Pulp have played some of their biggest and most celebratory shows over the past couple of years, a run of huge headliner slots at festivals in the UK and Europe, their own mammoth outdoor show at London’s Finsbury Park and they ended 2024 with a short, triumphant tour of the US. But it hasn’t always been like that for Jarvis Cocker & co.. They had to wait longer than most for their moment in the spotlight – when their Britpop classic Different Class made them stars in 1995, the Sheffield indie-rockers had already been going for over 15 years.
Even the year before that big breakthrough, on a US tour around the release of their game-changing 1994 album His’n’Hers, they must have been wondering why they bothered. In an interview with this writer around the release of his book I’m With Pulp, Are You?, guitarist Mark Webber recalled a strange gig the band had been booked for at The Howlin’ Wolf venue in New Orleans.
