News Archive
13 June 2024
I'm With Pulp, Are You? - a visual history of Pulp
Do we really need another book about Pulp? OF COURSE WE DO.
“I’m With Pulp, Are You?” promises to be the definitive visual history of the band featuring all manner of archival objects, ephemera and images from its long history, collected and curated by none other than guitarist and former fan club president Mark Webber. Featuring a foreword by Jarvis with text and essays by Mark, Simon Reynolds and Luke Turner, the 288-page hardcover is now available to pre-order from Hat And Beard Press ahead of its September 2024 release date.
Pre-order - UK & Europe
Pre-order - US & Rest of World
When Mark Webber discovered Pulp as a teenage music fan in 1985, the band was on first-name terms with most of their limited audience. Over the next few years, Mark began to help out with stage sets and light shows, eventually becoming the group’s first tour manager and running the fan club. After being called upon to play guitar and keyboards at live shows, he began to contribute to songwriting and recordings before being asked to join the band in 1995. This incredible backstory—from being a fan to joining his favorite band—provides the unique perspective of I’m With Pulp, Are You?
The book gathers material from Mark’s extensive collection of ephemera and objects accumulated over the last five decades of his involvement with the band. The lavishly illustrated pages combine images with Webber’s reminiscences to chronicle a history of the band told from the inside. It includes photographs, flyers, record covers, set lists, stickers, posters, press clippings, merchandise, and masses of promotional material. I'm With Pulp, Are You? also features a foreword by Jarvis Cocker, and newly commissioned essays by music writers Simon Reynolds and Luke Turner.
You can follow Mark and receive updates about the book via @imwithpulp on X (formerly Twitter).
15 February 2024
Intro remastered on blue vinyl for Record Store Day 2024
Intro: The Gift Recordings is to be re-released as an exclusive limited edition blue vinyl for Record Store Day 2024, Saturday 20th April 2024.
Remastered at Abbey Road Studios in London, the classic album - long out of print on vinyl - features the three singles released by Pulp on Sheffield indie label Gift Records during 1992/93, O.U., Babies and Razzmatazz.
Tracklisting
- Space (5:12)
- O.U. (3:44)
- Babies (4:05)
- Styloroc (Nites of Suburbia) (3:10)
- Razzmatazz (3:39)
- Sheffield: Sex City (8:32)
- Stacks (2:42)
- Inside Susan (5:35)
- 59 Lyndhurst Grove (3:32)
18 January 2024
New book - This Is Hardcore (33 1/3 series)
Another book about Pulp's sixth studio album This Is Hardcore will be published on 7th March. This one is part of 33 1/3, a series of short books focusing on music albums by a wide variety of artists. It is written by Jane Savidge, co-founder and head of the legendary PR company Savage & Beast, who has represented Pulp since 1992.
The book is described as a "unique insider/outsider’s guide to the record that destroyed Britpop, written by one of the key instigators of the 90s Britpop movement".
It is published by Bloomsbury in paperback and ebook formats.
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 inappropriately 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.
More details and ordering on the Bloomsbury website.
15 August 2023
Nick goes back on the road...
13 July 2023
All aboard the Pulp bus! / An Evening with Nick Banks in Manchester
A Pulp-themed bus has been unveiled by First South Yorkshire ahead of the two concerts at Sheffield Utilita Arena on 14/15 July and will be serving "random" Sheffield bus routes in the near future.
In other news, Nick Banks will be appearing at Waterstones Deangate in Manchester on Friday 22nd September at 6.30pm to promote his forthcoming memoir So It Started There published by Omnibus Press. General admission tickets are £5, or £22 with a paperback copy of the book. The evening will consist of a talk, followed by an audience Q&A and signing.
27 June 2023
Nick Banks memoir available to pre-order with signed copies & prize draw
The special edition hardback of Nick Banks' upcoming autobiography So It Started There is now available to pre-order from Omnibus Press. Priced £25 and limited to 1,000 copies, it features an alternative cover and includes entry into a special draw to win an original supermarket prop from the Common People music video. The regular paperback edition is also available, priced £20. The 432 page memoir features an introduction from Richard Hawley.
