Category: Pet Shop Boys

2003 got underway with the release, in February, of Disco 3,a remix album containing ten tracks, none of which, deliberately, were released as singles. The remainder of the year, musically, proved to be quiet until 17 November, and the release of new material:-

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Miracles

Those who had felt let down by the tunes on Release would no doubt have found some comfort in the return to electronica, but I’m of the view that it’s not really one I can get excited about. Enough people liked it to ensure it entered the charts at #10, but as was becoming the norm, it very quickly dropped out of sight.

2 x CDs and a 12″ remix single were put on sale.  CD1 had just one other track on it.

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – We’re The Pet Shop Boys

It’s actually a cover, having been written and recorded originally the previous year by the New York based electronic band My Robot Friend.   Chris and Neil were quite tickled by the idea of a tribute being paid to them in such a way that they chose to do their own version. Sadly, the idea is better than the execution, as the song itself isn’t much to write home about.

CD2 came with an extended version of Miracles, along with a remix by Lemon Jelly.  But there was also a very odd sounding previously unreleased song.

CD2

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Transparent

It has all the attributes of one that Chris came up with, with a load of different influences to the fore.  It also sounds as if it might be him on lead vocal, albeit through a vocoder, or perhaps the duo had sneaked one of their many famous fans to record anonymously.  Turns out it is Neil whose voice has been hugely distorted.

All in all, Miracles and the b-sides proved to make for the least appealing (IMHO) of any PSB single thus far.

One week after the release of Miracles, the compilation album Pop Art : The Hits was issued.  Those of you who are keeping up with the 60 albums at 60 rundown will be aware that I included this at #33 on the basis that it’s impossible not to have it above any studio album given that among its 35 tracks across the standard 2xCD issue, you can find some of the greatest pop singles released by any singer or group in the late 20th century.  There was only one completely new track on Pop Art, and it was no surprise that it was the next single, issued on 29 March 2004.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Flamboyant

It was actually a slightly different mix from that included on Pop Art, and is some ten seconds or so shorter in length.   It’s a classic PSB hit single by numbers, one that reached #12 and got them was an increasingly rare appearance on Top of The Pops given how little of their music was now being aired on Radio 1.

2 x CDs and a 12″ remix were all that you could find in the shops, although there was also a limited edition 12″ remix single issued for the European market.  CD2 was filled with remixes, which meant the only new song was a track on CD1.

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – I Didn’t Get Where I Am Today

This probably caught a few folk out as it is very unlike the PSB.  The electric guitar, courtesy of their old mate Johnny Marr, is very much to the fore and there’s a bit of ‘hey hey hey’ backing vocal that wouldn’t have sounded out of place in a 60s single. Indeed, although the ex-Smiths man had no hand in writing the tune, it sort of is the template for what would appear on his much later solo albums.  If I was on Jukebox Jury, I’d vote this one a hit…..

JC

A little bit of background as it’s something I was very much unaware of.  This is all from the ‘History’ section of the Pet Shop Boys official website.

On 6th February 6 2002, the Pet Shop Boys begin a brief tour of English colleges. “We’d never done it before so I thought it would be a laugh,” says Chris. “The original idea was based on Paul McCartney and Wings just upping off and playing universities during the lunch break and stuff. It just seemed like a nice way to play lots of songs off the new album. And also to get a band together.”

Neil plays guitar, Chris plays keyboards are there are two other guitarists and a percussionist onstage. “It was really good having a band – noisy,” says Chris. “It was quite interesting because the Pet Shop Boys have never presented themselves as being musicians before on stage, with the exception of when we played at the ICA in 1984,” says Neil. “We’ve always presented ourselves within a visual context on stage, which has been what we’ve become well-known for, and all of a sudden we thought it would be quite interesting to present ourselves as musicians.”

At one concert, in Middlesborough, they encore with a version of Eddie and the Hot Rods’ “Do Anything You Wanna Do”. The tour is completed by a one-off date in Cologne, Germany, on February 16.

On 16th March, they  record a live concert for BBC Radio 2 with their live band, playing a shortened version of their college tour set. Two days later, a new single is released.

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Home And Dry

It is interesting that the BBC, and indeed Chris and Neil, now saw their natural home as being Radio 2 and not Radio 1, which is the station aimed at younger listeners with its playlists, certainly during the day, concentrating on the current chart hits. 

This is not meant as an insult, but Home and Dry is a perfect Radio 2 song and PSB were very much an ideal Radio 2 group.  The station is the most listened-to in the UK, and its DJs have the task of broadcasting a very wide range of content, including hits from bygone eras. 

It’s a song that it is very hard to date as there are all sorts of 80s influences on it, but it has the crisp production standards of the 21st century. It got to #14 on the singles chart, which is a decent performance, given that a move to Radio 2 tends to come at a time when singers/groups are now seen as being more about their albums and live shows.

2 x CDs and a DVD version were put on sale.  CD1 had the single plus two new tracks

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Sexy Northerner
mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Always

The former is yet another superb b-side, full of humour and delivered with a knowing wink. Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty must surely have given this a listen and been proud that their influences were still very much to the fore.

The latter, while not as outstanding as Sexy Northerner, is one that would have raised hopes for the quality of the next studio album, given it was ‘deemed’ only good enough as an additional track on the lead single.  It’s another wonderful Radio 2 record, with a hint just after the three-minute mark of the same synthetic trumpet blast that was found on West End Girls.

There was one ‘new’ track included on CD2.

CD2

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Break 4 Love

Here’s an edit from wiki.

Break 4 Love is a song written, produced and recorded by Vaughan Mason, the principal member of American house music group Raze, the song’s original credited performer. The song, the group’s only significant US hit, featured vocals by Keith Thompson and Vaughan Mason, as well as sexual sound samples by Erique Dial. The single peaked at number 28 on the UK Singles Chart and topped the US Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in 1988. It is still considered a classic of the early house music genre.

In 2001, Break 4 Love was covered by Peter Rauhofer (an Austrian-American DJ/remixer who passed away in 2013)  and Pet Shop Boys, released under the name “Peter Rauhofer + Pet Shop Boys = The Collaboration”. The single was not released in the United Kingdom but was a B-side to CD 2 of their single, “Home and Dry”.

It’s maybe a reminder to their long-term fans that, while they may have gone out on tour in the UK with some guitars to the fore, house/club/dance music was still very much in the DNA of the Pet Shop Boys. 

A few weeks later, on 1 April, the eighth studio album hit the shops. 

Release was a significant departure from the norm, and I now get why they went out on that type of tour at the start of 2002.  It’s not a club or dance album, and was perhaps the duo’s way of staving off any sense of stagnation, or maybe their way of suggesting that they were intending to grow old with a touch of grace and style.  Neil was approaching his 48th birthday, while Chris was almost 43 – no age at all in the grand scheme of things but it was now more than 20 years since they had started working together.

Release, and this is not meant as an insult, is a perfect Radio 2 album, helped by the fact that DJs could talk about the fact that Johnny Marr had added his guitar-playing skills to mlost of its songs.  Sales, however, proved to be disappointing – the album did enter the charts at #7, but then disappeared from the Top 100 within four weeks.  It took until July 2002 before a second single was taken from it.

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – I Get Along (single edit)

This slow, piano-led single was as far removed from the ‘atypical’ Pet Shop Boys singles as can be imagined.  The version released as a single shaved about the best part of two minutes off the album version, but still came in at over minutes long.  Those who just wanted to dance must have listened and wondered ‘WTF’?  I’m not a fan. It entered the charts at #18, but was back out of them again within two more weeks, the shortest stay thus far of any PSB 45.

