Pulp

Despite being one of the icons of Britpop, a movement that effervesced the British independent music scene in the 1990s, Pulp originated in 1978 in the city of Sheffield, England. Young Jarvis Cocker, then fifteen years old, formed the band with schoolmates. Initially called Arabicus Pulp, the band spent the 1980s living in obscurity, despite releasing several singles and a few albums.

Always led by vocalist Cocker, Pulp has always had a constant change of line-up and styles, flirting with genres such as new wave, glam, acid house, europop and British indie rock.

In 1983, the group released its first album, It, originally in a print run of 2,000 copies on the Red Rhino Records label. It has a folk base, with romantic pop songs, influenced by Leonard Cohen. Their next album, Freaks, arrived in 1987.

With acid house influences, Separations, the band's third album, was recorded in 1989, but was only released in 1992 by Fire Records. The track "My Legendary Girlfriend" was released in 1991 as the first single from this album, and was named "single of the week" by the NME, starting the takeoff of Pulp's career.

The group's sudden popularity in the 1990s, appearing in Britpop alongside bands such as Suede, Oasis and Blur, led to their formation stabilizing with a core of members who became better known — Jarvis Cocker (vocals, guitar), Russell Senior (guitar), Candida Doyle (keyboards), Steve Mackey (bass) and Nick Banks (drums).

His 'n' Hers, the group's fourth album, released in 1994 by Island, reached number nine on the British charts and was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize. However, it was with the following album, Different Class (1995), that Pulp reached their peak in the English music scene, more precisely with the singles "Common People" and "Disco 2000". During the recording of Different Class, the group added a new member, guitarist Mark Webber, the president of the group's fan club.

Different Class won the 1996 Mercury Music Prize. Its successor, This Is Hardcore (1998), did not receive the same acceptance, but was also nominated for the Mercury Prize. The band returned with a new studio album in 2001, when they released We Love Life In 2006, Jarvis Cocker released his first solo album, Jarvis.

In 2011, the band returned for a few festival appearances, maintaining sporadic reunions over time. In 2023, Steve Mackey passed away at the age of 56. In 2025, twenty-four years after We Love Life, Pulp released More on Rough Trade.