A working-class English guy is seduced by a posh Greek student of sculpture who, taken by the romanticism and experimentation of 'slumming it', views him as a decent enough piece of rough with whom to jump in the sack. While at the college, Cocker acquired a part-time job cataloguing cassettes at the Record & Tape Exchange in Notting Hill... for a day. "It was a very challenging song to actually put together,” says David Nicholas, who engineered the record. "That being said, Jarvis was also a tremendous singer. Pulp - Help The Aged Lyrics "The thing with 'Common People' is that it starts at 90bpm and finishes at 160bpm, with each verse cranking it up. Once I got that narrative in my head it was very easy to write, lyrically.”. In 1995 Pulp and had become an unstoppable force as this footage of the band performing ‘Common People’ in London from the same year proves. Now fast forward to 1994, by which time Cocker had added the lyrics inspired by the slumming ambitions of his Greek muse.
"No, and I avoided that question as much as possible for the first couple of records. Little did they realise what a challenge it had been, but I love challenges like that.”. The band undoubtedly brought something fresh into the mix and the Yorkshire outfit’s significance is often unfairly overlooked. It was a lot of fun.”. "When I hear it on the radio today, it sounds flawless,” says David Nicholas whose production/engineering credits have also included Sting, Rod Stewart, the Pretenders, Soul Asylum and Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark. Pulp are an alternative rock band that formed in 1978 in Sheffield, England, United Kingdom. Engineer David Nicholas tells us how 'Common People' was recorded. Web site designed & maintained by PB Associates & SOS. Pulp’s breakthrough in the mid-1990s saw the band quickly evolve from cult Sheffield heroes, a group that had been on the grind for over a decade, into a headline set on Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage. Back in September 1988, when Pulp appeared to be going nowhere, Jarvis Cocker had headed south to study film at London's Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. You may login with either your assigned username or your e-mail address. Then again, being that Andrew and I had built the studio and installed the first Solid State Logic, no one else knew how to drive it anyway. The song is about those who were perceived by the songwriter as wanting to be "like common people" and who ascribe glamour to poverty. by Rosie Crocker on 3/20/2012 2:09pm @ Virginie Maurice.
But that guitar part, reproduced in mono right in the middle of the track, made all of the speed changes sound perfect. The tune's anthemic undertone reminded him of Emerson, Lake & Palmer's grandiose prog-rock version of Aaron Copland's 'Fanfare For The Common Man'.