Disco 2000
Jarvis Cocker famously said in a 2002 interview with Liz Kershaw that “the only bit of Disco 2000 that isn’t true is the woodchip wallpaper.” The song is a tumultuous albeit cocky account of Cocker’s real life friendship with Deborah Bone. The events in the song, are all based on real life occurrences, Deborah did move away from Sheffield at a young age and she did get married as Cocker expects.
It’s a song that when you first hear those opening notes you instantly recognise it as a classic. It brings back memories of the 90s and the song being played repeatedly on the radio on warm summer days. Then come the memories of the video itself, a tale of a disco and the pairing up of the two characters (fair enough it isn’t as romantic as the song suggests. but it still gets the idea across very well!) It sort of highlights the fact that Cocker doesn’t take himself too seriously too, a key ethos that Pulp have always possessed. The ability to be themselves.
Cocker sings the lyrics directly to Deborah, it’s almost as if the people listening are flies on the wall, even reading his diary or letters. The music is optimistic with a guitar riff that is quite disco as the title suggests, but that does add to the theme of it, a retrospective account of a time when he was thinking about the past and what might have happened otherwise.
Sadly, Deborah, the said inspiration for Disco 2000 passed away in early 2015, but the song remains a tribute to her and the early friendship she shared with Cocker, and for that reason it stands out as one of the greatest Pulp songs on A Different Class.
Words by Kirsty Jackson