10-Song Introductions: Pulp

Getting into an artist, especially an established one, is no easy task. There's often a daunting amount of material to sift through, along with the possibility of being called a bandwagon jumper. With this feature, I'll try to introduce you to the best aspects of an artist, with the hope that you'll hear something you like.

Pulp are (were):
Jarvis Cocker (vocals)
Candida Doyle (keyboard)
Mark Webber (guitar)
Steve Mackey (bass)
Russell Senior (guitar/violin)
Nick Banks (drums)

1. Common People
Truth be told, a "10-Song Introduction" to Pulp is a bit unnecessary given the undeniable brilliance of their released singles. The compilation "Hits" collects these singles into one incredible package and is a great place to start for any aspiring Pulp fan. Standing at the forefront of those singles is "Common People", which is not unlike "Like a Rolling Stone" in several ways--it's simultaneously one of the groups's best and most well known songs, and it tackles potent issues of class and identity:

Rent a flat above a shop, cut your hair and get a job.
Smoke some fags and play some pool, pretend you never went to school.
But still you'll never get it right
'cos when you're laid in bed at night watching roaches climb the wall
If you call your Dad he could stop it all.

Besides being a massive tune, the ability of people to relate to the story of an upper-class girl "slumming it" at an English art school is what made this a Britpop anthem. But the idea of class is not only a European concern--contrary to what American politicians might have you believe. As culture and the arts increasingly become an elites-only game in the US, Jarvis Cocker's diatribe against a posh girl from Greece only becomes more relevant.

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]

2. Disco 2000
Probably Pulp's second most recognizable song, this is a wistful, upbeat tale of unrequited love and nostalgia. Behind the narrator's longing is a deep sadness and even desperation. Cocker sings about how he and a girl lived very different lives--she was the beautiful girl down the street and he was the awkward kid who knew her through family. What's even sadder is how Cocker still longs for her even as a grown man:

What are you doing Sunday, baby?
Would you like to come and meet me, maybe?
You can even bring your baby.

This being Pulp, these stalker-ish sentiments are bathed in the warm glow of "Gloria"-aping pop, underpinned by a (what else) disco beat. On paper, it sounds terrible. Coming through one's speakers, however, it's a totally different animal: It's the kind of absurd amalgamation that only Pulp in their golden period were capable of.


3. I Spy
A lot of people have difficult childhoods. They live in fear and wallow in high school obscurity, seeing their obvious wit and brilliance go unnoticed by the pretty girl who is more interested in the school soccer star. Most of those people grow up and move on. Not Jarvis--he gets revenge.

But we're not talking revenge in the angst-y, Marilyn Manson/Pearl Jam's "Jeremy" sense of the word. No, Jarvis knows that the best revenge is returning to that small town and seducing that pretty girl (now middle aged) while the former soccer star (now fat and balding) is away at his office job:

You see you should take me seriously.
Very seriously indeed.
Cause I've been sleeping with your wife for the past sixteen weeks,
smoking your cigarettes,
drinking your brandy,
messing up the bed that you chose together.
And in all that time I just wanted you to come home unexpectedly one afternoon,
and catch us at it in the front room.
You see I spy for a living,
and I specialise in revenge,
on taking the things I know will cause you pain.
I can't help it,
I was dragged up.
My favourite parks are car parks,
grass is something you smoke,
birds are something you shag.
Take your "Year in Provence"
and shove it up your arse.

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]

4. A Little Soul
Another Pulp concoction of seemingly disparate elements--John Cougar Mellencamp guitar, lyrics about a dad telling his young son not to become a depraved bastard like him--that the band turns into a true thing of beauty. On the album "This is Hardcore", Jarvis has several tearjerker lines, but none as heartbreaking as this:

You look like me
but you're not like me I know.
I had one, two, three, four shots of happiness.
I look like a big man but I've only got a little soul.

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]

5. This is Hardcore
Late-period Britpop saw a host of troubling musical developments as artists tried to keep things fresh, one primary tactic being the introduction of long songs. The longer, the more poignant, they would have us believe. "This is Hardcore", however, is one of the few diamonds in that rough. Yes it's long, but it's long for a reason. Jarvis' epic analogy of fame and porn, accompanied by an excellent video, made this one of the best songs of the late 90s.


6. Razzmatazz
Nobody does the scorned lover routine quite like Jarvis. In his bitterness, he's not beyond waiting months or even years to see that ex-girlfriend lose her looks and fall on hard times. Come on, it doesn't get more petty than this:

You started getting fatter three weeks after I left you
Now you're going with some kid looks like some bad comedian
Are you gonna go out, are you sitting at home eating boxes of Milk Tray?
Watch TV on your own, aren't you the one with your razzmatazz
and your nights on the town?
Oh-oh-oh And your father wants to help you doesn't he babe?
But your mother wants to put you away
Now no-one's gonna care if you don't call them when you said
And he's not coming round tonight to try and talk you into bed
And all those stupid little things they ain't working
Oh they aren't working at all

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]

7. Babies
While this is far from this reviewer's favorite Pulp song, no introduction would be complete without it. "Babies" is Jarvis in storytelling mode, and represents perhaps the most engaging narrative he's ever committed to tape. The subject matter would seem trivial, if not downright sleazy: a teenage Jarvis watching his girlfriend's older sister make it with boys in her room. But Jarvis pulls the whole story off with wit and yes, innocence ("I only went with her 'cause she looks like you") so that he comes off as more endearing than perverted. Live versions of this song were often prefaced with one of Jarvis' lengthy monologues--an underrated aspect of Pulp's appeal as a live act.

8. Live Bed Show
Like "I Spy", this song represents the darker side of Pulp's defining album "Different Class", both musically and thematically. As Russell and Candida set a gloomy stage behind him, Jarvis sings about love gone wrong, cleverly wrapping the story around the couple's bed:

She doesn't have to go to work,
but she doesn't want to stay in bed,
cos it's changed from something comfortable,
to something else instead.

9. Dishes
According to Jarvis, he wrote this song after hearing the theory that men raised in the West go through a mid-life crisis at 33 because they realize they won't be Christ. Originally seeming like little more than an afterthought than a full-fledged song, "Dishes" blossoms into a beautiful climax:

And aren't you happy just to be alive?
Anything's possible.
You've got no Cross to bear tonight.
No not tonight.
No not tonight.



10. Sunrise
With Pulp having lost a good deal of their commercial mojo with "This is Hardcore", the British press falsely assumed that the band had lost most of their creative fire as well. That couldn't be farther from the truth: the band's final effort, "We Love Life", is remarkably consistent and just as artistically bold as its predecessors. Produced by legendary cult crooner Scott Walker, the album is full of big booming percussion and has a more acoustic feel than previous Pulp records. The album's closer, and high-point, is "Sunrise", an admission from Jarvis that he has squandered his youth:


I used to hate the sun because it shone on everything I'd done.
Made me feel that all that I had done was overfill the ashtray of my life.

It ends with a dizzying guitar freak-out led by Mark Webber and sometimes guest guitarist (and now bona fide solo artist) Richard Hawley. It's an exhilarating final glimpse of a band frequently misunderstood, yet unfailingly brilliant.

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]

[Band Wiki]

Jarvis Cocker on "Fresh Air" (Podcast)

Listen:

[Download the MP3 Here]
[Fresh Air Website]
[Jarvis on Myspace]