Again, 2 x CDs and a DVD version were put on sale.  CD1 had the single plus two new tracks, both recorded at the same time as the sessions for Release, but held back with the intention of being extra songs on any singles. CD2  had some live songs as the additional tracks.

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Searching For The Face Of Jesus
mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Between Two Islands

Given what I’ve written above about the album, neither of these should come as a surprise.

The year would end with another first, one that would have been unimaginable when they were releasing banger after banger.  The duo recorded a session for John Peel on 2 October that was broadcast on 10 October.

Peel references the fact that London was slated as the next single, but it never materialised. 

JC

Pop Art (The Hits) – Pet Shop Boys (2003)

OK.  It’s a cheat.

I’m copping out of choosing a particular album by Pet Shop Boys in favour of Pop Art (The Hits), a 3xCD release in a box from 2003.

The small sticker on the front of the box says:-

Special Limited Edition Triple CD features 45 remastered tracks including West End Girls, It’s A Sin, What Have I Done To Deserve This?, Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of Money), Se a vide e, Go West plus 2 new songs, Miracles and Flamboyant.  Includes bonus 10 track remixes CD.

I’m currently featuring all the Pet Shop Boys singles every Sunday, so there really isn’t any need to outline why this collection is appearing in the rundown.  It’s utterly joyous, and with the fall in prices for CDs in recent years, it can be picked up for a lot less than I paid for it back in 2003.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Can You Forgive Her (Rollo Mix)

Originally found on CD1 when the single was released in June 1993, it was included as Track 1 of the Mix disc within the box.

JC

The series has reached 1999, and if I now begin to appear a little unsure of myself, then it’s all down to the fact that I’ve only just got familiar with the songs as part of the idea to do this series as I didn’t buy any of the singles or the next album at the time.   Indeed, after 1997,  not too many Pet Shop Boys songs were picked up at the time of release.

Two years after the Savoy Theatre residency and the release of the Noel Coward cover version, Pet Shop Boys came back with a single of their own,

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – I Don’t Know What You Want But I Can’t Give It Any More

Released on 19 July 1999, it went straight into the charts at #15.   But, unlike so many of their other brand-new singles from the previous years, this one immediately plummeted right back out of the charts, dropping to #38 and then #57 before disappearing altogether.   In fact, this was the pattern that would be repeated with every subsequent PSB single thereafter, with fans buying the CD/vinyl/download within the first days of it being available, thus delivering a more than decent first-week chart position which would prove to be its peak.

As tunes go, it’s nothing terribly special.  I’d never accuse PSB of being boring (see what I did there?), but this is one which doesn’t have much in the earworm stakes.  Having said that, it borders on genius that the lines in all the verses seem to consist solely of questions.

2 x CDs and a cassette version were in the shops, along with a 12″ maxi single.  The vinyl offered 40 minutes worth of mixes of the single across six different versions.  CD1 had the single, two new tracks and the promo video, while CD2 had two remixes plus a cover version.

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Silver Age
mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Screaming

Silver Age is a slow, almost ponderous number that took a few listens to grow on me.  The fact I came to it in 2023 rather than 1999 might have something to do with it…..I spent ages trying to recall what it reminded me of, rather than taking it on its own merits.  Oh, and in the end I kept thinking of Portishead but with the hip-hop elements all removed.

Screaming also starts off in a ponderous manner. Until the 18-second mark.  Turns out that it had originally been released at the end of 1998 on Psycho: Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture, a CD tie-in with the Gus Van Sant remake of the Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece. As b-sides go, it’s good fun.

CD2

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Je t’aime… moi non plus

The thing is, although made available on CD2, it isn’t really a Pet Shop Boys recording.

It was originally included on a September 1998 release called We Love You, a collaboration involving modern artists and musicians.  It comprised a book of 118 pages and a CD with 18 songs.  PSB teamed up with Sam Taylor-Wood for a bonkers take on the infamous Jane Birkin/Serge Gainsbourg duet, with the artist taking the female vocal role while the male vocal is computerised, but most likely Chris Lowe having a bit of fun.   Make of it what you will. I think it’s a load of nonsense, albeit it occasionally threatens to break into the sort of tune Air were releasing around the same time.

The next single came out on 27 September 1999.

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – New York City Boy

Was this written as a sort of ‘thank you’ to Village People for Go West?  It’s certainly a real throwback to disco sounds of the late 70s.

It did marginally better than the previous single in that it reached #14.

Again, there were 2 x CDs, cassette, and a 12″ maxi single.  Once again, the vinyl offered 40 minutes worth of mixes of the single, but this time across five different versions.  CD1 had the single, one new track, one remix and the promo video, while CD2 had the single, one other new track, one different remix and some video footage of a solar eclipse, the reason for which I’ll get to shortly.

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – The Ghost of Myself

Once again, I find myself really enjoying a PSB b-side.   This is a track that wouldn’t have been out of place among the material released across the earliest of the albums. As I said, this is the era that has taken me almost quarter-of-a century to catch up with, and this is one of the few songs from the period that I regret taking so long to pick up on.

CD2

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Casting A Shadow

On the morning of 11th August 1999, part of south-west England gets to experience the first total solar eclipse over the British mainland for over 70 years. BBC Radio 1 marks the occasion with a live show from Cornwall at which the Pet Shop Boys perform.  The duo have written a new instrumental for performance to be broadcast during the actual eclipse itself. Said instrumental, which goes through a number of tempo changes (and which at its fastest, certainly owes a debt to Giorgio Moroder), appears as the extra track on CD2 of the next single.

The fact that the previous two singles hadn’t really set any heather on fire is perhaps one explanation as to why it took until 3 January 2000 before the release of the next one.

In the interim, the duo’s seventh studio album, Nightlife, had been released on 8 October 1999.  The artwork around the album was a continuation of what had been used on its preview singles, and quite a number of critics took the opportunity to ridicule the new look.  And, if we are being honest, it wasn’t a style which was well received by many fans.

The album was supported by a world tour called Dreamworld that got underway in Miami on 20 October and would continue through to 12 February with a show in Mannheim.  The calling points were America, Canada, Germany, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom, Spain, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Belgium and France. The costumes and wigs were elaborate and were often more commented on in reviews than the actual music. 

Tours are normally very good at giving life to new records, but Nightlife, certainly in comparison to the previous albums, sold in disappointing numbers.  It entered the charts at #7, the first time a PSB album had missed the Top 5.   Within two weeks, it was outside the Top 75 and destined before too long for the bargain bins. 

The January 2000 single was lifted from Nightlife

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk

It’s a fine song, albeit it doesn’t quite live up to its majestic title.  It’s also still part of the current set lists, albeit in an unplugged version with Neil Tennant strumming away on an acoustic guitar.  It actually works really well.

The best-performing of the three singles from Nightlife in that it reached #8, but that was possibly to do with the timing of its release in the first week of a new year when there are less new singles competing for attention and sales.

This time round, the cassette was dropped in favour of  3 x CDs, and a 12″ single. The vinyl had four remixes of the single, offering up more than 33 minutes worth of music.  CD1 had the single, two previously unreleased songs and the video.

CD1

mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Lies
mp3:  Pet Shop Boys – Sail Away

Lies is a club stomper. Chris Lowe is on lead vocal.  Yup, he sings on this one rather than talks his way through it, albeit he’s greatly assisted with the soulful, diva-style backing vocals.   This would not have been out of place on the Club Ibiza type CD compilations that were flooding the market at the turn of the century.  It’s great fun.

Sail Away is a cover of a song written in the 1940s by Noel Coward. It had been included on the 1998 charity album, Twentieth-Century Blues, which had been curated by Neil Tennant and involved modern-day artists, reinterpreting some of Coward’s best know songs, with the profits going to the Red Hot Aids Charitable Trust.

