Pulp's This Is Hardcore: (33 1/3)

"Essential reading, plain and simple." - Cult Following "Savidge knows the album backwards." – UNCUT This Is Hardcore is Pulp's cry for help. A giant, sprawling, flawed masterpiece of a record, the 1998 album manages to tackle some of the most inappropriate grown-up issues of the day – fame, ageing, mortality, drugs, and pornography – and still come out crying and laughing on the other side. The subject of pornography dominates the record – from its controversial artwork to the images conjured up by songs like "Seductive Barry" and the title track – after Pulp's main man, Jarvis Cocker – who'd spent most of his teenage and adult life chasing celebrity, only to be cruelly disappointed when it finally arrived in spades – hit upon the grand notion of using pornography as a metaphor for fame. The album's commercial failure as a follow-up to the band's Britpop-defining, Different Class, also symbolizes a death knell for Britpop itself. Dark, right? Except just like Pulp themselves, Jane Savidge's book is playful and sometimes very funny indeed. Kicking off with an imaginary conversation between Jarvis Cocker and the people who run the Total Fame Solutions helpline, Savidge expertly guides us through the trials and tribulations of an album that begins with the so-called Michael Jackson Incident, when Cocker got up on stage at the 1996 Brit Awards and waggled his fully-clothed bum at the King of Pop. Pulp's This Is Hardcore may be a sleazy run through porn and mental demise, and an album that chronicles Cocker's continuing disillusionment with his newfound lot in life, but Savidge's book assesses the cultural and historical context of the album with insider knowledge and a sharp modern lens, ultimately making a case for it as one of the most important albums of the 1990s.

Table of Contents:
Prelude: Fame: What Is It Good For? 1. You Got to Take These Dreams and Make Them Whole 2. Something Changed 3. This Is the Eye of the Storm 4. That Goes in There 5. The Sound of Someone Losing the Plot 6. The Earth Is Where We Are 7. Nightclubbing 8. Leave Your Wheelchair Outside 9. This Is Barry 10. A Hangover without End 11. Letters Home 12. Cartoons from Other People's Lives 13. Let's Get It On 14. You Look Like Her to Me 15. Come Share This Golden Age with Me 16. The Meek Shall Inherit Absolutely Nothing at All 17. “Are you well? Well, you won't be in a minute.” Postlude: The Sound of Failure Notes Acknowledgments

About the Author :
As co-founder and head of legendary PR company Savage & Best, Jane Savidge is widely credited as being one of the main instigators of the Britpop movement that swept the UK in the mid 1990s. During this time, Jane and her company represented Suede, Pulp, The Verve, Elastica, Longpigs, whilst representing many other artists of the era including the Cranberries, The Fall and Jesus and Mary Chain. She is the author of Lunch With The Wild Frontiers (2019) and Here They Come With Their Make Up On: Suede, Coming Up and More Adventures Beyond The Wild Frontiers (2022).

Review :
From Savidge's unrivalled vantage point, she offers an observation into how the band were functioning in those years … Offering unique insight into the record as an entity as well as the evolution of each of its individual tracks … This is Hardcore is every bit as entertaining, informative and gossipy as its predecessors. A witty, first-hand account of the Sheffield band's fame-comedown record, 1998's This Is Hardcore. Savidge knows the album backwards. [Savidge's] book provides an excellent survey of a record that has only gained in stature since its release: an unflinching examination of fame, notoriety and what it is to be a man. Witty insights into the music and a chatty, conversational tone that creates a huddled intimacy around a record that drew some pretty stark dividing lines for both fans and band alike. Top-drawer study of Pulp's top-shelf reaction to fame. Essential reading, plain and simple. Not just for fans of Pulp hoping to learn more about the beloved frontman, but a clear case for how fame affects the soul and the achievement of it can come crashing down. A stroke of genius. Savidge picks at the album's bones, track by track, with warmth, candour and insight. This Is Hardcore is more than a book about an album; it's a love letter to music itself. [Savidge] explains the album's genesis, analyses the tracks and the artwork, and ponders whether This Is Hardcore might actually be one of the best records of the 1990s. Savvy [and] gossipy. An exquisite blend of insider stories and facts.