Pulp’s Disco 2012 will be on a cruise

FROM THE PRINT EDITION OF TODAY’S DAILY MIRROR
Once he was proud to be one of the Common People; now Jarvis Cocker is taking Pulp on a luxury cruise – two in fact – aboard Celebrity Silhouette.
The group, who performed in April at the Coachella Festival – a desert institution held near Palm Springs, California, are top of the bill for the event’s first journey to sea. Also appearing will be Hot Chip. Yeasayer and Girl Talk.
Bookings open today and British fans can make reservations at ss.coachella.com. All fares are priced in US $ and start at $500 per person (cruise only) per person in a cabin of four. Two guests sharing a balcony cabin would pay $1,300 each. Prices are quoted in dollars because they must be made direct with Coachella in the US and are not being sold through agents in the UK – although the festival and Pulp are promoting the event through the British media.
SS Coachella consists of two cruises from Fort Lauderdale, Florida – to the Bahamas from December 16-19 and Jamaica December 19-23. Silhouette, launched just last year, caters for up to 3,100 passengers and has a grass lawn the size of five tennis courts on its top deck.
Unlike most British festivals this summer, there will be no mud in sight.
Celebrity say passengers who had made bookings for the week-long cruise originally planned for these dates have been offered sailings on alternative voyages.
Another unlikely name will also be performing at sea next year. Sixties supergroup The Moody Blues have chartered a ship for a cruise from Florida to Jamaica and Grand Cayman from March 20-25.
The three remaining members of the group – Justin Hayward, John Lodge and Graeme Edge – have not yet announced the name of the ship which will host the cruise, but I understand it is MSC Poesia.
Music charters are becoming a mainstay of cruising. Donny and Marie Osmond chartered a ship this year, and groups such as Kiss, Weezer, Backstreet Boys and New Kids on the Block have all got in on the act.
PLEASE NOTE: Jarvis Cocker did not pose, wearing a captain’s hat, for the picture at the top. It’s a mock-up, clumsily created by Captain Greybeard.