CD2 had three mixes of the single, while CD3 has a live version of ‘You Only Tell Me…’ along with live versions of Always On My Mind and Being Boring.  As such, there’s nothing further to offer from the release.

No more singles were lifted from Nightlife.   The duo remained on tour for much of 2000 and included their first ever Glastonbury performance.  2001 was taken up by  the staging of Closer To Heaven a co-written by the Pet Shop Boys, something they had been working on since 1996.  The show opened in May 2001 and ran until October 2001.  Reviews were, at best, mixed.

The next new PSB recorded material would surface in March 2002.  I’ll hopefully see you next week…..

JC

What follows is likely to be the longest single posting in the series……but that’s as much down to contemporary review being part it.  Thanks in advance for reading.

September 1996, the new album Bilingual is released. There’s a familiarity with a couple of its tracks thanks to them previously being released as singles, but everything else is brand new.  

I think this is the watershed moment in the history of PSB.  Having emerged and enjoyed initial success as a synth-pop duo, they had, with each passing year, sought to expand their horizons and incorporate all sorts of new sounds and influences.  The new album was a quantum leap in that regard.

There had been previous examples of their love for the music of Latin America, but this went to whole new levels in terms of rhythm and language.  It wasn’t univerally welcomed, as can be seen from some lukewarm reviews from bemused critics, while its sales and chart position were both less than previous efforts.  Bilingual was the first PSB album not to go Top 3.

Not only had the album not reached the Top 3, but it very quickly plunged down the charts out of the Top 100.  In time-honoured fashion, the releases of a new single was seen as a way to boost things.  

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Single-Bilingual

The second track on the album was Single, but when it came to issuing it along those line on 11 November 1996, it was called Single-Bilingual.  The reason given was that Everything But The Girl had, just a month previously, released a single called Single, and it was all about avoiding confusion.  Given how long it takes to clear artwork etc. for any release, I’m not convinced this was really the case, and giving such a new title did, of course, work in the name of the latest album.

This one takes the energy and beat of Se a vida é and cranks it up a few notches.   It was one of the highlights of last years’ live show, especially from the way it effortlessly segued into Se a vida é, but it wasn’t well-received at the time of its release, only going at #14 and disappearing altogether after three weeks.  Nor did it do much to alter the fortunes of its parent album.

The usual practice was followed of having  2 x CDs and cassette versions up for sale, but there weren’t quite as many remixes around, possibly as there was a limit on what you could do with Single-Bilingual without completely destroying the song’s very fabric. Instead, the album’s opening track, Discoteca, was given the remix treatments and made available widely on the two CDs.  There was only one completely new song, placed at Track 3 on CD1.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – The Calm Before The Storm

This is a lovely and understated number, lasting less than three minutes.  It seems it was recorded, almost as live, in the studio and on the face of it seems to be from the perspective of someone who is anticipating a sad or indeed update. I read somewhere that the lyric was written by Neil shortly after Bilingual had been readied for release in the expectancy that it would be something of a flop in comparison to previous albums, but I’m not sure if that’s a truth or urban myth.ly predict about Pet Shop Boys was they were unpredictable, as evidenced by the next single.

The fourth song to be lifted as a single from Bilingual was a really odd one. Released on 17 March 1997,  A Red Letter Day was quite different from the album version, with a lot of the noise and clutter removed, as well as it being substantially remixed.

As with Go West from a few years back, there’s a reliance on the involvement of a choir, but this time it’s the Choral Academy of Moscow and only in the opening few seconds.   It very quickly settles into the sort of tune that had given so much success to PSB over the years, which maybe was a signal that the more experimental nature of recent singles was coming  to an end.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – A Red Letter Day

It sort of worked in that the single went Top 10 but only for one week, while the sales of the parent album weren’t impacted at all.  It was almost as if the new ‘product’ was only of interest to the fanbase and not the wider public.

Again, there were 2 x CDs and a cassette, although a close look at the sticker on CD1 (as illustrated above) reads ‘To complete set – also available REMIX CD -includes over 35 minutes of remixes by Motiv 8, Trouser Enthusiasts and Basement Jaxx.  Plus 12″ red vinyl’

CD2 was the remix CD, while CD1 had two new songs.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – The Boy Who Couldn’t Keep His Clothes On
mp3: Pet Shop Boys –  Delusions of Grandeur

The former is what most folk would call a PSB classic.  More than six minutes in length, complete with prominent keyboards, house-beat and synthetic horns and strings thrown into the mix.   It’s certainly one that it could be argued was wasted as a b-side…..it even has that cheeky, irrelevant sounding repetitive chorus that sounds tailor-made for radio.  OK, for a single, it would likely have needed edited down, but as we’ve seen from past hits, this wouldn’t have been a problem.

The latter opens up with notes that remind me of ‘Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me’ by The Smiths.  But after ten seconds, the synthetic horns kick in……..and it goes to the most unexpected of places.   It’s one of those frantic, almost million-miles-an-hour tunes that are guaranteed to work up an immediate sweat in the clubs, set to a lyric in which Neil Tennant seems to be fantasising that he is becoming the new Pope……

It is bonkers and it is absolutely brilliant.  It also means that CD1 of Red Letter Day is one of my favourite PSB releases of them all.

In June 1997, PSB again do something out of the ordinary.  It’s not an event I can remember, but then again, I don’t always pay attention when it’s not centred around Glasgow.

Here’s a review as written by Anthony Thornton for The Independent newspaper on 8 June:-

Try walking into a record company to sell them the idea of two average-looking blokes on stage wearing shapeless Communist-style clothes, with the baseball- hatted one standing motionless behind an ancient keyboard and the balding one singing in a monotone, and you’ll discover at first hand how efficient their security staff are.

The Pet Shop Boys have somehow avoided forceful ejection from pop heaven for 12 years now. Until 21 June the pop ironists are nestled in the Savoy Theatre, London, playing a series of concerts entitled “Somewhere”. They are the first band to play a residency at a West End theatre, but it’s hardly surprising because they have always been more at home with Coward and Wilde than Hendrix and Clapton and their songs have always sounded like they belong in an unwritten musical.

Ironically (what else could it be?) the theatrical setting sees them at their least theatrical. The atmosphere is far more intimate than previous shows; the absence of huge choreographed antics and massive costume changes probably makes this the nearest thing the Pet Shop Boys will get to an unplugged concert.

Initially they play lots of B-sides, as if a serious setting requires serious work from the audience. Then, just as everyone’s gearing themselves up for a dance as they play “Go West”, they tip straight into the interval. The interval? We wanted to dance. This theatre thing must have gone to the Boys head.

After the interval normal service is resumed. They play “It’s a Sin” mixed up in a disco cocktail with “I Will Survive”. Neil Tennant tells us it’s all right to dance. So we jive in our seats. And we notice Chris Lowe has slipped a bit of drum ‘n’ bass into the mid section. Albeit quietly, Sylvia Mason James belts out the “I will survive” and Neil’s monotone duets with her powerful wail. A mistake he probably won’t make again.

Their forthcoming single, “Somewhere”, a cover of the West Side Story song, is all disco beats, orchestral strings and epic arrangements which manage to sound even bigger than the epic disco of “Go West”.

Despite all this faceless anti-pop star treatment and bright arrangements, Neil is equally capable of singing from his heart: for every meaningless “Che Guevara and Debussy to a disco beat” there’s the tragedy and Wildean wit of “Whatever fatal points they scored, I have never been ignored”.

This tenderness reaches its peak during the encore, when Neil appears with an unwieldy acoustic guitar. He gently strums his way through a tender version of “Rent”. It works so perfectly, you wonder why they haven’t done it before.

