10 Most Controversial Album Covers Of All Time
3. This Is Hardcore - Pulp (1998)
The success of Pulps Different Class catapulted the band into league with the types of people they despised and, in the process, beckoned them into bed with drugs, partying and, inevitably, total strangers. And whereas the words cool and Pulp may seem like strange bedfellows, the band managed to use their newfound popularity to a sumptuous degree on the successor to the album that made them.
Alongside the Emergency Room shot that graced Blurs eponymous 1997 record, Pulps This Is Hardcore photographed the decline of Britpop decadence. The albums startling art symbolised the feeling in the Pulp camp; one of lifelessness and exploitation, an inescapable stench of the undignified hanging heavy from misdemeanour and the decimation of principles. Undoubtedly provocative but an artistic encapsulation of the cavernous vacuity that replaced the euphoria of the 90s dream, This Is Hardcores cover supported its lyricisms sobering exploration into the questionable excesses that this euphoria sanctioned, forcing the hedonists to gaze deep into their own shame. Intending not to spike controversy but convey Pulps characteristic irony, posters advertising this release were defaced by offended London Underground commuters.
Nevertheless, This Is Hardcore is the morning after the night before, a guilt-ridden and bitter analysis of Cool Britannia that poured vitriol onto its ravaged carcass and engulfed its trite optimism in unforgiving flames.