diff --git a/VERSION b/VERSION
index 9084fa2..26aaba0 100644
--- a/VERSION
+++ b/VERSION
@@ -1 +1 @@
-1.1.0
+1.2.0
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 5308077..16cc7c7 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -4,24 +4,21 @@
 import os
 import sys
 from setuptools import setup, find_packages
-try: # for pip >= 10
-    from pip._internal.req import parse_requirements
-except ImportError: # for pip <= 9.0.3
-    from pip.req import parse_requirements
-import pkg_resources
 
 here = os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(__file__))
 
 with open(os.path.join(here, 'VERSION')) as f:
   VERSION = f.read().strip()
 
-pr_kwargs = {"session": False}
+# Read requirements without using pip internals
+def read_requirements(filename):
+    with open(os.path.join(here, filename)) as f:
+        return [line.strip() for line in f
+                if line.strip() and not line.startswith('#') and not line.startswith('-r')]
 
-install_reqs = parse_requirements(
-    os.path.join(
-        here,
-        './requirements.txt' if not sys.argv[1] in ['develop', 'test'] else './requirements-dev.txt'
-    ), **pr_kwargs)
+install_reqs = read_requirements(
+    './requirements.txt' if not sys.argv[1] in ['develop', 'test'] else './requirements-dev.txt'
+)
 
 setup(
     name='discovery',
@@ -30,7 +27,7 @@
     author_email='tech-notify@clever.com',
     url='https://github.com/Clever/discovery-python/',
     packages=['discovery'],
-    install_requires=[str(ir.requirement) for ir in install_reqs],
+    install_requires=install_reqs,
     setup_requires=['nose>=1.0'],
     test_suite='nose.collector',
     long_description="""\