RIght, just in from the pub and tried to get this working but the bastard thing is on the blink. I checked earlier and Dizzee Rascal was in full flow on a decent-quality stream. Don't know why it's not working now...
Not sure if anyone else has been sad enought to stay up for this aswell, if so, are you able to view it ok?
Ok, I've got the live audio stream going and the quality is absoloutley brilliant I have to say. Would be great if someone is recording this, don't think I can on this machine...
The Hold Steady are still on, sounding pretty good aswell.
'kin hell, he's belting out the new ones. And they're rockier alright. First one has a mantra of 'Do you follow me?', possibly the name of it aswell. Playing the second one now, 'Caucasian Blues' it's called. Upbeat but fairly pedestrian sounding on a first listen. Lyrics, sex (but of course) for a more adult Nick Cave audience judging from the phrases "find a wife and fuck her til your hair falls out" and ''hung like a white man". Nice dig at Eric Clapton while introducing that one.
Third song was Tonite...Jarvis on acoutic guitar, xylophone effect on the keyboard, makes the song a little too poncey.
And then 'Girls Like It Too'. Jarvis introduces it by recalling a letter that John Peel's brother wrote to the great man when he was about 14 and getting into girls, telling him that 'Girls Like It Too', the phrase stuck in Jarvis' mind. As you know it would. Well performed, if they get this right in the studio it could be his most popular solo song so far. Still lacks a little something live, if they don't get it right when recording it, maybe it will just mean that it's not as good a song as we thought.
...followed by Fat Children (preceded by an amusing talk on the accuracy of Wikipedia). And now, 'Angela' who, in true Babies & Your Sister's Clothes fashion, is a sister of Big Julie apparently!
The next song starts with a piano roll and very reminiscent of 'Into My Arms' by Nick (yes, again) Cave, for the first verse part. Memorable if quite straightforward chorus "I told you once, (guitar lick), I Want To Be Your Lover...(louder) I told you twice, (riff), I Want To Be Your Lover''. In true Jarvis fashion of taking a song from being playable to your parents into the gutter, the bridge goes (lyrics slightly off probably) " You told me you wanted someone cuddly, then cuddle me, I can be your teddy bear - a teddy bear with an erection".
Black Magic and now Running The World are bringing the gig to a close. "Hopefully we can stop playing this one soon" Jarvis introduces the latter. Followed by 'Go Obama Go!' spiel. Or more accurately, anti-Bush. "A 5 year old could have done better", no doubt thinking of little Albert, (he must be 4 or 5 now, right?).
They come back for 'not an encore' but because they "played the songs quite fast and still have 5 minutes". So what do they play? Er, a house track from 80's Chicaco outfit called Master C & J. Lots of electronic bleeps and sustained synth noises, and bits of guitar feedback with repetitive lyrics from Jarvis but quite a downbeat track, given the genre, and really a bit of a strange way to end...
And that's that. So a good sprinkling of new songs, missed the start so I can't fully comment on the first track performed. But that, Caucasian Blues and Angela really do seem quite meat and potatoes rock. Again, more listens (particularly of the 'proper' versions will bear out their quality or otherwise) I Want To Be Your Lover has more subtelty about it but Girls Like It Too is still the one to emulate. The songs performed from the first record sound quite jaded to me, maybe cos I've heard them a lot over the past 18 months or so. The band still seem like hired hands, shuffling in the background perhaps because that's what they are, or because Jarvis is such a natural front man but I always thought the rest of Pulp, especially when Russell was in the group, had a real presence about them when performing live.
Anyway, the crowd really seemed to enjoy it and Jarvis was in great form. I'd be interested in seeing what the attendance was, seemed like a full football field (or similar size), which would probably be the biggest crowd he's performed to as a solo artist I think?
Seems strange, that the sun was shining brightly on Chicago when Jarvis was just getting into his stride less than an hour ago but now it's all gone dark. As it has been here for several hours. And on that note, my bed calls.
Here's a couple of youtube links for a couple of the new songs - the opening song he performed, possibly called 'Further Complications', line of note - "your life is just a carrier bag". Starting to grow on me, quite punky sounding:
i dont know, they didnt sound that good to me. But I dont quite like hearing songs live before i hear the studio version, so i wont watch these more than once.
Just listened to Further Complications, on the basis of which I'd say that these allegations of heaviness are a bit overstated - it sounds like Franz Ferdinand to me!
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"Yes I saw her in the chip shop / so I said get yer top off"
I had killed my account in May, but with Jarvis apparently putting on quite the impressive show in my adopted hometown of Chicago after more than a decade, I've been moved to sign myself up again to share my thoughts.
It's bittersweet for me. I no longer live in Chicago, and a confluence of events prevented me making the trip back to Chicago to see the show. I was just there in June for a wedding, and now I'm knee deep in coursework. But the bittersweet part is that I spent most of the last decade trying to get Jarvis/Pulp to play Chicago, and now that I'm gone, he's done it. Meanwhile, he's left my new home, Toronto, completely off his tour schedule.
Anyway, I've been getting emails from out of the internet ether from people I haven't heard from in ages. They are all saying some variation of "You were right all along!", and "Now I get what you were talking about!"
So, years of being possibly Pulp's biggest Midwest fan, and certainly their biggest -unofficial- Midwest promoter, and it's finally come together. I do know the folks who put together the Pitchfork Festival, and I had been pushing them to get Jarvis since they started. So, in a way, I feel it's my post-humous gift to Chicago. Chicago got Jarvis. At last. And at least a few people remembered to thank me...
And I thought several of the new songs were quite good. Even "Angela" sounded alright.
Good to see you back Fuss Free. I sent you a PM after you left but I don't think a mail is sent to individual email addresses notifying you of a new PM like on other forums. So, as your 'account' on here was cancelled at the time it probably never delivered.