It’s the contradictions: disposable beats and intimate clever lyrics that make the Pet Shop Boys appealing. Their self-conscious anti-rock stance is an antidote to whoever happens to be mistreating an electric guitar elsewhere in the charts. And thankfully, Chris standing behind the same Roland synthesizer pretending to produce all these sounds live is still the funniest running gag in showbiz.

The forthcoming single referenced in the above review was released on 23 June, immediately at the end of the residency.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Somewhere

West Side Story music set to a disco and club beat…….it might have reached #9 in the singles chart, but it doesn’t do much for me.  But it sounds as if the duo had great fun putting it all together.

The usual 2 x CDs and cassette singles were on offer.  Unlike most of the previous times with the CD singles, both would need to be purchased to pick up what woule previously have been refered to as b-sides.

CD1

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – The View From Your Balcony

The sort of slow-paced and reflective number of which PSB were increasingly becoming fond of recording….and I don’t mean that as any criticism.  This one has a very straight-forward and unambigious lyric that has clearly been inspired by Neil looking out over London from a high-rise flat, in a location that was once edgy but is part of the increasing gentrification of the city.

CD2

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Disco Potential

There’s a lot of noise on this one.  It’s from 1997.  That was the same year that U2 had a #1 hit with Discotheque, with which they had been accused by some of jumping on the dance bandwagon as a way to try and stay relevant.  I’m wondering if this is Neil and Chris having a bit of gentle fun at the expense of Bono et al?  It’s certainly not one of their most essential b-sides……

The next two years proved to quiet in terms of new material.  It’ll be 1999 before you know it.

JC

The first sighting of the Pet Shop Boys in 1996 came on 19 February at the Brit Awards.   Not that they had been nominated for anything after a quiet year, but they were on stage performing, more or less as backing group, for David Bowie as he collected the ‘Outstanding Contribution Award’ for his lifetime of work.  It was the same day as his new single Hello Spaceboy had been released, itself a Pet Shop Boys remix of a song from the album Outside.

It would be another two months before any of their own new music was available in the shops.

Before was released on 22nd April 1996.   Maybe it was the fact that after a more than a decade of being part of the fabric of the UK music scene, during which time they had, in my opinion, hardly put a foot wrong, but I found myself thoroughly underwhelmed by the new single.  It was a mid-tempo, soulful sort of tune in which Neil sang in something akin to a falsetto, relying on female backing vocals to guide us through the chorus.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Before

It was available on 2 x CDs, cassette and a limited edition set of 12″ vinyls.  Most of the releases, as had increasingly been in the case in recent times, came packed with different mixes of the single, but CD1 did offer two further new songs plus a new mix of an old favourite.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – The Truck Driver And His Mate
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Hit And Miss
mp3: Pet Shop Boys –  In The Night 1995

The single did get to #7, but I didn’t buy it at the time, and so it took me a number of years before discovering the other tracks.  ‘Truck Driver..’ is an absolute joy,  driven along by a rocky and raucous beat, with a lyric that is packed with innuendo and humour.   I incorporated it into one of my monthly mixes a wee while back.

Hit and Miss is another fine song, but again is something of a curveball given there’s a lot of acoustic guitar on it. It’s a mid-tempo and melancholy number that wouldn’t have sounded out of place if it had been released by one or other of the many Britpop bands hanging around the UK music scene at the time.

Maybe it was the fact that the three new songs might have seen long time fans wondering where exactly the ’96 version of PSB were heading that a bit of a comfort blanket was provided on the single with the new Hi-NRG/house instrumental take on the old classic that had originally found its way into our hearts as the b-side to Opportunities in 1985.

One thing you could accurately predict about Pet Shop Boys was they were unpredictable, as evidenced by the next single.

Se a vida é (That’s the way life is) hit the shops on 12 August 1996.  Four months had been an unusually long time between singles in advance of a new album, certainly in comparison to previous years.  Anyone expecting a retread of the pedestrian nature of Before would have got a bit of a shock

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Se a vida é (That’s the way life is)

The writing credits on this one give mention to three Brazilian musicians and that because its is based on Estrada Da Paixã, a song written by Olodum, an African-Brazilian band who had supported PSB on the Discovery tour in late 1994.  Packed with brass, guitar and, above all else, the noise made by 20 female drummers, it was memorable in a way that probably stunned many of the club-going fans of the group.  There was probably a hope this was different sounding enough, in the same way that Go West had taken hold of the listening public, to reach #1, but it peaked at #8.

Again, it was available on 2 xCDs, cassette and 12″ vinyls, all packed with remixes.  Two additional songs were on CD1:-

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Betrayed
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – How I Learned To Hate Rock’n’Roll

The first is a strange one.   I’ve read that it was written originally as a country song, before being given a makeover along the lines of drum’n’bass, with Walking Wounded by Everything But The Girl seemingly being an influence.  Maybe so, and while it might have its fans, I think it’s a bit of a mess.

The latter?   On the face of it, it seems to be a pointed and direct dig at guitar music which was going through another revival in the mid-90s.  But the duo had, on the previous single offered up two b-sides as ‘rock and roll’ as anything they had ever released while Neil was more than happy to be associated with Johnny Marr through his work with Electronic.  And then there’s the fact that, just a few months after the release of this song, he would take to the stage and duet with Brett Anderson at a Suede live show, an event that would later be immortalised as a Suede b-side?   Irony?  From the Pet Shop Boys?   Surely not……

A month after Se a vida é (That’s the way life is),  the duo’s sixth studio album, Bilingual, was released.  And that’s where we will pick up things next time around.

JC

Comic Relief is a British charity that aims to raise money and awareness for good causes all around the world. In support of the charity, a Red Nose Day event is held every two years. This involves a live television broadcast featuring a host of comedians and celebrities.  Since 1986, the event has also been supported by the release of a charity single, often with a comedy element included. 

In May 1994, the Pet Shop Boys accepted the approach to get involved.

The song was called Absolutely Fabulous, and it was released under the artist name of Absolutely Fabulous, based on a sitcom which starred Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley. It is set to a tune written by PSB  and features snippets of dialogue taken from the show as well as some additional lines recorded in the studio.   Neil and Chris were huge fans of the sitcom and were delighted to be involved, and in response to some criticism which was thrown their way, Neil said:-

“I know some people are horrified that we did a charity record, but it just seemed a way of dealing with it. It made it simple, because we did the record for fun, not as a major artistic statement”.

7″

mp3: Absolutely Fabulous – Absolutely Fabulous
mp3: Absolutely Fabulous – Dull Soulless Dance Remix

It reached #6 in the singles chart. The b-side extends to eight minutes in length…..

On 29 August 1994, a fifth and final single was taken from Very, eleven months after the album had been released.

As with ‘I Wouldn’t Normally…..’, the version issued as a 45 was a substantially different mix from that found on the album, with production input from Julian Mendelsohn who had previously worked with PSB as far back as 1987, and Jam & Spoon, a German electronic duo who were enjoying chart success as musicians and on the production side of things.

This is one of the singles that I can take or leave.   It comes across as PSB by numbers, but I suppose it sounded great in a club setting.

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Yesterday, When I Was Mad

It was the first PSB single not to be released on 7″vinyl, albeit a 12″ version was made available alongside 2 x CD singles and a cassette single, across which three new songs could be found alongside various remixes of ‘Yesterday…..’and a swing version of Can You Forgive Her.  

CD1

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – If Love Were All

In which Neil and Chris go all west end theatre on us.  It’s a cover of a song written by Noel Coward in 1929, first appearing in the operetta Bitter Sweet.  It’s rather a lovely song about loneliness, but it had to be said that Neil’s vocal limitations don’t do him any favours.  You’ll find better cover versions out there…..

