When I first moved to Los Angeles 7 or 8 years ago I became obsessed with Six Feet Under. I remember going to work one day and one of my coworkers talked about the show for hours. She couldn't believe that I was not watching it. However, I didn't have HBO and I don't think the show was out on DVD yet. I didn't even have a DVD player yet. VHS releases of TV shows were starting to disappear so I didn't really have any way to watch it-- so it might have been Six Feet Under that made me finally give in and get a DVD player. My first DVD purchase was The Muppet Movie, but I think my second or third purchase was the first season of Six Feet Under. It had been a while since I had been obsessed with a really good TV show. I still managed to watch the entire Twin Peaks series about once a year, but there wasn't much else out there. It was just that I didn't have HBO. I had heard about all these new shows, but still had never watched Oz or the Sopranos. These shows would later become some of my favorites as I started to collect the DVDs and eventually was forced to get HBO again. I don't want to sound like an advertisement for HBO, but it really did change the way I looked at TV and really gave me many enjoyable viewing hours. Six Feet Under came at a perfect time in my life. The show took place in the Los Angeles area and was filmed just down the street from Amoeba at the Gower studios. I somehow felt the show was speaking directly to me. And I somehow felt more involved with it since it was filmed so close to me and took place in a city so close to my heart. It was also nice to see a gay character as one of the lead roles in a drama series. I have always had a love/hate sort of relationship with Los Angeles, but this show made me love it just a little bit more. The five seasons of the show took me on a long and intense journey. I fell in love with all the characters and started to think of them as my family. The show followed me back to San Francisco, where it eventually ended in 2005. This was one of those shows that I really did love but it also just sort of tortured me when I watched it. Not only was every episode dealing with somebody's death, but it was also dealing with all the characters' messed up lives at the same time. It was an intense journey. The thing that made this show so fantastic was the cast. The mix of the brilliant writing with the perfect cast was a magical combination -- and it doesn't really happen that often. The leads were all perfect. Peter Krause, Michael C. Hall, and Lauren Ambrose were perfect as the siblings of the house. Frances Conroy was brilliant as their mother. The show just had a list of some of my favorite or soon to be favorite actors -- Rachel Griffiths, Freddy Rodriguez, Jeremy Sisto, Lili Taylor, Kathy Bates, Richard Jenkins, Rainn Wilson, Justin Theroux, Mena Suvari, Veronica Cartwright, Illeana Douglas, and Catherine O'Hara. And Patricia Clarkson and Joanna Cassidy were nothing short of brilliant as the aunt and mother in law. I wish they could have been in every episode, I don't think any TV show will ever get a better cast...although Mad Men comes very close.

I was wondering whilst trying to fall asleep the other night why I haven't ever looked up any Pulp videos on Youtube before. Then I remembered that I had a dvd called Hits, so what else could there be? A few seconds later, a vacuum tube in my mind sparked to life and I recalled (to myself) that Jarvis is pretty ambivalent at best about the early years, so I was excited to find two early videos.


PULP'S BEGINNINGS 

Pulp was formed in 1978 by 15-year-old Jarvis Cocker, a student at Sheffield's City Secondary School.
In 1980 they, amazingly, recorded a Peel Session. I only just found out that it's available on CD, so I haven't heard it, but it's supposedly pretty in-line with Sheffield's reigning synth-rock sound of the time.


In 1982 the still virginal Jarvis recorded It.


The record reflected a change in direction toward a folky, jangly sound with wide-eyed lyrics about love and being shy all sung rather off-key but kind of managing to sound like early Leonard Cohen.

The following year saw the single "My Lighthouse."

 










And, at the encouragement of someone at the label to record more commercial stuff in the style of Wham!, they followed it with the rare, and not half-bad Everybody's Problem.

OK everybody, it's April. I'm not sure how 3 months already passed by this year, but they did. Today is a Tuesday, which means another street date. So every Tuesday I'm gonna discuss the new releases that are coming out -- at least the important releases. or at least what is important to me...which may not be important to you...but it should be. As far as music goes, there is not a whole lot out today.

But most important is the new album by Jarvis Cocker Jarvis. I have loved Jarvis for a long long time now, but I have to admit that I had not paid much attention to him lately. After Pulp broke up in 2002 I never thought Jarvis would be able to put out anything nearly as interesting or fun as those Pulp albums. Back in the 90s I wore out my old Pulp albums: His 'n' Hers (1994), Different Class (1995), and This is Hardcore (1998). These 3 albums have all been reissued as deluxe versions. They are available now as imports but I'm sure they will be out soon domestically, especially now with the domestic release of his excellent solo album.

It's been over 12 years since Different Class came out. Seriously, one of the best albums of the 90s! I danced many nights at Pop Scene to Pulp along with Blur, Oasis, and Suede. This album made Pulp huge stars both in their native England and in the U.S. and this album blew me away. It was just one of those albums you can't get enough of. I could never hear "Mis-shapes," "Common People," or "Disco 2000" too many times, and it seemed like most friends I had at the time agreed with me. This album came out when Brit pop was one of the most popular styles of music. They were on the cover of all the music magazines and everyone was talking about them.  1995 was the year Blur's Great Escape and the Oasis album (What's the Story) Morning Glory? came out. Suede's Dog Man Star was released the year before, just as Jarvis is now releasing his solo album ...