In the spring of 1999, Young MC was the opening act of a concert at American University. Midway through his set, and reacting to the - to be polite - apathetic response of the crowd, he blurted out, "C'mon, y'all, I can't play 'Bust a Move' seven times."
In 1999, Jarvis Cocker was still the lead singer of Pulp, the Brit-pop superstars best known for the song "Common People." But the band's 1998 release "This is Hardcore" disappointed the crossover crowd and the band could never recapture that level of success.
Monday night at the Wiltern, Cocker played a full 90 minutes of material from his two solo releases, "Jarvis" and "Further Complications," to a crowd of Angelinos whom, for most of the show, seemed much more interested in rehashing hits of 15 years ago. But while Young MC eventually relented and gave the half-drunk college kids what they wanted, Cocker stood behind his new work - a move that brought post-show boos from a vocal portion of the audience when the houselights came up after the encore.
The 45-year old now sports a beard that, when combined with his jacket-and-tie onstage ensemble, leaves him two elbow patches short of a professorial look. But his persona, honed by an astounding 28 years of performing and music-making, stays bigger-than-life, and his rock-star mannerisms still connect.
It's even easier for him to pull off those rock star moves now, as he tours behind his hardest-rocking album of his career. "Further Complications" is a nasty piece of work in the best way, as Cocker found his way back to his sex-and-class fascinations of the mid-90s, this time from the perspective of a dirty middle-aged man and from behind a wall of guitar.
Kicking off his set with "Angela" and the newest title track, Cocker had the crowd willing to listen. But midway through the set, when slower numbers like "Hold Still" were the norm, the energy slowly left the building, and by the time "Black Magic" closed the first set, "restless" would be the best description of the crowd outside of the Cocker diehards in the pit.
The encore, despite the performance of "Don't Let Him Waste Your Time," his most successful solo single to date, and the introduction of his band (which includes Pulp member Steve Mackey), didn't help. A distortion-laden outro to "You're In My Eyes (Discosong)" closed the night, and the boos started when the house lights came on and the house music started.
The audience reaction was shameful, considering that Cocker's solo work matches up well with everything Pulp ever released with the exception of "Different Class," the 1996 album containing "Common People" and one of the top albums of the 1990s. Such is the price of having a hit, it seems; it's nearly impossible to get away from it.
Whenever stories come up about people seeing music artists from their childhood, I recount the tale of when I saw Young MC at American. As I recall, when he acknowledged that he only had the one hit and that it would not be good showmanship to sing it repeatedly, the crowd immediately picked up and cheered for him throughout the rest of the show.
Posted by: Josh | July 28, 2009 at 05:36 AM
They certainly laid off him a bit, yeah. The funny thing was, it actually was a pretty good show. He did well, and Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock did, too.
De La Soul was better the next year, though. :)
Posted by: Robert | July 28, 2009 at 09:37 AM