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Jarvis Cocker, solista, dopo i Pulp, appare solo. Nonostante l'apporto strumentale di Steve Mackey, il bassista storico della band di Sheffield, e di Richard Hawley, che coi Pulp aveva già proficuamente collaborato. Nella foto di copertina si staglia con espressione furtiva su uno sfondo metà grigio e metà grigioverde (altro che rossi e neri...), e ha persino bisogno di una freccia che lo distingua dalla non-massa. Nelle foto interne del bel libretto è solo e spaesato: contro un muro immenso, in un interno, per strada, sulle scale, in un corridoio. Spariti tutti. I Pulp non esistono più: niente più storie provinciali, racconti di amori adolescenziali, pub e pomeriggi acrilici, sabati sera di divertimenti strascicati e sigarette fino all'alba, sesso mortificato e sogni della domenica.
In questo disco Cocker, amareggiato e deluso, canta la storia di un'agghiacciante disillusione, con pochissime o quasi nulle speranze o vie d'uscita. E per comunicare tutto ciò, il compassato dandy britannico sceglie nientemeno che l'antifrasi: allora l'album si conclude con un coro "Everything's going to be alright" a cui è evidente che Cocker stesso non crede affatto; allora nella dolcissima e xilofonante "Baby's coming back to me", che potrebbe suonare come la canzone d'amore perfetta, si capisce, man mano che il pezzo procede, che lei, a casa, non ci tornerà mai più; allora il pacifico individuo middle-class, che si dà un tono ascolticchiando musica classica e ogni tanto si gode la vista di donnine nude su internet, si rivela un potenziale assassino ("I Will Kill Again", minimale, apparentemente leggera ma molto inquietante, come il disco nella sua interezza); allora "Disney Time", che ci si aspetterebbe essere un pezzo stile Pulp scanzonati e colorati, si rivela essere un brano di una cupezza asfissiante, vicino piuttosto a certo Nick Cave, con una batteria ovattata, arrangiamenti tetri e un Cocker dai toni bassissimi (la cosa migliore). Allora il primo singolo, "Running the world", è piazzato come ghost track dopo 25 minuti di silenzio. E dice che sono gli stronzi a governare le cose. E perciò sulla copertina, accanto a quel nuovo Cocker disorientato, si accampa un bel adesivo di parental advisory.
Detto questo, rimane qualche scoria dei Pulp a livello musicale, ma non troppe. L'atmosfera può avvicinarsi in qualche passaggio al clima più scuro e introverso di "This is Hardcore" (come in "Heavy weather" o "Big Julie"), ma mancano qui molte tipicità pulpiane, dagli arrangiamenti di Candida Doyle al cantato-parlato tipico di Cocker, che sparisce del tutto. Nessun brano rimanda ai fasti di "His'n'hers" o di "Different Class": altri tempi. Si sente qua e là l'apporto di Hawley, soprattutto nella piacevole apertura ("Don't Let Him Waste Your Time") o in qualche pezzo che ha un aspetto quasi polveroso e datato ("Tonite", "Quantum Theory"). Per il resto è il nuovo Jarvis, solo e solista. Ne risulta un lavoro molto compatto, disteso su ritmi lenti (solo una vera rock song: "Fat Children"), che rinuncia a qualsiasi eccesso di rumore per scegliere piuttosto continui ripiegamenti e attenuazioni, sordine e levigature. Liscio, al limite dello scazzo, per poi pungere nei testi.
La stampa britannica ha tributato molti elogi a questo nuovo Cocker, deluso e impietoso analista, puntando soprattutto sull'aspetto testuale del disco, avvertito come una dura critica alla società di oggi tout court, e a quella inglese in particolare. E musicalmente ne ha lodato la maturità. Che ha portato Cocker a rallentarsi, a osservare più cose, con più coscienza, con più dissimulate fragilità.
Niente paura, comunque: Cocker non è "cresciuto vecchio", come avvertiva di non fare agli ascoltatori di "This Is Hardcore": lo spirito non si è perso. Avverte sulla superficie del cd che il disco "non va usato come sedativo", scrive versi di una finezza e arguzia straordinarie ("How come they're called 'Adult movies' when the only thing they show is people making babies filmed up close?") e, quel che più conta, scrive ancora ottime canzoni. Riuscendo benissimo a far capire, pur attraverso un disco dalla resa fonica quieta e apparentemente serena, quanto male, sotto sotto, ci si senta. Perfetta mimesi della realtà.
Elenco tracce testi e video
04 Heavy Weather (03:51)
This morning it was summer
By noon a cold front building
Where did you go?
Where did you go?
