Out of all of the bands that could be classed as Britpop, Pulp formed first. Starting out in 1978 (when Tim Wheeler from Ash was about 1 year old), front man Jarvis Cocker has been the only ever present. It took them two years to play a gig and then in 1981, they had recorded a demo tape which the band gave to legendary DJ, John Peel, who duly gave them some exposure with a Peel Session. The original line up disbanded not long after this as most of the members went off to University and, the Peel Session not leading to any success. A new line up was formed and it was then that ‘It’, their first album was recorded and released in 1983. A second album, ‘Freaks’ was released in 1987 but Cocker took a break to study at Central Saint Martin College, putting the band on hiatus.
By the 1989, Cocker had resurrected the band and they had a deal with Fire Records. It was whilst on that label that the released the ‘My Legendary Girlfriend’ single. This was made weekly music newspaper, the NME’s single of the week. The trajectory of the band started to rise and ‘O.U’ was made single of the week by Melody Maker, an other UK weekly music paper. Signing to Island Records, ‘Lipgloss’ became their first single to break the UK top 40. Parent album, ‘His ’n’ Hers’ broke into the top ten of the LP charts and the band was on its way, finally.
‘Different Class’ followed soon afterwards but there were some incidents of controversy. There was the single ‘Sorted For E’s & Whizz’ which was said to be pro drugs and the original artwork showed people how to make a paper wrap which was interpreted as a way of hiding drugs. Then there was the 1996 BRIT Awards when Cocker rushed the stage during Michels Jackson’s over the top performance of ‘Earth Song’ for which he ended up spending a night in jail for. None of this seemed to hurt record sales though.
There would three year gap before their next album was released. ‘This Is Hardcore’ which was darker than the previous two efforts, mostly down to the pressures of fame, Cocker having a cocaine addiction and a lack of new material. The band would record one more album, 2001s ‘We Love Life’ before splitting. There have been a few reunions but none that herded any new music. They did leave quite of a lot of quality music though for us to listen to and this is shown by the amount of top notch B-Sides they produced during the period they were signed to Island Records. For this, the sixth and final B-Sides collection from the major players of Britpop, Pulp are afforded a double album.
Side A
- The Babysitter (Do You Remember The First Time)
- Deep Fried In Kelvin (Lipgloss)
- You’re A Nightmare (Lipgloss)
Side B
- Seconds (The Sisters EP)
- Street Lites (Do You Remember The First Time)
- Your Sister’s Clothes (The Sisters EP)
- The Professional (This Is Hardcore)
Side C
- Ansaphone (Disco 2000)
- His ’n’ Hers (The Sisters EP)
- Ladies’ Man (This Is Hardcore)
- Tomorrow Never Lies (Help The Aged)
Side D
- We Are The Boys (Party Hard)
- P.T.A. (Parent Teacher Association) (Mis-Shapes & Sorted For E’s & Wizz)
- Cocaine Socialism (A Little Soul)
- Mile End (Something Changed)
- 59 Lyndhurst Grove – Live (Common People – French Single)
I normally would not include live tracks on B-Sides collections, but this version of ’59 Lyndhurst Grove’ was. It finishes with a nice thank you by Jarvis Cocker and I felt it was a really nice way to finish off.