P U L P Soundsystem
Pulp can do anything. They can reunite after an extended hiatus…to headline Coachella and that festivals inaugural cruise, in the same year… They can take a 12 year old demo, record…
By Mario Cotto • • 1 min readPulp can do anything.
They can reunite after an extended hiatus…to headline Coachella and that festivals inaugural cruise, in the same year…
They can take a 12 year old demo, record it AND have James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem) produce it…
They can take that recording and give it to attendees of a December concert in their hometown of Sheffield in the form of a digital download on a Christmas Card only available on Christmas Day…
And they can later (given interest outside of people at the show in Sheffield) quietly make it available to everyone without much hullabaloo…
Said single, “After You” is a stellar marriage of everything Pulp fans miss about Pulp and LCD fans miss about LCD, while simultaneously being a celebration of both those things.
Pulp was revisiting “disco” long before anyone thought it was cool. And 15 years ago in an American climate where proclaiming you loved disco would be in request to get bonked over the head with a blunt object, James Murphy was the guy with the most lumps on his head. However, long since then, disco has returned and morphed into a panoply of dance musics.
All that to say that old habits die hard, and both Pulp AND James do their old school best. In typical Jarvis Cocker fashion, he sneers about dancing and the end of everything and going to Tesco. In typical James Murphy fashion, the track chugs along in perfect, shimmering 4/4 time until it frantically rises to a noodly end.
It’s good, fun and (literally) old while simultaneously being nostalgic and brand new at the same time.
They can do anything.