Pulp singer Jarvis Cocker has said his writer’s block “led the band to grind to a halt”.
The Britpop band, best known for their hit song Common People, will release their first album in over two decades, More, on June 6.
The frontman, 61, said he wrote the lyrics before going into the studio to “make things easier”.
Speaking to the Big Issue, Cocker said: “It’s weird because we don’t hang around with each other outside of the band any more, but I was aware of what the others were up to with various projects. But when you’ve made music with people for that many years, you have an unspoken understanding.
“I tried to make things easier by writing my lyrics before we went into the studio, for the first time ever. Because that’s what kind of led the band to grind to a halt in the first place.
“It was taking me so long, I just felt embarrassed that the rest of the band were hanging around waiting for me to get my finger out.”
The group split in 2002 but got back together for occasional live performances including headlining Wireless Festival in Hyde Park and playing at Glastonbury in 2011.
They reunited again in 2023 for a series of UK and Ireland dates, but months before the tour was due to start bassist Steve Mackey died at the age of 56.
Cocker added: “It sounds a bit crass, but Steve passed away just before our last tour and it made me realise that we only have a finite amount of time to do the things you want to do. And for Steve, it was no longer an option, but it was for us.”
Speaking about raising his son amid conversations about toxic masculinity he said: “Women brought me up. All the males in our family just disappeared, and that had a significant effect on me.
“As for Andrew Tate, I did worry when my son first got his phone that he would encounter weird ideas about stuff. I thought, ‘If I don’t discuss certain subjects with him, then who will he learn from?’”
The Sheffield group formed in 1978 and is currently made up of singer Cocker, keyboard player Candida Doyle, drummer Nick Banks and guitarist Mark Webber.
The band struggled to find success in their early days, releasing It (1983), Freaks (1987) and Separations (1992), before finding their audience during the 1990s Britpop era with their first UK top 40 single, Do You Remember The First Time? and subsequent His ‘N’ Hers album, in 1994.
In 1995, they gained nationwide fame with the release of the single Common People and the critically acclaimed Different Class album as well as their Glastonbury performance.
They have since had five UK top 10 singles and two number one albums.
The new album More is dedicated to bassist Mackey and is due to be released on June 6.
