Scott Walker's Meltdown, Royal Festival Hall, London 20 June

Set list: Intro / Untitled / The Trees (early instrumental version) / Forever in my Dreams (instrumental) / Untitled / My Body May Die / On Your Own Again

Held annually, Meltdown is a fortnight of events at London's Royal Festival Hall. The 2000 event was curated by one of the latter part of the twentieth century's greatest & most respected singers, Scott Walker, and featured a performance by Jarvis, Steve, Mark and glass harmonica player Alisdair Malloy entitled "A Touch Of Glass".

Sandwiched in between Austria's Fuckhead (Mmm, thanks Austria) and Smog, A Touch of Glass, barely rehearsed and looking slightly apprehensive, played a short-ish but very beautiful set. They were joined on stage by the fabulous Swingle Singers for a version of "My Body May Die" and finished with a cover of Scott Walker's "On Your Own Again". We all clearly thought it was great but I'm informed that we were in the minority!

As the first notes were struck it was clear that 'A Touch of Glass' would be no ordinary event. The audience's patience (or at least mine) had been sorely tried by the preceding band, Fuckheads, who seem to have taken some of their best ideas from Laibach and then removed any meaning from them. After their endless and ear-splitting performance, 'A Touch of Glass' seemed all the more sublime. With songs of such musical mastery, spiritual subtlety and emotional resonance, the musicians (including Alisdair Malloy on the amazing glass harmonica, Jarvis on his white Omnichord, as well as Mark and Steve) left much of the audience behind. This was not a scaled down Pulp gig, it was something unique and exquisite in its own right.

The first song was a reworking of 'I Spy', and although the thrill of recognition was part of the pleasure, it was also an exploration of a new realm. This interpretation highlighted the musical depth of Pulp's songs, which stand alone without the lyrics, although critics don't usually appreciate this. The second song was 'My Body May Die', written for the recent remake of 'Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)' but, as Jarvis said, "don't let that put you off." I thought it worked OK on TV too, but freed from the ephemerality of the programme it became a profoundly pure and overwhelming piece. The performers were brave to attempt this live, and the risk paid off as the result was breathtaking. The song is built up layer upon layer, music and voice wrapping themselves around each other. Everyone involved was concentrating hard and the intensity of the instruments, including the beautiful glass harmonica, the lyrics and the voices of Jarvis and the Swingle Singers combined to create moments of transcendent ethereality. All this, yet things never became over-earnest. In fact, there was a real sense of stripped down simplicity there, no pretentious posturing, in contrast to the other acts. Unnecessarily but charmingly modest, Jarvis then told Scott Walker that he might want to leave the building as they were about to cover one of his songs, 'On Your Own Again'. I hope he stayed, as this was also perfect. A song exactly suited to Jarvis's voice and attitude, it was as moving and understated as it was brief. As with the best things in life, 'A Touch of Glass' left me yearning for more.  (Milena Michalski-Gow)

"Jarvis Cocker and his Pulp friends soothed the nerves with synthetic variations on systems music, Beach Boys enhanced samples and well designed excursions into the nod-out zone where Tangerine Dream meet Popul Vuh. They were easy on the ear. (Max Bell, writing for the London Evening Standard)

Jarvis Cocker has all the stage presence of a garden rake. You could make your own Cocker at home, using a couple of pipe cleaners and an old sock, and it would be no worse than the real thing. Yet he has no shortage of fans. Cocker had assembled a bunch of louche instrumentals that wouldn't be too difficult to play on his dinky electronic keyboard, plus two songs for good measure....as his combo meandered through their three chord ambient stuff, given weird colourings by a bizarre keyboard device called a glass harmonica, it was pleasant, but scarcely compelling. A version of Cocker's song 'My Baby May Die' (sic) was rendered whimsical by a chorus he introduced as the Swingle Singers... [How do these people get to write professionally?? How???! -Ed.]. Finally, there was a perfunctory trot through Scott Walker's 'On Your Own Again', which seemed to stop before it had started properly...(Adam Sweeting, The Guardian)

Well, this is quite an unusual, partial Pulp set. It starts with the same introductory music as the 1999 concerts (not a reworking of 'I Spy', just something which sounds like it in places!), a piece which has gone under several names, most notably 'Venice' and 'Roald Dahl'. It merges into something really calm which we've (who's we? Ed.) given the name of 'My Chopper'. Soon we're treated to a song which uses a sample from a film called 'Otley' (later to become 'The Trees'). Again, nice and relaxed and it's interesting to listen to alongside its finished product; the lack of vocals and strings make it an interesting listen. The next song, 'Forever In My Dreams' carries on in a similar vein to the rest of the set, it is nice and calm and I'm looking forward to hearing the recorded version when it's released. It's from this moment on that things start to get interesting. The next instrumental (possibly called 'Fire Island') is a jam with the glass harmonica which sounds very good indeed. It isn't a million miles away from 'Master of the Universe' or 'My First Wife' (it's instrumental though!) and I really wish it had been reused in another song. Next is 'My Body May Die' which is a good song but spoilt by poor sound quality, Jarvis' voice isn't loud enough and, unfortunately, the performance is blighted sharply because of this. Jarvis then tells Scott Walker it would be safe to leave the room and let's face it, it would! They perform his song, 'On Your Own Again' which could have easily fit into Jarvis list of bad cover versions. Overall, I suppose when it is a one-off performance and the sound quality is poor, you can't really go expecting something big. However, most of this is quite good and it's an interesting listen. (Ian Clark)