Pulp

Throughout their twenty-five years as a band, Pulp were led by gangly, eccentric frontman Jarvis Cocker. As a bored Sheffield teen, Cocker formed an early lineup of Pulp in 1978 and proceeded to kick around the British indie scene for close to a decade, offering John Peel-inspired post-punk to limited success. The first real sampling of things to come was the rave-heavy Separations, released in 1992 via respected indie Fire Records. The well-reviewed LP caught the ear of Island Records, who released the group's next four albums, completely capturing both their creative and commercial peak. Their major label debut His ‘n Hers produced the band's first radio hits, but its superior follow-up, 1995's Different Class, catapulted the band to Top of the Pops status in their native land. It was for this record Cocker penned "Common People," a scathing attack on class tourism in mid-nineties England, which remains the song for which the group is best known. The single shot to number two in their homeland and served as Pulp's climactic set-closer while filling in for the Stone Roses as Glastonbury Festival headliners in 1995. But as the popularity of Britpop waned, Pulp once again altered its sound: 1998's This Is Hardcore and 2002's We Love Life are far darker and more reflective than their predecessors. Since going on hiatus in 2002, mumblings of a Pulp reunion did not come to fruition until November 2010, when the band announced a smattering of British festival dates for 2011.