I dont know to me it was mainly a lack of interest, or they would have kept the TIH sessions (Dirty World, Street operator, You are the one could be used today as album tracks) and a few DC one (Paula, We Can Dance Again).

In 2006, CD were still selling, and they focused on the ones that were to sell the most. the "big 3". WLL was still "recent" and i doubt it would have sold well back then.

I would not mind them doing a side record with all their unused demos.

After You
You are the One
Street Operator
Can I Have My Balls Back Please?
Paula
Quiet Revolution
Cuckoo
Love Is
St Just
We Can Dance Again
The Last Song In The World

That's a great record, although we dont know half the songs :D

Anything is possible now. And it's exciting.

Yeah, if I'm quite honest, some of the Pulp b-roll material is genuinely weaker than the stuff that made it to record. Not everything is a hidden gem.

In my opinion, 'Can I Have My Balls Back Please?' and 'Paula' are weak, jokey throwaways, and by no means do they stand up to the actual content of Hardcore or DC. And this will sound harsh, but I bloody hate 'The Quiet Revolution', can't stick those sodding panpipes. (Well, it's probably flute, but it sounds like panpipes.)

Also, those demos and unused tracks - well, they've been released, now! They're out there! You can buy them and stream them. They're not works-in-progress like the previously lyricless 'Got to Have Love' and 'Grown Ups'. Pulp might reasonably go back to some of the demos from the WLL sessions if they really want too, but all the fully-formed stuff from the Deluxe additions has been available to fans for nearly twenty years now - there's no way that they're going to retread stuff that's already out in the world in a complete state. Reissue, repackage, repackage...

And I'm sorry to bang on, but 'After You' has already been released too as a single. They aren't going to suddenly turn back around and say 'actually we should redo this one' and redo it. It's out. It's complete. It's done. If people don't like the released version, they can listen to the demo, but Pulp *have* released that 2013 version, and it's been out in the world for twelve years. It's even been remixed, and used in a massive video game. It is, to all intents and purposes, the definitive version, and what's more, it's also the last thing they ever recorded with Steve, so I really, really can't imagine them just retconning it and acting like they'd never released it before, then reproducing it and releasing it again. I'm sorry, but I just can't. I know not everyone likes the production on 'After You' (I personally really like it), but it wouldn't be the first Pulp song to have been released with opinion-splitting production - the band themselves have expressed misgivings about how 'Pink Glove' and 'I'm a Man' were recorded, and they're no more or less likely to return to those tracks than they are 'After You'

They have new songs. They have at least most of another album, if they want to do it. And there is the possibility that some of that enigmatic WLL-era material will see the light of day like GTHL and GU did, which I agree with Andy is very exciting! (I'm intrigued about 'Darren' and 'Emmanuel', personally.) But whether they use those ideas or not, they don't need to go back to existing, already released songs, and pull them together for a new album or compilation. They aren't Fire Records.

The theoretical limit, I think, for 'already released song that gets picked up again and retooled' is 'Grandfather's Nursery', because it isn't commercially available on streaming (it was only ever a free download, in the days when Amazon was still relatively obscure). But even then, seeing as it's also been released in some kind of form, I can't see that happening, either: there's a difference between that which Pulp have intentionally released (like 'Grandfather's Nursery') and that which fans have leaked (like 'Got to Have Love' when Trixie turned up on here).

The unreleased, hidden scraps that fans have clamoured for for so long might indeed turn up in the form of new songs, which is a tantalising possibility - but at the same time, the stuff without a previous origin, the legitimately brand new stuff, is just as exciting to me - maybe more so! 'Tina' is one of my favourites on the new album, while I'm also very keen on 'Partial Eclipse' - and both seem to have been conceived entirely during the More sessions. So it's not all just about digging up past fixer-uppers.

-- Edited by lipglossed on Monday 30th of June 2025 07:39:45 PM

I think that Pulp Summer has probably kinda of ended and that's fine - from exactly one month since the BBC Sessions; the positive reaction to the second single, Got To Have Love, after Spike Island's strong impact, the album listening parties, the release of More, the arena tour, the number one album trophy, the secret Glastonbury set - it's been an incredible triumph. Rave reviews for all the above across the board. And really well-timed as just like in '95, the first part of the summer of Pulp inevitably gives way to their more popular northern cousins hogging the headlines til August. I think Pulp would have struggled to get so much coverage if Oasis had started their tour a month earlier or Pulp a month later.

I'm not sure a deluxe petition for a WLL deluxe edition will make much difference. More's sales figures will though or certainly should. And the album should hopefully go back into the top twenty, maybe higher, this Friday after the positive reaction from Glastonbury. Universal may see 50k UK copies sold of a new album from a band with an average age of 59 but a fan demograph spanning the generations as the perfect time to go hard on dressing-up and dredging-up the past.

