Pulp: This Is Hardcore (2LP) [ISLAND]

Why you'll love it

This Island 2LP set spreads the album across four sides with custom inner sleeves, and adds "Tomorrow Never Lies" and the End of the Line remix of the title track. It debuted at No. 1 on the UK Albums Chart and earned Pulp their third straight Mercury Prize nomination.

This edition

• 2LP set
• Gatefold jacket
• Custom inner sleeves
• Bonus tracks
• Pressed in the EU

About the album

After Different Class made them household names, Pulp followed it with something darker and grander. Jarvis Cocker went to New York alone to write, and the songs he brought back leaned into art rock and glam, with fame and getting older very much on his mind. Work started in November 1996 and wrapped in January 1998.

Chris Thomas produced it at The Townhouse and Olympic in London, with strings recorded at Whitfield Street. "The Fear" opens in a fog of unease, "Party Hard" struts, "Dishes" is a tender, funny confession, and the title track, built on a sample from the Peter Thomas Sound Orchester, swells into full film noir. "Sylvia" and "The Day After the Revolution" take the album out on a long, glorious exhale.

Peter Saville and painter John Currin art-directed the cover, and the title track's video, directed by Doug Nichol, was later named No. 47 on NME's list of the best videos of all time. We file it under P, though it's rarely where we left it, because somebody always has it out to look at the sleeve again.

Also at Kops: more Pulp on vinyl · browse Alternative

Tracklist

Listen

On Island (cat# 4786651), a reissue of the 1998 album.