When they write the histories or our century, 1995 will be referred to simply as "Pulp". No band in living memory has dominated a calendar so completely. Jarvis Cocker has been on the front of every magazine in the world apart from the Dallas-based periodical Militant No-Nonsense Kick-Ass Grunge Recidivist Week, and has guested on every television programme bar "Blind Date", which he will almost certainly end up hosting in his dotage. For all his teetering on the brink of over-exposure, however, Cocker hasn't shied from the necessity of abasing himself in his song writing (as evinced by "I Spy", he's writing himself into them by name). Tonight, Pulp are triumphantly savage once more (the best "Babies" ever, while "Common People" remains just one of the best songs ever) and Jarvis' between-song French isn't bad, either.

An outrageously great live band, Jesus Christ's agent would shy from booking Pulp as a warm-up for the second coming; that PJ Harvey, then, found themselves comprehensively upstaged, is no lasting disgrace.