Jarvis Cocker - Pulp's 'Accidental' Hit

Pulp's 'Accidental' Hit

Jarvis Cocker says Pulp's 'Common People' was a ''popular song by accident.''

The band's 1995 single was a number two hit in the UK, and has remained the band's defining moment, and Jarvis admits as soon as he came up with the idea that they were onto something.

Jarvis said: ''I'm quite proud of that song. I must have written it in mid 1994. It was an exciting time. There was this feeling in the air that something was changing, with Britpop.

''We felt like we'd managed to tap into something so we wanted the single out very quickly.

''We played it at Reading in 1994 and it went down amazingly. We'd written a popular song by accident.''

The frontman added he still gets excited every time the reformed band play the track, and if he didn't, he would know it was time to quit.

He added: ''If I didn't feel excited playing it, that's how I'd know it was time to get rid of the high heels and call it a day.''

The song's lyrics talk of a rich Greek student who wants to live with ordinary working class people, based on one of Jarvis' real experiences, but the girl's identity remains unknown, as Jarvis never found out her name and an attempt by documentary makers to track her down also proved fruitless.