CD2

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Some Speculation

I’m not sure if this was a song held over from the Very sessions or had been worked up in the intervening period.  It’s a long song, some six-and-a-half minutes long, and the folk assisting with the production and engineering side of things had not been involved with the album, which makes me lean towards it being a more recent work.   It’s a more than decent b-side, albeit without any of the catchiness and hooks that make it an essential PSB song, but a worthy reward for fans happy to spend money on yet another single, the sixth all told in a 12-month period.

Cassette

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Euroboy

Also made available as a track on the European version of the CD single

One on which both Neil and Chris’s vocals can be heard, with the latter using a vocoder.   It’s a track that, if Neil’s vocal hadn’t been so recognisable, could have been attributed to any number of club acts who were enjoying chart success in the mid 90s (none of whom I can name off the top of my head!!)

Yesterday, When I Was Mad got to #13 in the UK singles charts, but maybe the best indication of where the PSB sounds had been increasingly heading was that it reached #4 in the Billboard Chart for US Club and Dance.

1994 ended with PSB undertaking a six-week ‘Discovery’ tour in which they played shows in Singapore, Australia, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Argentina and Brazil.

1995 proved to be very quiet with just the one single released, on 31 July, and even then, it wasn’t new material.

Paninaro ’95 was, a new version of the song they had first recorded in 1986, and was based upon the new arrangement  Chris performed on the ‘Discovery’ tour, along with his new updated lyrics.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Paninaro ’95

It was also part of the promotion for a new compilation album, Alternative, a 2xCD set featuring 30 b-sides

Paninaro ’95 was issued on 2 x CDs, the first of which had five different mixes of the single, while CD2 had one new track:-

CD2

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Girls and Boys (live in Rio)

PSB had previously produced a remix of Girls and Boys for Blur, and so enjoyed the process that they played a cover version during the Discovery tour that had been undertaken in late 1994. 

The single, despite being such an old tune, reached #15 in the UK singles charts, and was another to peak at #4 in the Billboard Chart for US Club and Dance.

PSB proved to be much more active and more prominent in 1996.

JC

No sooner had Go West taken its leave of the singles charts was another single readied from Very.

I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind Of Thing was reckoned to be one of the standout tracks from the album.   It had hit single written all over it from the outset, but Neil and Chris decided to do something quite radical in that a three minute song was extended by the best part of an additional two minutes, while the really catchy piano opening in the house music style piano opening was replaced by something rather grand, orchestral and epic.  The opening refrain was put to much use throughout the new version, particularly within each chorus as the words ‘I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind Of Thing’ were followed with an uplifting flourish of noise.

The remix was the work of Beatmasters, a four-piece electronic/dance group who had enjoyed some chart hits in the late 80s but had really found fame and fortune as producers and remixers, and were riding high at the time from their work with The Shamen.

I wasn’t initially all that fussed about the remix as I really loved the album version, but it has grown on me over the years.    Looking back, it was the right sort of big and bouncy remix needed to complement the success of Go West, but I still feel it goes on for maybe 30-45 seconds too long.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind Of Thing
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Too Many People

The b-side is another excellent listen.  There’s so much going on over its four minutes.  It opens up as something akin to a house tune (and like something off the Electronic album) before settling into something which harks back to the music of the first two albums, but the next thing you know there’s all sort of production tricks thrown in, but that proves to be short-lived, and soon we are back to classic early days PSB with a sing-along chorus. 

Worth mentioning that this single was released across a range of formats, with ‘I Wouldn’t Normally….’ getting at least five different remixes/dub versions, while West End Girls was given the remix treatment of the 12″ and CD versions.  No wonder, for the sake of my sanity, I’m sticking to the 7″ releases (while I can!!).

The next single was released on 4 April 1994.

I’ll be honest and admit that until pulling this series together, I had no idea that Liberation, one of the slower numbers on Very, had been issued as single, never mind that it was a decent-sized hit, entering and peaking at #14 on the basis of its first week of sales.

I don’t mind the song, but it’s not close to being one of my favourites. It did fit in very well on the album – it was the third track and provided a nice change of pace after the one-two opening of Can You Forgive Her? and I Wouldn’t Normally…., but I much prefer To Speak Is A Sin, one of the other ballads on the album.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Liberation
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Decadence

I’ve only just got to know this b-side, thanks to me picking up a second-hand copy of the 7″ single.   On first play, I thought it very cinematic in theme, while the very opening notes reminded me a bit of Confide In Me, the superb single released by Kylie Minogue a little later the same year.  I was really enjoying it, but there was something else that I couldn’t quite put by finger on.   I put on my reading glasses and looked at the small print on the back of the sleeve.

Guitars : Johnny Marr

All of which led to me doing a  little bit of searching on t’internet and coming across this nugget of info*:-

” Pet Shop Boys had been asked to write the theme music for a film titled Decadence based on a play by Steven Berkoff. Chris began writing a song built around a sample of the opening two bars of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David tune “I Say a Little Prayer” as performed by Aretha Franklin. When the song was finished, however, Neil and Chris decided that the track didn’t need the sample and thus removed it. They also decided not to submit the song for use in the film after having seen a rough edit, which they apparently didn’t particularly like.

According to Neil, the lyrics directly address “someone who’s become a really horrible person because they take lots of drugs and all they think about is money.” When once asked whether “Yesterday, When I Was Mad” was about the Boys’ former manager Tom Watkins, Neil replied, “No, but ‘Decadence’ was.” Neil has also stated elsewhere that he regrets the reference to “fin de siècle pretense” (fin de siècle is French for “end of the century,” commonly a period for decadent behavior), chiding himself for his own pretentiousness in authoring such a line.

Johnny Marr, formerly of the Smiths, played guitar, giving the track a distinctly “unplugged” feel—which undoubtedly inspired the Boys to go all the way and provide an “Unplugged Mix”. Chris says the recording “cost a fortune.””

There was no way I wasn’t hunting that down….

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Decadence (Unplugged Mix)

As found on CD2 of Liberation.

*it was found on what can only be described as probably the most informative and well-written PSB fan site anywhere on the internet. It’s called Commentary, and it’s the work of Wayne Studer.    It can be found here.

Apologies to Wayne for not acknowledging this fully when the piece was initially posted.

JC

1992 had been very quiet in the world of the Pet Shop Boys.   1993 started very quietly.  It took until the month of June before they popped their heads up above the parapet again.  The wait was worth it.

1 June 1993.  The first new material since the release of the Discography collection back in November 1991.   It was the longest they had been out of the spotlight since West End Girls had propelled them to superstardom. 

Can You Forgive Her? proved to be a tremendous return to form.  There is absolutely no messing around with this one.  The first note is bombastic, and it never really relents.   It’s the sort of tune that lends itself to a full orchestra, but somehow Chris Lowe manages, thanks to his keyboard wizardry and arrangement skills, to do it all by himself.  At just short of the forty-second mark, Neil Tennant joins in as the narrator of what turns out to be a desperately sad tale.

A man can’t sleep because he’s angry/upset that his girlfriend/wife has made a fool of him in public.  His mind then turns to the other humiliations he’s experienced at her hands, including the taunts about his sexual inadequacy.  Finally, the reasons behind it all are revealed, in that the man is, and has been since his school days, gay but is unwilling to face up to the fact.  His wife/girlfriend clearly knows the truth and piles on the misery by saying she will cheat on him and his mind turns to revenge…..except that he’s clearly too weak/cowardly to actually do anything. 

