Earlier this year, Sheffield, UK-bred legends Pulp issued More, their first album in nearly a quarter-century. It was welcomed by fans of their sophisticated pop-rock hooks, high-drama witticisms and sartorial flair – but when the project began it took longtime guitarist Mark Webber by surprise.
When Pulp began rehearsing for a series of reunion shows in 2023, he’d initially thought they’d stick to their hits, as they’d done during their first run of comeback gigs in 2011-13. But one day, during a lunch break, Webber caught vocalist-songwriter Jarvis Cocker working on an unknown tune with their string section.
“I told Nick [Banks, drummer] and Candida [Doyle, keyboards], ‘They’re playing something new!’” Webber says. “It turned out to be The Hymn of the North, which Jarvis had written about eight years ago for a play. He said, ‘Why don’t we just try this?’”
Pulp premiered the spacious ballad at a hometown show in Sheffield – and promptly turned the corner on writing their first album since 2001’s We Love Life. “We thought, ‘Okay, we actually can do new things,’” Webber says. “And the songs started coming one by one.”
Some new songs were newer than others. The jauntily-pomped Grown Ups and post-disco glitzy Got to Have Love had started in the ‘90s with bassist Steve Mackey, who died in 2023. But those songs were energized for Pulp’s latest era, alongside the sensuous low-end bump of Slow Jam, the kinda spy-rocking Tina and more.
Webber’s playing can be elegant and laid back at times — less is More, if you will — but he brings his bright-bursting Tone Bender fuzz for a few elevated leads. Cocker added some Dobro while collaborators Jason Buckle and Richard Hawley also layered guitars onto the record.
More begins with that big slide sound on Spike Island. How did that come about?
“That wasn’t me, actually, but it was the first song we recorded. Jarvis had tried it a few times. He’d written it with Jason Buckle; they were in Relaxed Muscle and Jarvis’ band together, and he’s doing percussion and guitar with us live.
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“I don’t actually know who came up with the slide line. I think it was Jarvis, because he was playing it when we started to rehearse it. On the recording, I think it’s both of them.
“My bit is that other melody which leads into the verses. I don’t really know where that came from, but I’ve rationalized it as the influence of Buck Meek’s playing with Big Thief. They are one of the bands that have made me enthusiastic about playing guitar again. Buck kind of does these random textures and little melodies throughout their songs; I guess I was thinking of that.
“Then there’s a stupid bit in the bridge, with the power chords. It’s not that I don’t like it, but I don’t like the reference. I’m thinking of Loaded by Primal Scream, which is a song I don’t like.”
Why throw it in there?
“Because it seemed like an exciting pop thing! Making music is a selfless act, isn’t it? When you’re in a band and you have something you think improves the whole – even if it’s not something you’re 100 percent behind – you just have to do it.”
Tina is a bit of a rhythmic outlier on the record. It’s not necessarily ska, but it has a pronounced upstroke to the beginning of it.
“That’s a song I didn’t like, but I can appreciate it without liking it. It makes me think of wacky ’60s TV shows like The Prisoner or Thunderbirds, especially with all those lush strings. I tried to subvert it with a kind of punky counter-rhythm with the upstrokes. Jarvis has since asked me to stop playing it like that!
“I don’t want to be too negative – generally I’m really happy with the record. I’m kind of amazed we could do it, and I’m happy with my contributions.”
What about that big, double-harmonized lead section in Got to Have Love?
That pedal will do something really extreme. It’s sort of uncontrollable. That recent acquisition got me quite excited
“It has the harmony because I kept playing the solo in different places in different keys in concert. Some bright person thought, ‘Why not have both on the recording?’
I”t’s the classic Mark Webber guitar solo sound, using the Tone Bender for color. That’s also on Common People, Mis-Shapes and The Fear; it’s like my go-to. If I want to be heard over everything else, I’ll press the Tone Bender.”
Along with the Tone Bender, what else is in regular use on your pedalboard?
