"Common People"

Pulp
(Island, 1995)

The lie of rock is that it breaks down class barriers. Little in recent memory has done quite so much to enforce them -- especially in England, where class is the national obsession. So consummate Brit Jarvis Cocker, who had spent 15 years dicking around with Pulp, finally wrote a song that did for sex and class what "Lola" did for sex and gender. It starts out pulsing like a seduction, but when he gets to his slummer's come-on -- "I want to sleep with common people like you" -- his voice starts dripping with fury, and by the end it's a storm of pure acid.

-- Douglas Wolk