It might be a really sad and tragic set of circumstances, but it’s set to an absolute barnstormer of a tune.  One that went to #7 in the charts.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Can You Forgive Her?
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Hey, Headmaster

It’s a hugely enjoyable b-side.  It’s another sad tale, but this time it has the sad sounding tune to match.  I’ve often wondered if it was a close cousin to the A-side in that the headmaster in question was repressing his sexuality in order to maintain his position.  But then again, it might well be the tale of someone who is just fed up with his lot and is past the stage of caring about the school and the pupils who attend it.  All in all, this really is one of those occasions when a listener shouldn’t try to read too much into a song and simply enjoy the music and vocal delivery for what they are.

The next single was released on 6 September 1993. 

It wasn’t until doing a bit of research for this single did I learn the full backstory.

As we’ve seen, 1992 was a quiet year for PSB. However, on 13 May, they had accepted the invitation from filmmaker Derek Jarman to participate in an AIDS charity event at The Haçienda nightclub in Manchester. The duo decided that Go West would be the song of choice.

Neil and Chris later went into the studio with the intention of recording it as a stand-alone single, but having listened to the results, the idea was put on the back-burner.  It was revisited during the sessions for the next album, where it was decided that what was really needed was an all-male Broadway choir to get the message of the song across more fully.

It was an audacious move.  One that rode a very fine line between producing something that was genius or ridiculous.  Me?  I’m very much of the view it was genius – a sentiment shared by many others as the single reached #2 in the charts

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Go West
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Shameless

This b-side is one of their very best.   An upbeat and very danceable number where the duo have their tongues very firmly in their cheeks:-

We’re shameless, we will do anything
to get our fifteen minutes of fame
We have no integrity, we’re ready to crawl
To obtain celebrity we’ll do anything at all

It really is hard to fathom why Shameless was thrown away as a b-side.  Not only would it have been a great track on any album, but there’s a real sense that it could have been lifted as a future single.

I bought Go West on the week of release.  Listening to it, and its b-side, and recalling the quality of both sides of the previous single, had me thinking that the upcoming new studio album, their fifth but first in three years, was going to be an absolute belter.

Very was released on 27 September 1993.  It did something no other PSB album had ever done in that it went to #1.  And the next part of this series will look at its later singles.

I’ll finish off today with a bit of footage that might bring back memories for some UK members of the TVV community and maybe put a smile on the faces of those who are seeing it for the first time.  It’s what I reckon is the definitive performance of Go West at the Brit Awards on 14 February 1994:-

Neil and Chris are in suspiciously clean overalls, while the backing vocals come courtesy of a Welsh male voice choir, all dressed as miners.  And given how many mining communities right across the UK had been decimated over the previous decade, it was a very poignant, powerful and moving sight. 

JC

As mentioned last week, Pet Shop Boys spent much of the first half of 1991 on a world tour which saw shows in Japan, the USA, Canada, France, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Holland, the United Kingdom and Ireland.  

All the while, there continued to be chart hits, so you wouldn’t have blamed Neil and Chris for wanting to take a break, but instead they worked on some new material to be part of a ‘Greatest Hits’ release that was scheduled for release in the run-up to the festive period.

DJ Culture was released on 14 October 1991.  It was well publicised that it was going to feature on the upcoming ‘Best Of’ compilation, so perhaps this was a factor in the relatively poor sales of the single – it entered the charts at #13, but disappeared out of the Top 75 within two more weeks.

It also suffered from a lack of radio exposure, certainly in comparison to earlier PSB singles.  There’s no real ‘killer’ chorus, and the downbeat nature of the lyric was certainly never going to make it easy for radio DJs to work up any sort of on-air enthusiasm – much easier to whoop and holler when you’re pressing the play button on an ironic U2 cover or a tune that would fill a dance floor.

Me?  Well, I was one of those who didn’t buy it at the time.  I don’t recall even hearing it anywhere (although I surely must have), until I got my Xmas copy of Discography, the name applied to the new compilation.   I need to also confess that I didn’t fall for its charms – it just seemed a touch too morose – but it’s one I’ve grown to appreciate in later years.  Not sure, however, if I’d ever include it on any ICA (Volumes 1-3).

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – DJ Culture
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Music For Boys

It would be a very long time before I heard this instrumental b-side.  It’s very much a house number with a few influences to the fore – I always think of The KLF when the crowd noises are in effect – but at the same time it was sort of ahead of its time as there’s bits of it that seem very similar to what the Chemical Brothers would do a few years later. 

Discography was released on 4 November, three weeks after DJ Culture.  It contained 18 songs – as it said on the sleeve, it was the complete singles collection.   Surprisingly, it didn’t come in at #1, being kept off the top spot by a similar type of Greatest Hits package by Queen which had fallen to #2 to be replaced by Enya, whose new album Shepherd Moons went straight in at #1. I had no idea the Irish musician had been so successful back in the day – especially as this wasn’t the album which gave rise to the 1988 mega-hit single Orinoco Flow

The above is the sleeve for Was It Worth It?, the 18th and final track on Discography that was released as a single on 8 December.   It wouldn’t have been too much of a surprise to all concerned that its presence on Discography would affect sales, and it got no higher than #24, which made it the first PSB 45 not to crack the Top 20 since their commercial breakthrough.

Spoiler alert.  There would be another twenty-two singles released in the UK before there was a similar failure.  But that’s all for the future editions of this series.

Was It Worth It? gives more than a nod to the days when disco music ruled.  It is a HI-NRG tune which wears its heart on its sleeve, a paean to love that must be roared from the rooftops.  I’ve always found it to be a fun number, utterly joyous and camp, that is impossible not to try and dance to.  In some ways, it’s a waste that it was thrown away, more or less, as an extra track on Discography.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Was It Worth It?
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Miserablism

Miserablism will have its fans, but my own view is that it pales into insignificance when compared to some of the earlier b-sides. 

It’s probably worth recalling that December 1991 was a time when the Pet Shop Boys were in real danger of going out of fashion.  Guitar music was to the fore, while a number of critics weren’t slow to suggest that Neil Tennant’s best work in recent months had come courtesy of his involvement with Electronic alongside Bernard Sumner and Johnny Marr.

As it turned out, the next twelve months (and slightly beyond) was a very fallow period for PSB.  There were no high-profile activities other than Neil’s contribution to Disappointed, a new single released by Electronic in June 1992, before a new long-play video, Performance, was released in September, capturing the highlights of the world tour that had taken place back in the first half of 1991.

But what would 1993 hold in store?

JC

And so we reach the 1990s.  Pet Shop Boys had, in just five years, become one of the UK’s most popular groups, notching up twelve Top 20 hits (including four #1s) and three albums that had all gone Top 3. 

This post covers the period September 1990 – October 1991 and will be one of the longest in this series.  There were four singles lifted from the album Behaviour, itself released in October 1990

So Hard was released on 24th September 1990.   It is about “two people living together; they are totally unfaithful to each other but they both pretend they are faithful and then catch each other out”, which seems akin to David Gedge territory.  Musically, it is very much of that late 80s/early 90s era – I certainly see it as a fairly close cousin to songs found on Technique, the 1989 masterpiece from New Order.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – So Hard
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – It Must Be Obvious

The b-side is a love song.  Less full on musically than most of the material from the 80s and tempo wise, more akin to what was going to unfold over the next decade and beyond.  It’s not too cruel to say that it found its place as a b-side as the tune doesn’t really go anywhere.

I don’t normally want to get into the whole remix thing with singles, but given that the KLF did some work on So Hard……….

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – So Hard (The KLF versus Pet Shop Boys)

There’s a real nod to It’s Grim Up North as well as the choral aspect to Left To My Own Devices in the opening section of the track.

