Jarvis Cocker Won’t Waste Your Time

“Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time” is a grand cautionary tale that Cocker originally wrote for Nancy Sinatra (“You ain’t getting no younger and you’ve got nothing to show, so tell him that it’s now or never and then go … He can have his space. Yeah, he can take his time. Now he can kiss you where the sun don’t shine. Oh baby, don’t let him waste your time.”). The dramatic “Black Magic” contains the familiar beat sample from the Shondells’ “Crimson & Clover”; the languid tracks “Heavy Weather,” “I Will Kill Again,” and “Baby’s Coming Back to Me” have a slight country vibe. The hidden track (which clocks in at about twenty-four minutes at the end of “Quantum Theory”) is “Running the World” (“Well did you hear, there’s a natural order. Those most deserving will end up with the most. That the cream cannot help but always rise up to the top. Well I say: shit floats … ”). The original title for the song includes an expletive that can’t be printed, but sums up Cocker’s opinion of current world leaders quite succinctly.  

The album evokes a sort of theatrical, old-school crooner feeling, similar to Gainsbourg, Leonard Cohen, Scott Walker, and Lee Hazelwood—all artists Cocker admires. Though he’s now forty-three and a settled-down family man, Cocker’s still an excellent entertainer. Seeing him at NYC’s Webster Hall at the end of April, Cocker proved he’s still a first-rate songwriter and extraordinary performer … and I’m still in love with him!