 

I'd expect a Different Class superdeluxe to come first with all the 12 interchangeable covers and a remastered Glastonbury '95. And eventually something that covers the We Love Life pre-era. Controversial call but thinking about it from the perspective of a major label who don't care much for anything beyond the bottom-line; if they got buy-in from Jarvis, and they weren't confident of sufficient sales from Pulp's seventh album getting a glow-up; they could even package and sell the unreleased songs from the turn of the century with a complete disassociation from the largely unloved WLL by releasing a stand-alone "lost" album, called "The Quiet Revolution" as originally envisioned by JC. With a bonus disc of demos that came later in 2000.

Hey, The Boss has just released seven "undiscovered" albums. If it's good enough for him - Wearing a shirt (lumberjack?) that was trying too hard...

Basically, I think we're gonna be alright 

Eamonn wrote:

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Controversial call but thinking about it from the perspective of a major label who don't care much for anything beyond the bottom-line; if they got buy-in from Jarvis, and they weren't confident of sufficient sales from Pulp's seventh album getting a glow-up; they could even package and sell the unreleased songs from the turn of the century with a complete disassociation from the largely unloved WLL by releasing a stand-alone "lost" album, called "The Quiet Revolution" as originally envisioned by JC. With a bonus disc of demos that came later in 2000.

 

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I think if there was any chance of that, some of them would have been used on the Mojo CD.  The distinction and integrity of the WLL demos seems to be being kept intact.  

Ian wrote:

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Given Pulp's current popularity, is it time for us to make a concentrated effort to persuade Island to release the "We Love Life" deluxe? There has been a petition on Pulp Wiki for years but that was started at a time when the band was dormant and (probably) before social media existed.

What are people's thoughts on this?

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 I suspect it is not viable as the audience would be pretty limited.  I believe More sold around 30,000-40,000 physical copies but there were the likes of me buying 3 different vinyl versions. So with a core of 15,000 sales and a number of those not too worried about obscure tracks, the numbers probably would not add up in commercial terms.  However, a RSD limited edition could be created as a new Pulp compilation album to cover off the 1999-2010 era.  That could then be available for streaming.  By way of comparison, the Bowie Width of A Circle, Divine Symmetry and Rock n Rock Star outtakes haven't exactly sold like hot cakes 

ArrGee wrote:

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Ian wrote:

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Given Pulp's current popularity, is it time for us to make a concentrated effort to persuade Island to release the "We Love Life" deluxe? There has been a petition on Pulp Wiki for years but that was started at a time when the band was dormant and (probably) before social media existed.

What are people's thoughts on this?

---

 I suspect it is not viable as the audience would be pretty limited.  I believe More sold around 30,000-40,000 physical copies but there were the likes of me buying 3 different vinyl versions. So with a core of 15,000 sales and a number of those not too worried about obscure tracks, the numbers probably would not add up in commercial terms.  However, a RSD limited edition could be created as a new Pulp compilation album to cover off the 1999-2010 era.  That could then be available for streaming.  By way of comparison, the Bowie Width of A Circle, Divine Symmetry and Rock n Rock Star outtakes haven't exactly sold like hot cakes 

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CDs cost pennies to manufacture, it'll be pure profit for them. It's vinyl you need to be confident of a decent take-up of.

Why is stuff like this being released all the time, if there's no market for it?:

 

https://superdeluxeedition.com/news/supergrass-life-on-other-planets-reissue/

https://www.demonmusicgroup.co.uk/catalogue/releases/brett-anderson-collected-solo-work-5cd-deluxe-packaging/

https://www.demonmusicgroup.co.uk/catalogue/releases/heaven-17-penthouse-and-pavement-2cd-deluxe-gatefold-packaging/

 

ArrGee wrote:

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HoltbyCity wrote:

CDs cost pennies to manufacture, it'll be pure profit for them. It's vinyl you need to be confident of a decent take-up of.

Why is stuff like this being released all the time, if there's no market for it?

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 No idea.  There maybe a market, but its not particularly large. Would be interested to know sales on these.

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It's free money, however many they sell.  The record companies already own the recordings and the rights.  There's no risk, like when they have to invest in paying a band for rights and for the recordings to take place.  

50p to manufacture. Sell for say £23.  £22.50 profit on every unit.  

Eamonn wrote:

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I doubt more than a couple of thousand people bought multiple copies of More. After Glastonbury, I reckon you'd be looking at close to 50,000 unique buyers of More by the time the album charts is updated on Friday (it's 22 in the midweeks). Quite a few new releases this week so it may land lower.

I think Supergrass and Suede had contracts where the publishing rights reverted to them hence their deals for deluxe editions with specialist labels. Demon's quality control is ropey as fcuk though. Pulp deserve the best so if Universal could just be arsed, there's easy money to be made, as you say.

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Sometimes the record labels outsource it themselves to those companies like Demon.

E.g. Cast's All Change got the same Universal reissue as the three Pulp albums: https://www.discogs.com/release/3180463-Cast-All-Change

But then 4 years later they licenced Demon (aka Edsel) to do it again, plus do the remaining three Cast albums: https://www.discogs.com/release/23865107-Cast-All-Change