have been a big hit, but it signaled that he had begun a productive new phase. That same criticism applies to his 1992 solo debut (by this point, he had dropped "Movement," and decided to just be "Weller"). Heavily inspired by soul and classic rock (more early Humble Pie than Led Zeppelin, of course), it's a solid effort whose best songs — the opening triptych "Uh Huh Oh Yeh," "I Didn't Mean to Hurt You," and "Bull-Rush," plus "Into Tomorrow" — demonstrate the virtues of nostalgia, particularly when it's tempered with fine songwriting. If he drifts a bit toward the end, and winds up with some lightweight songs, it's still gritty and effective, displaying a focus absent in the Style Council's last few albums. It's not a full-fledged comeback (that would arrive next), but it's a fine start all the same.

John Galilee, Amazon.co.uk

Just two years before the release of Paul Weller the former frontman of The Jam and the Style Council had been written off as a has-been. However, his self-titled solo debut stifled the critics and once again highlighted his importance--and relevance--to the contemporary music scene, especially as this album partly inspired the emerging Britpop sound. Weller's life-long musical influences are overtly obvious, as the album ranges from the psychedelic ("Into Tomorrow", "Clues" and "Bull-Rush") to the blue-eyed soul influences of his Style Council days ("Amongst Butterflies"). The album's material revels in its own simplicity, free from the prosthetic sounds of synthesisers and drum machines, but at the same time highlights Weller's extraordinary musical and songwriting talents.

Personnel: Paul Weller (vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, percussion); Jacko Peake (flute, saxophone, background vocals); Steve White (drums, percussion). Additional personnel: Brother Marco (bass); Dr. Robert (bass, background vocals); Dee C. Lee, Camelle Hinds, Carlene Anderson (background vocals). Producers: Paul Weller, Brendan Lynch, Chris Bangs. Engineers: Martin Heyes, Paul Gumersall, Robin Black.

Weller's first solo album is stylistically of a piece with his earlier work with the Style Council, which is to say that there's a '60s soul feel to it but it also reflects his passion for various '60s English bands, primarily Traffic. Soul-flavored songs like "Remember How We Started" and "Above the Clouds" are virtual tributes to Marvin Gaye and Curtis Mayfield, but the rest of the album tilts, quite attractively, towards a sort of pastoral, psychedelic R&B reminiscent of Traffic's classic MR. FANTASY.

Kara Manning, Rolling Stone issue 644

After a four-year hiatus following the demise of the Style Council, singer-guitarist Paul Weller again explores his everchanging musical moods on this solo debut. Once the angry young mod of the Jam, Weller chucked his punkish persona in 1982 for the Council's silky indulgences. Yet he never quite abandoned his rebellious stance. The Council's forays into jazz, Stax and Philly soul, funk and all-American pop were still spiked with political rhetoric. Weller hadn't lost his edge – he just wanted to sound prettier.

Times change, however: Margaret Thatcher is gone, and on this album Weller has reemerged as a thirty-something Brit with an identity crisis. Wavering between his beloved repertoire of Marvin Gaye grooves and dicier attempts at retro-psychedelia, Weller meanders between both worlds in a haze of self-doubt. Moments of coherent beauty are countered by episodes of confused ingenuity. What might be most disconcerting – but gratifying – is that sad puppy Weller seems to be having too much fun.

Ever the romantic, Weller can still dish out lovely, lyrical gems like "Round and Round" ("Only surface – jus' skin deep/When words fly like angels around your feet") and the anxious sigh of "Above the Clouds." Not content with his smoother formulas, though, Weller derails other songs with jagged introductions, false endings and curious side journeys. The glorious bump and grind of "Uh Huh Oh Yeh" hiccups with deliberate dissonance, and "Clues" collapses into a frenzy of flutes, "Bull-Rush," perhaps the album's most uplifting song, coyly deflates its seriousness and knocks off a Jam-ish nod to the Who's "Magic Bus."

Reuniting with former Style Council cohorts – drummer Steve White, saxophonist Jacko Peake and coproducer Brendan Lynch – Weller doesn't reinvent his sound so much as redirect his anger. "You have to shed that shit to move on," he chastises himself at one point on the penitent "Bitterness Rising." Obviously, the politics of the moment are personal ones, and Weller has never been a diplomat, even with himself. Ultimately, Paul Weller is a therapeutic release for a musician who refuses to roll helplessly in the ashes of his youth but isn't quite sure how to confront the future.

© Frank Steven Groen