Monday, November 18, 2002

Newsfelch!

Calling all Morrisphiles: Chris Morris's debut short film, 'My Wrongs 8245-8249 And 117', the first from Warp Films, gets its first screening at the Auto Festival curated by Steve Mackay and Jarvis Cocker of Pulp and which is being held at the Magna Science Centre in Sheffield on 14th December.

On the subject of Pulp, if the festival DOES see them performing their farewell gig, then it'll be a sad day for British music. While I wouldn't count myself as an admirer of their music on the whole, I'm a fan of Jarvis Cocker - he's always got something to say, and for the last ten or so years they've been one of the most intelligent and literate acts around, positioning themselves carefully somewhere between the pop world and the leftfield, slightly out of place in either. They've never followed trends, and equally they've never stood still. Following Different Class with This Is Hardcore was, as Jarvis himself said, "commercial suicide", but it was also evidence they hadn't lost their artistic integrity and were brave enough to make a difficult record, and releasing the title track as a single was as risky as Radiohead's post-The Bends comeback with 'Paranoid Android'. So, respect to perhaps the only Britpop-era band that deserves it (apart from maybe Supergrass).

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