“It’s what the upstarts have yet to learn: less is more and one of Jarvis’s erudite lines can say more than many bands manage in a career. ”
“It’s what the upstarts have yet to learn: less is more and one of Jarvis’s erudite lines can say more than many bands manage in a career. “
That Jarvis Cocker Record…
Jarvis – Jarvis (Rough Trade / Konkurrent)
Do You Remember The First Time? Perhaps you were an early starter, your passions stirred by tales of legendary girlfriends and suddenly nothing else mattered. What about sinking your anger into Mis-shapes, in awe that such an anthem for the downtrodden could sneak onto the radio. Maybe it was coming across This Is Hardcore their bitter, remarkably prescient attack on what success had made them. Pulp changed lives, altered opinions and still sound invigorating today. Five years after they split it’s hard to imagine that such a fully-formed intelligent pop band ever existed and their legacy has been stunning: frequently referenced but never equalled their reputation has quietly grown whilst Britpop has, critically at least, wilted away. Ignore his outsider schtick, Jarvis Cocker knows the rules of entertainment; he’s let the crowd call for the encore before returning, stage left, with this glorious new album.
The self titled Jarvis (now a Parisian, the ‘Cocker’ appears to have been left behind in Sheffield) is no attempt to recapture former glories. His former band’s sleazy synths have been cast aside, along with their disco-pop sound, in favour of a Glam-Rock-meets-the-Velvets sound that evokes his seventies upbringing. This is the sound of a man growing old in style; not mourning past mistakes but righteously celebrating his flaws in an instantly lovable package. The stomping riffs are accompanied by piano while modern troubadour (and sometime Pulp member) Richard Hawley brings a degree of lush melancholy to the collection. It’s the aural equivalent of Friends Reunited: an album that looks back; compares aspirations with reality and examines how old flames turned out. It’s tempting to imagine that the like of Stormy Weather, a wry musing on a past affair, is addressed to an affluent former St. Martins College Student somewhere in the Adriatic.
Quick fired vitriol has been superseded by painfully deep musings on, well, y’know, the meaning of it all. Like an ageing sportsman he lacks pace and vigour but he retains an eye for a stylish set piece. It’s what the upstarts have yet to learn: less is more and one of Jarvis’s erudite lines can say more than many bands manage in a career. The album is liable to become hideously downbeat as we hear “It’s the same from Auschwitz to Ipswich: Evil comes I know from not where” but you’ve got to wonder whether Jarvis really feels so strongly about East Anglia or if, more likely, the joke’s on us.
The spectre of Pulp hangs over the album; there’s the familiar warning requesting, lest we forget, to avoid reading the lyrics while listening to the record but the rhetoric has calmed down and so it should; this is a father of 40-something years rather than a zetigist-defining revolutionary and this is one musician who consistently tells it like it is. Unrestrained by bandmates his darker side runs wild and there’s a fear that the erstwhile Mr. Cocker’s streak of resilience has been lost in the process. But no, this is modern life for the Britpop generation – the flames have died down but the fires still burn underground. “Jarvis” won’t define lives but is a cause for reflection and a chance to hear this most iconic of star’s return to greatness.
Words: James Waterson.