Candida Doyle

Candida Mary Doyle (born 25 August 1963, Belfast, County Antrim, Northern Ireland) is a keyboard player and occasional backing vocalist with the band Pulp, which she joined in 1984. She joined her brother Magnus Doyle in the line-up replacing a previous keyboard player who had left the band.[1]

Doyle attended piano lessons from age 8, but did not practice despite finding the experience enjoyable.[2]

During Doyle's first few years in the group, Pulp were not enjoying financial success; she has been recorded as saying that she spent more money on the band than she made from it.[citation needed]  She kept jobs in two toy shops in Manchester, before being sacked from one for a "lack of dedication". Although Pulp "sort of split up" in the period around 1986, they went on to release Freaks in 1987 with Doyle on board for her first album.

When playing live with the band Doyle has used Farfisa Compact Professional and Roland XP-10 synthesizers as well as Akai S3000 samplers.[3]

Other artistic members of her family include her mother Sandra Voe, an actress who has appeared in Coronation Street, and two musician brothers. Her grandfather owned a fishing factory in the Shetland Islands. Doyle has lived in many places, including Belfast (where she was born), Manchester, Sheffield from the age of ten and where Pulp formed, and London, her current home.

Since Pulp began a hiatus in 2002, Doyle has occasionally appeared live with Jarvis Cocker, playing keyboards. Following this period, with Pulp's 2011 reunion, Doyle joined the rest of the 'Different Class' line-up on stage in concert for their UK comeback gig at the Isle of Wight Festival on 11 June 2011.