Jarvis: 10 June 2007 - The South Bank Show (TV)

Jarvis Cocker, the charismatic former front man of Pulp, is one of Britain's best-loved musicians and cultural icons - and the subject of The South Bank Show.

Melvyn Bragg meets him in Paris to talk about song-writing, politics, his ambivalent attitude towards fame and what he likes about his new life in France.

Jarvis formed Pulp while still at school in Sheffield in the late 1970s. As an awkward teenager he felt that pop music did not adequately inform him about the disappointments of growing up, and wanted to write songs that included "the bits which other pop songs had edited out".

It took Jarvis more than a decade to find success with Pulp who went on to become one of the most popular bands of the 1990s, with hits including Do you Remember the First Time and Common People.

Although Pulp have never officially disbanded, Jarvis moved to Paris four years ago with his family, taking a break from the band and the spotlight.

Last year he re-emerged, releasing his first solo album, Jarvis, for which he received a Brit Award nomination for Best Solo Male.

The South Bank Show filmed Jarvis' recent concert of new material at The Roundhouse in Camden. Jarvis takes The South Bank Show on a tour of some of his favourite places in Paris.

He also returns to Castle Market in Sheffield, where he worked as a teenager on a crab stall, "probably the only proper job I've had in my life". The musician Scott Walker also gives a rare interview about Jarvis as a songwriter.