I got to find some shelter
'Cos any minute now
It's gonna blow
It's gonna blow
But I don't mind the rain
So strike me once again:
I've got nothing to lose
And it looks like we are in for stormy weather
With death and destruction coming through
Oh, look out there she blows
Now everybody knows:
Stormy weather always makes me think of you
And watch out 'cos the storm is coming through
But you're so still and silent
Whilst everything's dissolving
Melting away, melting away
But I don't mind the rain
So strike me once again
I got nothing to lose
Yeah, it looks like we are in for stormy weather
With death and destruction coming through
Oh, look out there she blows
Now everybody knows:
Stormy weather always makes me think of you
Oh and it looks like we are in for stormy weather
With death and destruction coming through
Oh, look out there she blows
Now everybody knows:
Stormy weather always makes me think of you
And watch out 'cos this storm is coming through
Yeah, watch out 'cos the storm is coming through
07 Fat Children (03:25)
Last night I had a little altercation
They wobbled menacingly
Beneath the yellow street light it became a situation
Well, they wanted my brand-new phone with all the pictures of the kids and the wife
A struggle ensued and then fat children took my life
Fat children took my life
Fat children took my life
Fat children took my life
Well, some passers-by took me to the station
The police force was elsewhere,
putting bullets in some guy's head for no particular reason
So I died in the back of the cab
but I'll be back to haunt them
This thing does not end here
My spirit walks the streets of Tottenham
Singing:
Fat children took my life
Fat children took my life
Fat children took my life
Oh, the parents are the problem
Giving birth to maggots without the sense to become flies
So pander to your pampered little princess
of such enormous size
08 From Auschwitz to Ipswich (03:51)
"They want our way of life"
Well, they can take mine any time they like
'Cos god knows - I know I ain't living right:
I'm wrong
Oh, I know I'm so wrong
So like the Roman Empire fell away
Let me tell you; we are going the same way
Ah, behold the Decline and Fall
All hold hands with our backs to the wall
It's the end:
Why don't you admit it?
It's the same from Auschwitz to Ipswich
Evil comes
I know from not where
But if you take a look inside yourself -
maybe you'll find some in there
Not one single soul was saved
I was ordering an Indian takeaway
I was spared whilst others went to an early grave
Oh, got stoned
Yeah, went out and got stoned
Well if your ancestors could see you standing there
They would gaze in wonder at your Frigidaire
They had to fight just to survive
So can't you do something with your life?
It's the end:
Why don't you admit it?
It's the same from Auschwitz to Ipswich
Evil comes
I know from not where
But if you take a look inside yourself -
maybe you'll find some in there
Here it comes, why don't you embrace it?
You lack the guts needed to face it
Say goodbye to the way you've been living
You never realised you were on the wrong side
And nobody's going to win
"They want our way of life"
Well, they can take mine any time they like
11 Big Julie (04:43)
She’s by herself again
in the quiet secret night
Below the neighbour’s window
hands in pockets, head on one side
And the radio plays an unknown song
that has nothing at all to do with God
But it’s miles away
from this sad town
and the stupid kids who get her down
Just wait until Big Julie rules the world
Big Julie rules the world
Well, the radio still plays
floating beyond time
like the greatest people in the world
all springing up and feeling fine
And it’s far away
from these sweaty lads
who say that boys
cannot be slags
And if it’s not them
then it’s their dads
Like the guy who felt
her up in class
And the Sunday-School teacher
who said she had beautiful breasts
and the local radio DJ
who is so obviously obsessed Yeah,
form an orderly queue when Big Julie rules the world
Big Julie rules the world.
Yeah, go and chase your dreams
but if your dreams are not your own
then wouldn’t it be better
just to work things out at home?
And she knows sex is just for dummies anyway
something you do when you’ve run out of things to say
But this song will play
until the light
It’s the sound of her trying
to find something to like
the sound of her walking
day and night
And this song may lead her
far away
but tonight it seems to light the way
And she can almost see the future shine
And everything’s in tune
and everything’s in time
And it will play until the day
Big Julie rules the world
Big Julie rules the world
14 Running the World (04:44)
Well did you hear, there's a natural order?
Those most deservin' will end up with the most?
That the cream cannot help but always rise up to the top
Well I say, "Shit floats"
If you thought things had changed
Friend, you'd better think again
Bluntly put, in the fewest of words:
Cunts are still runnin' the world
Cunts are still runnin' the world
Now the workin' classes are obsolete
They are surplus to society's needs
So let 'em all kill each other
And get it made overseas
That's the word don't ya know
From the guys that's runnin' the show
Lets be perfectly clear boys and girls:
Oh cunts are still runnin' the world
Cunts are still runnin' the world
Ah yeah!
Oh yeah!
Oh feed your children on crayfish and lobster tails
Find a school near the top of the league
In theory I respect your right to exist
I will kill ya if you move in next to me
Ah, it stinks, it sucks
It's anthropologically unjust
Oh but the takin's are up by a third
Oh so cunts are still runnin' the world
Yeah cunts are still running the world, ah yeah!
(Cunts are still running the world) Ohh!
(Cunts are still running the world)
The free market is perfectly nat'ral
Do you think that I'm some kind o' dummy?
It's the ideal way to order the world
Fuck the morals, does it make any money?
And if you don't like it? Then leave
Or use your right to protest on the street
Yeah, use your right but don't imagine that it's heard
No, not whilst cunts are still runnin' the world
Yeah, cunts are still runnin' the world
Yeah cunts are still runnin' the world!
Yeah cunts are still runnin' the world!
Oh cunts are still runnin' the world!
Cunts are still runnin' the.. world!
Cunts are still runnin'... the world..
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Altre recensioni
Di Torre Ste
"Somewhere gravity can not reach us anymore, somewhere we’re not alone. Everything is gonna be alright."
Le cose migliori si fanno sempre alla fine, quando non ti accorgi di sapere che cosa hai fatto in un periodo della tua vita in cui non ti saresti aspettato niente di esaltante.