Being Boring was released on 12th November 1990. 

The duo’s fourth album, Behaviour had hit the shops a month previously.  It had entered the charts at #2 in its first week, but unlike the previous three albums, it failed to sustain sales over any extended period.  One of the reasons for this were some negative reviews that focussed on the downbeat nature of many of the tunes and lyrics. 

This lack of sales extended to Being Boring which only reached #20, the first time since the re-release of Opportunities that a PSB single hadn’t gone Top 10.  The version released as a single was a couple of minutes shorter than the album version, but was still ignored by daytime radio.  Nor could anyone see the very stylish black & white promo video, which had been made by fashion photographer Bruce Weber, as it was subjected to a ban thanks to it containing some shots of full-frontal male nudity.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Being Boring
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – We All Feel Better In The Dark

Does anyone else immediately think of Need You Tonight by INXS when hearing the opening notes of this b-side?   And then it sounds like an early Human League number…..before going all creepy and soundtrack like.   It’s one that Chris sings on and, as you’d expect, it’s more experimental and edgy than most other PSB songs.  

Being Boring, despite its poor sales, has become a real anthem over the years and is never far from the top of any lists when PSB fans mention their favourites. It also has tended to close the live shows over the years.

Fun fact.  I didn’t know this until doing a bit of research for this posting, but the music for Being Boring, along with a couple of other tunes, was written in Glasgow.  The duo had so enjoyed the city when they played there on tour in 1989 that they later decamped to a small studio in the west end of the city to come up with some new material.

The next single was released on 11th March 1991.

The plan was that How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously? would be the third single to be lifted from Behaviour.  It was going to be a very different mix from the album version. 

Whether it was the fact that Being Boring hadn’t done so well, or that the album had, by the beginning of February 1991, dropped out of the Top 75 after less than four months, but there was a change of mind.  The duo had recently recorded a HI-NRG, and very camp, cover of one of the biggest selling rock songs of the 80s for possible release later in the year, but this was brought forward to March 1991 with the decision that it be a double-A side with the remixed ‘Seriously’.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Where The Streets Have No Name (I Can’t Take My Eyes Off You)
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?

I still think this is one of the best jokes ever played on the music industry.  The title of the original PSB song on one side of vinyl while the other seems to poke a bit of fun at how serious U2, (and others like them) and their fans, were beginning to take themselves.  The deadpan delivery of the vocal on ‘Streets’ is such a contrast to the way Bono had thrown his everything into his performance of the song back in 1987 when The Joshua Tree had sold across the world in tens of millions.  And adding in the refrain of an easy-listening number from the 60s was just genius……

It was a timely reminder that music can and should often be about having fun.

The 12″ release had a new PSB composition included – I’m assuming it was meant to be the original b-side until the change of plan.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Bet She’s Not Your Girlfriend

Another New Order-esque tune, but with a frantic and all-knowing manic lyric from Neil, makes this one of my favourite PSB b-sides.    It wouldn’t have sounded out of place on the Electronic album which was just a few weeks away from being released…..

On 28th May 1991, the fourth and final single from Behaviour was released.  I’ve used the CD cover of Jealousy – the picture of Neil was used on the 7″, while the picture of Chris adorned the 12″ – with them coming together for the CD version.

This was the closing song on the album.  As was becoming the norm, it wasn’t a straight lift for the 45. The remix this time is about thirty seconds shorter but utilises a real orchestra at the end instead of relying on a sampler.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Jealousy
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Losing My Mind

The b-side is the duo’s take on a song, written by Stephen Sondheim, for the 1971 musical Follies.   It wasn’t their first involvement with the song, as back in 1989 they had played on and produced a version that had taken Liza Minelli back into the charts since the 70s.  It’s still a staple of the PSB live shows.

I’ll finish things off with a little extra as a thanks for making it this far.

There was also a limited edition CD single issued in the UK. 

As well as the extended mix of Jealousy which had been released on the 12″ vinyl, there were two bonus tracks.  One was a new mix of So Hard, the first single to be lifted from Behaviour, while the other was an extended version and fresh mix of one of the best tracks on Behaviour and which must at some point have been under consideration as a single.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – This Must Be The Place I Waited Years To Leave (extended mix)

Pet Shop Boys spent the first half of 1991 on tour, It began in Japan on 11th March, and took in the USA, Canada, France, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Holland, the United Kingdom and ending in Ireland on 17th June.  

The year ended with the release of a Greatest Hits compilation, including two new songs, both released as singles.  That’s exactly where this series will be heading next week.

JC

It’s Alright was released on 26th June 1989. It was the third single to be lifted from Introspective.

The timing of this release always seemed strange. It had been seven months since the previous single. The album from which it was taken had dropped out of the charts a month previously.  Was there really any demand for it as a 45?  

It turned out there was, as it went straight in at #5.  It managed to hold its position in the Top 10 for a few weeks thanks in part to the marketing campaign which had involved the initial 26th June release being on six formats – 7″, 7″ limited edition sleeve, 12″, 12″ limited edition sleeve, compact disc and cassette single – that was followed up by a 10″ version on 3rd July and a 12″ remix on 10th July.

All told, including the remixes, there were six versions of It’s Alright across the various singles, none of which were identical to the version that could be found on Introspective.  No wonder the people in charge of compiling the charts soon put restrictions on the multi-format method of boosting sales.  I’m not entirely sure how much involvement Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe had with all of this, or whether it was down entirely to the label bosses.

It’s Alright was a cover song, although it very much sounded like a PSB original. It was originally written and recorded in 1987 by Sterling Void & Paris Brightledge, the former being one of the prominent DJs within the ever-increasing and influential scene associated with Chicago house music.  The first version that PSB recorded was more than nine minutes long and closed off Introspective.  The 7″ version was remixed and had the addition of an additional verse that addressed environmental concerns, but was edited right down to a little over four minutes in length.

7″ Limited Edition

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – It’s Alright
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – One Of The Crowd
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Your Funny Uncle

The standard edition of the 7″ didn’t include Your Funny Uncle. 

The two b-sides are a total contrast. 

One Of The Crowd has, unusually, Chris on lead vocal, albeit he uses a vocoder as a partial disguise.  The tune has always reminded a bit of one of those big hits from Adamski.

Your Funny Uncle is a piano-led ballad and a bit of a tear-jerker based on a true story. Neil wrote the lyric after attending the funeral of a friend who had died from AIDS.  It’s not the usual b-side, but it is one of their loveliest numbers.

 “All the details are true: the cars in slow formation, and so on. He did have an uncle, who had been in the army all of his life and suddenly found himself at the funeral of his evidently gay nephew who’d died of Aids. I think it must have been quite a difficult situation for him, but he was really nice and dignified and spoke to all of his nephew’s friends. I had to give a reading, and the bit I read was from the book of Revelations…at the end it says there’s somewhere where there’s no pain or fear, and I found it a really moving piece of prose, and attached it to the end of the song.”

The success of It’s Alright returned Introspective to the Top 40 of the album charts after a couple of months outside the listings.  The album’s highest placing was #2, the third time in a row a PSB album had just come up short in attempts to dislodge an 80s mega-seller (Brothers In Arms – Dire Straits; Bad – Michael Jackson; Rattle and Hum – U2). Would the luck change as a new decade dawned?

JC

I hope you didn’t mind that last week concentrated on just one single.  The reason for asking is that I’m sticking again today to just one single. the second to be taken from Introspective.

Left To My Own Devices was released on 14th November 1988.

I wrote about the single at some length back in 2017.  I’m going for a slightly amended cut’n’paste from that piece.

