Pulp Present the John Peel Show - November 97

Details

  • Dates: 25th to 27th November 1997 (three two-hour shows)
  • Programme: The John Peel Show (BBC Radio 1)

Presented by: Jarvis Cocker, Nick Banks, Candida Doyle, Steve Mackey, Mark Webber.

This overview was written by Alex Deck for Pulp People Newsletter 21 (Winter 97):

D-J ing at the HMV store on Oxford Street must have given Pulp a taste of the big time, because they repeated the perform­ance three nights running on Radio 1 FM...John Peel has never done this before, handed his entire show over, so its a big compliment. Either that or he couldn't get anyone else at such short notice.

Pulp certainly enjoyed the challenge, even though Candida forgot to turn up for duty on the Tueday night, thinking it was Wednesday, Thursday, Friday instead! I suspect Jarvis has a tendancy to take over the controls, it would have been nice to hear a bit more from Candida, Nick and Mark. High points included Nick dedicating DAF's "Der Musolini" to his wife Sarah, and an excellent competition to find the records that sound best played at the wrong speed. The winner was Spizz Energy's cover of Virginia Plain, which really did sound a lot better at 33rpm! The overall standard of music was very high, even if you might not have liked all of the records played, they were still interesting.

The other high spot was of course Electric Sound of Joy's first Radio 1 session - thanks to Pulp for setting that up, it was just fantastic. Hope you the listeners enjoyed it as much as we did! The boys played four songs: Ray Away, Our Flag, Dont Waste My Time and I Cant Wait, to which Jarvis responded, "I cant wait for them to release another single". Too right! Now we will sit back and wait for the offers to come rolling in (haha).

Anyway, for those of you who missed it, here is the Pulpy playlist in full...my playlist differed rather from the Radio 1 one but its pretty much correct.

Day One: Tuesday 25th November

  • Rude Boy Monty - Warp 10
  • Le Hammond Inferno - Marrakesch
  • Cornershop - Brimful of Asha
  • The Idjut Boys - Stick It In
  • Baby Birkin - Melo Melo
  • Velocette - Get Yourself Together
  • Rialto - Monday Morning 5:19
  • Electric Sound of Joy - Ray Away
  • Carl Orff - Gassenhauer (Badlands theme)
  • Schoolly D - We get 1 2
  • Tipsy - Cinnabar
  • The Verve - Sonnet

At this point Rough Trade boss Geoff Travis began his "History of Independent Music" with the 1970s, playing a couple of suitable tracks:

  • Cabaret Voltaire - Nag Nag Nag
  • Young Marble Giants - Searching For Mr Right

Martin Green from Smashing started mixing at this point so it got a bit confusing, but I think we got most of it down:

  • Air - Sexy Boy
  • Sally Kellerman / Quincy Jones - Coming And Going
  • Dual Tone - Small World
  • Roxy Music - In Every Dream Home A Heartache
  • Serge Gainsbourg - Requiem Pour Un C...
  • Gastra Del Soul - The Seasons Reversed
  • Rex - Jet

Pulp invite listeners to phone/fax their suggestions for the song that sounds the best played at the wrong speed - winners to be announced on the final show. As an example, the following record is played at 33rpm, and very good it sounded too!

  • ESG - The Beat
  • Amazon Two - King of the Beats

Finally, the theme from Robinson Crusoe closed the show this evening

Day Two - Wednesday 26th November

  • Rude Boy Monty - Warp 10
  • Vanilla Ice - Ice Ice Baby
  • Earl Brutus featuring Alan Vega - On Me Not In Me
  • Chin - The Phat Lady Sings
  • The Singers And Players - Bedwood The Flying Preacher
  • Add N to X - The Black Regent
  • Plone - Electronic Beauty Parlour

Mark's sonic experiment: Mark plays the two next records simultaneously, one down each channel. Sadly it seemed to be a bit of a technical flop, we could only hear the one (luckily)

  • Phill Niblock - Four Full Flutes
  • Charlemagne Palastine - Strumming Music
  • Aphrodite - Mickey Finn
  • Lo Fidelity Allstars - Disco Machine Gun
  • Mason Williams - Classical Gas
  • The Slits - Shoplifting
  • Sugarcubes - Birthday
  • Add N to X - Hit Me

More of Geoff Travis' History of Independent Music now, with a couple of tracks from the 80's:

  • The Fall - Totally Wired
  • The Smiths - This Charming Man

At this point Martin Green does a bit more DJ-ing, but I don't know the tracks he used - sorry

  • British Racing Green - Penniless Man in Gucci's
  • Artery - Into the Garden
  • Future Sound of London - Papua New Guinea (played at 45rpm)
  • Add N to X - Sir Ape
  • Dory Previn - The Lady With the Braid

Day Three - Thursday 27th November

  • Rude Boy Monty - Warp 10
  • Red Snapper - Get Some Sleep Tiger
  • Dummy Run - Parisian
  • Smog - To Be Of Use
  • The Clash - Time Is Tight
  • Bikini Beach - A Design For Life
  • Electric Sound Of Joy - Our Flag
  • DAF - Der Musolini
  • Magazine - The Light Pours Out Of Me
  • Jacques Dutronc - L'ldole
  • Happy Mondays - Kinky Afro
  • "If" soundtrack - Sanctus
  • Ian Brown - This Is My Star
  • Bernard Butler - Stay

Geoff Travis reappears with the final part of his History Of Independent Music, the 90's

  • Tiger - Friends
  • DJ Hype - Peace, Love And Unity
  • Electric Sound Of Joy - Dont Waste My Time

Pulp now play the three finalists for the competition, which are:

  • Spizz Energy - Virginia Plain (chosen by Will Walker)
  • Cats UK - Luton Airport (chosen by John O'Shea)
  • The Who - Anytime, Anyhow, Anywhere (chosen by Tara Spinks)

The winner is announced - Spizz Energy! Mind you it can't have been a close thing as I phoned up myself and spoke to Nick, who appeared to be manning the Radio 1 phones at that time, and there had only been one other call, and that was a Spizz Energy vote too...!

  • Dreadzone - Little Britain
  • Lou Reed - Perfect Day

At this point Steve enters, having been asleep in Studio 3 next door, and Mark says he's found a lovely record to ease him back into a state of wakefullness:

  • La Monte Young - Sarabande

It was a very beautiful record too. Steve was so grateful that he played the next record as a thankyou, and if you haven't heard it before, buy it straight away, then you too can imagine Mark's face as he tries to cope with the alien noises produced by...

  • Aphex Twin - Come To Daddy
  • Electric Sound Of Joy - I Cant Wait
  • Myro - Round Here We Both Share The Same Coma
  • I'm So Hollow - Dreams To Fill the Vacuum
  • Sweet People - The Birds Were Singing
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