Pulp – More

On their first album since 2001’s We Love Life, Pulp offer a warmth and immediacy rare in late-career revivals. More feels richly lived-in yet remarkably contemporary, lifted by Richard Jones’ lush, cinematic string arrangements – they're particularly striking on Partial Eclipse, whose outro drifts into a moody, Giacchino-esque beauty, reminiscent of the title card score from Lost.

Album opener Spike Island instantly charms with producer James Ford’s recognisable percussion riding aside Jarvis Cocker, all shimmer and gossamer, its rhythmic flourishes crafting an inviting sonic warmth that makes familiarity thrilling rather than stale.

The album's emotional anchor, Grown Ups, is a sprawling meditation whose string-laden melancholy distills decades of mundane experience into something surprisingly transcendent. It's vintage Pulp: charmingly cynical yet quietly profound, showcasing their enduring capacity to tap into life's bittersweet mundanity. But it’s Got to Have Love that truly ignites, its Latin disco exuberance colliding spectacularly with Cocker’s visceral declarations on the necessity of love, capturing a moment of genuine emotional clarity and wall-of-sound scale that tilts the listener backward.

True, there are stumbles: Tina’s bossa nova rhythms slip awkwardly between homage and parody, its retro charms uncertainly realised. Yet even these misfires retain the warmth and sincerity that make More an inviting return. Pulp demonstrate here that revisiting the past can yield genuinely uncompromising and organic rewards.

Listen to: Got to Have Love, Slow Jam, Grown Ups