There are many bands over the years that I have been obsessed with. At one point it was Depeche Mode, The Cure, and The Smiths. Then it was Suede, Pulp, Blur, and The Verve. Once your obsession reaches a certain point, I think it never really goes away. Part of it is always there or it just builds and gets bigger and stronger. I have no doubt that these bands will be with me the rest of my life. Depeche Mode and The Cure are my Rolling Stones and The Who. The Smiths are my Beatles. My obsession can live on in Morrissey's solo career much like that of Paul McCartney does for fans of The Beatles. The Verve could not have come at a better time in my life. I sort of needed them. I needed a new band to latch on to and get obsessed with. My shoegaze bands like Ride, The Pale Saints, and Slowdive were starting to break up and dissolve away. The first Blur album had come out a couple of years prior to 1993, but I didn't really get into them until 1993. This was the year of the first Verve album, A Storm in Heaven and also the year of Blur's second album, Modern Life is Rubbish. The album that really made me a fan. 1993 was also the year of the self titled album by Suede and my first Pulp album, His 'N' Hers. Pulp had already been around for a decade or so but I had never heard of them until 1993. I suddenly had all these new bands to obsess over. The albums were all excellent and easy to get obsessed with. Many of my friends, and most everyone else in the world, were all into Oasis, but I remember seeing Oasis in some interview and right then deciding that I didn't want to like this band..but they obviously played a part in this period of music. Their debut album Definitely Maybe would come out a year later in 1994. These bands were also all over the magazines and a lot of my friends were also getting into the same bands. It was just an exciting time for music.

I was wondering whilst whiling 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 divda 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 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 and 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"

Two years later, frustrated by unfulfilled dreams of success, Jarvis grew rather gloomy and Pulp entered their "arty" phase.
    
                       
Little Girl With Blue Eyes            Dogs Are Everywhere (1986)       They Suffocate at Night (1987)

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 near 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 ...