jarvis-cocker-sunday-service

Jarvis Cocker talks about his favorite LPs, curated 'Sunday Service' compilation

In the time between his 2009 solo album Further Complications and his new JARV IS project (who will hopefully release an album in 2020), Jarvis Cocker hosted the weekly “Sunday Service” radio show on BBC 6. With that put to bed last year, Jarvis has now compiled some of his favorite songs he played on that show on a new two-disc compilation that’s out now via ACE Records. Music from Jarvis Cocker’s Sunday Service includes songs by Antony & The Johnsons, Serafina Steer, Cabaret Voltaire, The Legendary Tigerman, Art Garfunkel, Alternative TV, Moog outfit The Camarata Contemporary Chamber Group interpreting Erik Satie, Nina Simone, a live improvised “jamma” between Jarvis and David Cunningham (The Flying Lizards) and more. An official stream of the album has not been released but someone has made a Spotify playlist with most of the songs and you can stream that below.

To promote the album, Jarvis has talked with The Quietus about 13 of his favorite albums and he picked ones that he actually owns on vinyl. “There’s an art to an album,” Jarvis told The Quietus. “If you’ve got an album that’s got a shit song on it, especially if it’s in the middle of a side, you’re not going to play it as much because you know you’re going to have to get up and skip that track. That’s what I’ve tried to do with these, it’s records that I don’t mind putting on then you can relax or talk to people or whatever, but you know you’re not going to get some kind of fucking horrible shitty stinker of a song on it.” The list includes LPs by The Beatles, The B-52s, Serafina Steer, Terry Riley, Bill Callahan, The Pastels, Jeffrey Lewis, Endless Boogie and more. Here’s Jarvis talking about why he picked Abbey Road:

Abbey Road – I was young at the time, 10, 11, 12, whatever, and the track that ends side one, ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’ that was mind-blowing to me, the way it went on and on and on at the end, with this big synthy wooshy noise. I’ve since found out its Ringo playing this machine that sounds like wind that you get in classical orchestras. It was a psychedelic experience in a living room in a normal part of Sheffield in the early 70s, where, you know, psychedelic experiences weren’t that common. I’ll always remember it, that song in particularly took me somewhere. And that’s the end of that side – if you had Abbey Road on CD it wouldn’t be right, it only really works as a statement if you listen to it for ages and then it suddenly stops and then you’re left in silence for a while until you can be bothered to get up and start again. I started with this because it plays with what an album can be. It’s great.

Read the whole feature on Jarvis’ favorite albums over at The Quietus.