“A new one is the Death By Audio Reverberation Machine, which I used on quite a few of the new songs. That’s a really exciting pedal – you press it and it will do something really extreme. You can try and temper it, but it’s sort of uncontrollable. That recent acquisition got me quite excited.”
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You’ve retired your Crybaby – why?
“It’s partly for space. Wah is one of those great but kind of very obvious things. It’s easy to rely on, so I thought, ‘Well, maybe I could do without it for a while.’ And we’ve got two other live guitarists that use wah-wahs, so we don’t need another one.”
Your big red ES-345 is foundational to your setup. You’ve played it since the Different Class era. When did it come into your life?
“I bought it when we were starting to work on Different Class. I used to have a really crap 335 copy; I think it was a Hohner. It would just never stay in tune. I’m not a very technical person, but you know how the A string is always out of tune on most guitars? It was particularly bad on that one. If you went up the neck, it went out of tune.
“Fortunately it got stolen along with quite a lot of our other equipment when we’d left it in the dressing room of a TV studio. We lost about four guitars that night, and I needed a replacement.
“This was 1994, and our managers at Rough Trade were working with Bernard Butler. They asked him if I could borrow one of his guitars. I went up to his flat and I borrowed a 345 he had. I really loved it and I bought mine quite soon after that.
“It was the first really good quality guitar I owned. I like the idea that it’s in stereo, but I don’t think I’ve ever used it in stereo. It has Vari-Tone, which I don’t use either – I think there might be something wrong with the wiring. But the guitar is really low-action and playable. I don’t use it as much now because I got into Collings guitars.”
What’s the primary guitar on More?
“It’s a Collings SoCo Deluxe. I’ve ended up with about 15 guitars, which is unnecessary — but they’ve all got their qualities, haven’t they? I might use five or six through a concert.”
You were a longtime fan of Pulp before you joined. What was the first Pulp song you learned on your own?
It’s basically Heroes by David Bowie. The walking bit turned out to be on a minor chord, so I was doing it wrong
“It must have been [1985’s] Little Girl (With Blue Eyes) – it has some slightly tricky chords in it. It was the first Pulp song I heard. It had just come out, and someone in the local record store played it to me. I’d been playing for two or three years; I’d taught myself playing along to records.”
What was the first Pulp song that you had a decent hand in?
“I contributed to the writing of Do You Remember the First Time? – the bass line in the chorus. I tour-managed Pulp for a while, then they asked me to play at the concerts when they needed an extra pair of hands on the keyboards, or when Jarvis wanted to stop playing guitar and concentrate on singing. I just played his guitar parts.
“I was around the rehearsal room when they were working on Do You Remember, struggling to come up with something in the chorus. I picked up the bass guitar and came up with that line.”
It’s a bit of a walking bass line.
“It’s basically Heroes by David Bowie! Then it has the walking bit, which turned out to be on a minor chord – so I was doing the walking bit wrong! Steve realized that one note needed to be changed.
“I guess the next song after that was Common People, which was written with everyone together. But it was still before they asked me to join the group. I didn’t really know where I stood, officially.”
Moving back to More, My Sex has an interesting, ambient, whale-moaning texture through it — drawn-out single notes that creep along the arrangement.
“I own up to that! And the Reverberation Machine is definitely contributing to that sound, as well as a volume pedal, which is also one of my essential pedals.
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“Volume swells are something I’ve done at least since This is Hardcore, probably trying to imagine that I could play guitar like Tom Verlaine! He’d do it with his little finger [rolling the volume pot]; I needed a pedal.”
There’s also an intense reverb-chamber noise crashing into the piece. Is anyone physically shaking your amp in the studio?
“No – that’s the volume pedal as well. Because it’s quite early in my pedal chain, it’s getting processed by the Reverberation Machine and delays. We didn’t know to end the song, so there were all these false endings – the drums would continue because he didn’t realize we were ending – and then I made all these kinds of pulses and earthquaking noises.”
What brand of strings do you use?
“How do I know?! I haven’t changed guitar strings myself for 25 years. But I know they’re 0.10 to 0.46.”
- More is on sale now via Rough Trade.
