The Daily Spin, May 27
Pulp | Different Class
Welcome back to the Daily Spin, the series in which I review 365 albums during 2023.
Each album will be given a rating on a scale from 0 to 10. You can look at the entire set here. Additionally, you can check out a list of my favorite song from each album right here.
If you want to suggest an album, good news! You can do so right here!
Album: Different Class (1995)
Artist: Pulp
Link:
After toiling in obscurity - not even relative obscurity, just plain old obscurity - for nearly two decades, Pulp finally landed big with 1995’s Different Class, outsiders cracking their way into the heart of the Britpop movement through Blur-like soundbytes and a hefty awareness of hot-button social issues.
It’s that willingness to confront society at large that landed them at the front of the charts in 1995, mostly through their most popular song on this record, ‘Common People’ - and in the title of the album, illustrating the impossible gulf between the haves and the have-nots in mid-nineties Britain.
These issues stay present even now, and maybe that’s why this album resonates like it does - but for all the commentary it offers, I’m still left feeling like the tank isn’t quite full here. There’s something missing, potentially in that it struck such potent feeling with Common People and was unable to replicate it through the remainder of the album, but also in regards to the instrumentation, which at best feels a little bit this side of hollow.
Rating: 7.8/10
Best Tracks: Common People
Worst Tracks: Sorted For E’s and Wizz