On just about any sunny day, if you pull up to the Maida Vale coffee shop of choice for rock’s ruling class, you’re likely to see a who’s who of the past 50 years of England’s music charts. Johnny Marr, Noel Gallagher, Earl Slick, and Glen Matlock are all regulars. But everything seems to swirl around the orbit of Paul Weller, who strides in almost daily when he’s not on the road or in the studio, then taking a seat outside and holding court with whoever happens to be about. A cult figure in the United States, Paul Weller is known as the Modfather in the U.K. and is beloved around the world. Now in his fifth decade of making music, with the release of the new covers album Find El Dorado, Weller wears the fame he’s had since his late teens loosely.

“It’s my local,” Weller, sober more than 15 years now, says matter-of-factly. “People know I’ll be there if they really want to see me, but nobody beyond that bothers me more than to say hello.”