Pulp kicked off the North American leg of their 2024 tour at Chicago’s Aragon Ballroom on September 8th. A sold out show in a castle of a venue, fitting for the international powerhouse of a band. Three hours before the eight o’clock start time, a queue of fans was already wrapped around the building, across the street, and down about two city blocks.
Escape-ism opened with a mixed reaction from the crowd, it took the audience a moment to warm up to the avant-garde nature of their set. Compared to their softer recorded sound, Escape-ism put on a surprisingly energetic and unforgettably frenetic performance to perfectly usher in Pulp.
Anticipation and fog machine smoke swirled to mix with pink backlights as Pulp took to the stage. The first notes of “I Spy” barely made it through the crowd’s excitement and as the song built, lead singer Jarvis Cocker emerged from behind the curtains to find his spot at center stage.
The concert ebbed between slow and upbeat songs, a careful balance. The audience sang along for each song, taking in the striking visual ques achieved via an elaborate setup of multicolored lights. Different color pallets complimented different songs, with almost no repetition. This allowed each song to showcase its own unique mixture of emotions through a curated set of colors.
Cocker began “Do You Remember The First Time,” by asking the audience if anyone could remember their first performance in Chicago at the Vic Theatre in 1994. During this spiel, he also threw candy and grapes from his pocket out into the audience. Before “Pink Glove,” Cocker accepted two pairs of pink gloves thrown on the stage and threw them back into the audience throughout the song. It was clear that Pulp had a deep respect and understanding of their audience, who responded in kind to Cocker’s jokes throughout the show.
Speaking between songs, Cocker geared the crowd up for “Common People” by hinting at other songs like “Party Hard” and asking the audience what song was on the B-side of their “Underwear” single. The live rendition of Common People included a heightened keyboard, making it much louder and bouncier than the original recorded version. An absolutely magnetic performance from keyboardist Candida Doyle, as the song gained an especially new resonance after hearing her live. During “Common People” and multiple other songs, Cocker used mallets to emphasize the beat on a drum positioned next to drummer Nick Banks.
Returning to encore, the band premiered a brand new song which Cocker called “Spike Island.” A blend of everything the band has created before it, “Spike Island” was an emotion filled song that felt crafted to be the perfect cap to the night.
Coming from an era of music pre-streaming, Pulp takes a heavy focus on creating music that is meant to be performed live. Seeing them in-person completely blows their impressive discography out of the water. As their first romp through North American since 2012, this is not a tour to miss. For a full list of tour dates and locations, check out their website.
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