The press release in full:
So It Started There chronicles the life and career of drummer Nick Banks, and how he came to be in one of the UK’s most iconic and beloved bands: Pulp.
Beginning with his childhood in Rotherham, Nick recounts his personal and musical journey through the genres, first as a punk, then as a goth; how it all started when he was first inspired to pick up the sticks by Sex Pistols drummer, Paul Cook.
Flash forward to the eighties, Nick has been playing in a handful of Sheffield groups and spies an ad from his favourite band, Pulp, in a local club. He pays Jarvis and the gang a visit and the rest is history.
From there, Nick describes his growth as a professional drummer and musician, the trials and tribulations of chasing success in the music industry, touring triumphs and horrors, the band’s journey from relative obscurity to becoming a global sensation, and the process of writing and recording their most famous albums.
Written with warmth, humour and inimitable northern charm, Nick tells all. And with it, tells the story of a band that defined a generation.
‘Nick Banks is the time-keeper of Pulp, and within these covers are the early times, the good times, the not-so-good times and the WTF times. Do You Remember the First Time? Nick does. Great stuff.’ – Jarvis Cocker
17 June 2023
Pulp at Isle Of Wight Festival highlights on Sky Arts and Absolute Radio
The summer of Pulp continued this weekend with a headlining appearance on the Main Stage at the Barclaycard Isle Of Wight Festival on Friday 16th June.
Three songs from the set were televised by Sky Arts late in the evening, repeated on Saturday 17th June at 7pm, with Common People available to watch in full via Sky TV's official YouTube channel for a limited time. Digital radio station Absolute Radio carried the same performances in their Saturday evening programme from 6.55-10pm.
The Isle Of Wight County Press reported how the band had soundchecked at the nearby Medina College, on the outskirts of Newport, in between GCSE exams.
Meanwhile, the classic Island-era Pulp singles from Lipgloss onwards are finally being made available via streaming platforms on a weekly schedule, along with 'remastered' promo videos. Unfortunately it appears, however, that not all songs are as they were initially presented on those original releases, with the The Sisters E.P. very clearly using edits/versions that were later included on the His 'n' Hers deluxe album. It's to be hoped that these will be corrected at a later date.
1 June 2023
From Bridlington To Santiago! Further dates announced as Pulp go global
After two highly praised appearances in Bridlington and Warrington, Pulp have added three further UK dates to their expanding 2023 reunion tour.
A huge outdoor show at Manchester's Castlefield Bowl (8,450 capacity) will take place on Tuesday 4th July with support from Baxter Dury. Two further nights at London’s Eventim Apollo Hammersmith with special guest Lisa O'Neill are confirmed for Friday 28th and Saturday 29th July, with the latter seemingly being filmed by the band (hopefully for commercial release).
Tickets for all three dates go on sale at 9am on Friday 2nd June.
In exciting news, the band have also confirmed a return to South America later in the year, performing at Fauna Primavera in Santiago, Chile on the weekend of 24/25 November, exactly eleven years after their last appearance - surely paving the way for more appearances across the globe in the coming months.
1 June 2023
Buy Pulp Stuff!
An official merchandise store has been launched to coincide with the band's live return.
Pulp Official sells all manner of items from t-shirts to tea bags, tea towels to beach towels and for the particularly flash, Tatty Devine jewellery and a wall mirror. Certain items are online exclusives many are also be available to buy at concerts from the merchandise stall.
24 April 2023
Nick Banks memoir announced for September 2023
In news that will delight diehard Pulp fans everywhere, Omnibus Press have announced the memoirs of long-serving drummer Nick Banks are due for publication in September 2023.
'And It Started There: From Punk To Pulp' "will trace the musician’s life from childhood through to the success of Pulp, which helped define the Britpop era".
Nick (pictured right with Omnibus editor Claire Browne) shared the news via Twitter, commenting: "Guess I might as well tell you lot. The memoir is in the can and out Sept this year - timing or what... Let you know more as we know it. Ok?”