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Of all the Pet Shop Boys singles, my favourite is Left To My Own Devices. My first exposure to the song had come thanks to it being the opening track on the album Introspective.  Just over 8 minutes in length, it was something to behold.

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Left To My Own Devices (album version)

I was quite bemused when I read it was going to be issued as a single given it was such a strange and almost surreal lyric. OK, the word love was contained within the chorus but it wasn’t quite boy meets girl or boy meets boy or girl meets girl material what with it also wittering on about Che Guevara drinking tea and setting the sounds of classical composer Claude Debussy to a disco beat. But somehow the madcap approach worked as it reached #4 in the UK singles chart when it was released in November 1988.

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Left To My Own Devices (single edit)

But it turns out that the album version wasn’t the one in which Neil and Chris, along with producers/engineers/orchestral arrangers Trevor Horn, Stephen Lipson and Richard Niles had really thrown the kitchen sink. Nope, for that you had to get the 12″ version which extended out to an incredible eleven and a half minutes, beginning with an unlikely drumroll before incorporating house, disco, brass, strings, operatic backing vocals and a more deliberate spoken rap from Neil. What’s not to love?

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Left To My Own Devices (disco mix)

The b-side is a bonkers sounding bit of music, the sort of thing that seems to accompany a character in a film having a drugs-induced breakdown or panic attack. And in the typically perverse way the boys were behaving at the time, the short version (3:38) was put on the CD and 12″ releases, with the full version (5:13) available only on the flip side of the 7″:-

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – The Sound Of The Atom Splitting (extended version)

I went to see Pet Shop Boys last May at the cavernous Hydro in Glasgow.  The set was a Greatest Hits type of evening, and so there were many highlights.  The best, as far as I’m concerned, was Left To My Own Devices, which came in around a third of the way into the set.  Full volume in front of 12,000 ecstatic fans.  I was only sorry they performed the short version of the tune.  I’d happily have danced away to the near 12-minute take on things.

JC

 

And now we reach what I think is my favourite phase of the Pet Shop Boys between September 1988 and June 1989, and the three singles that were lifted from their third album Introspective, itself released in October 1988. And it’s why I’m temporarily deviating away from looking at all singles from an album in one posting.

Domino Dancing was released on 12th September 1988

Perhaps already tiring of being pigeonholed as purely a synth band, Pet Shop Boys in March 1988 had decamped to Miami for some recording sessions.  This was around the same time as when Heart had raced all the way to #1, and given what they were working on in the studios is perhaps the best indication as to why they had been so ambivalent to the previous 45.

They chose to work with Latino producer Lewis A. Martinée, the results of which saw far more musicians play on a PSB track than ever before.   The credits on the single list two additional keyboard players, a guitarist, a four-piece brass section and a backing vocal group in the shape of The Voice Of Fashion.

More than 20 years after the event, the memories of the recording sessions still could bring real excitement to Neil:-

“All the musicians on it are Cuban. There’s tons of people playing on it. This trumpet player came in who couldn’t really speak English and he played loads of notes for the solo, and so I said, ‘Can’t he play the tune, and then halfway through play loads of notes?’ and he did that, and it was great. And he came up to me afterwards and hugged me. I hate it when the solo has none of the tune in; it’s the jazz version of a remix not having any of the song in.

We made the seven-inch version, and then Lewis Martinée expanded it to the twelve-inch version on the album. Towards the end there are lots of edits, all done by hand. You could see all the white sticky tape going past. When Lewis Martinée finished the mix we suggested to him that he did a mix without the drums and that was done in half an hour. I’ve always liked that mix.”

All of which explains why I’m going to go beyond just the 7″ version.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Domino Dancing
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Don Juan

Despite having a latin-sounding title, the b-side is a complete contrast to Domino Dancing having been recorded in London and featuring just Neil and Chris.  It’s a decent enough song but sounds rather sparse in comparison to the single.

The record-buying public didn’t really take to Domino Dancing as it only reached #7, which was seen as a bit of a let-down after two consecutive #1s.

But for me, the real majesty of the song can be found on the 12″ and CD versions, as well as on Introspective:-

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Domino Dancing (disco mix)

Here’s the mix without the drums that was referred to by Neil in his comments above. It becomes a totally different song:-

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Domino Dancing (alternative mix)

It was also included on the 12″ and CD versions of the single.  A few years later, when Introspective was given an expanded re-release, the demo version of the song was provided.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Domino Dancing (demo version)

This had been recorded in Los Angeles in 1987, and the really interesting thing is the lack of lyrics for the verses, as they hadn’t been completed yet.

JC

 

On the 14th August 1987, the ITV network across the UK broadcast Love Me Tender: A Tribute to the Music of Elvis Presley.  It’s a two-hour show to mark the 10th anniverary of Elvis’s death and it consists of singers and bands from all eras and all genres offering their take on some of the songs he was best known for.

The British Film Institute website provides an exhaustive list of those who were involved in some shape or form.  Pet Shop Boys stand out as just about being the only non-guitar or traditional rock based act taking part.

Such was the reaction to their appearance that the duo decided to do a proper recording and release it as a stand-alone single.

 

The single certainly divided opinion.   Elvis Presley, while not the first to record it, had been the first to have a hit with it in 1973.   A decade later, Wille Nelson enjoyed success with the song.  Both versions were derivative in that they were along the lines of what you’d expect a break-up song to sound like.  Pet Shop boys, however, went all HI-NRG and dancey on us.  The sort of sound that appealed to those who hadn’t carried any torch for Rent.  It was all over the radio stations after its release on 30th November 1987.  Just over three weeks later, and it was a most unlikely Christmas #1.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Always On My Mind
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Do I Have To?

The b-side is a ballad.  It sounded quite different to most previous PSB tracks, but, as now can be seen with many of the b-sides, it was a sort of trial run for the sort of sound they would introduce on albums many years down the line. It’s rather gorgeous, albeit I didn’t fully appreciate it until those later albums got me more familiar with this side of PSB.

Heart was released on 21st March 1988. It’s a bit of a strange one in that the duo went back to the well of Actually to lift a fourth single from it, a full six months after the album had been released.  To be fair, it wasn’t a straight lift as a new mix that was, in places, noticeably different from the album version.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Heart
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – I Get Excited (You Get Excited Too)

The normal course of events for a fourth single to be taken from an album is to slide in around the #20 mark and then quickly disappear from you.  Not in this instance as Heart spent three weeks at the top of the chart.

The duo, despite continuing to air the song in the live settings in acknowledgement of its success, have both said it feels a bit lightweight and straightforward compared to many earlier and indeed later singles. It’s also the case that the b-side, while being enjoyable enough, didn’t really bring anything new to the table, being another HI-NRG dance number.

The fact that Heart proven to be their final #1 single probably adds to their feeling of annoyance and a view that chart positions aren’t everything.  It was also the case, although we didn’t know it at the time, that Neil and Chris were in early 1988 working on material that was radically different to what they were most associated with.  But that’s for next week.

Worth mentioning at this juncture that, despite yielding two #1 singles and two other top ten hits, as well as a non-album single also being a #1 hit, Actually never got any higher than #2 in the album charts, all of which led some snobbish critics to dismiss them as lightweight and inconsequential. How wrong could they be???

JC

 

And now we reach the first imperious phase of the Pet Shop Boys between June and October 1987. Three singles were lifted from their second album Actually, itself released in September 1987.

One of the singles went to #1, while the others reached #2 and #8.  Oh, and while they were at it, they attracted the attention of a brand-new audience for one of the greatest female singers to ever have emerged from the UK, but whose chart hits had long dried up. 

As it turned out, a fourth single would be released from Actually, but that tale is more suited to next week’s instalment.

It’s A Sin was released on 15th June 1987

From the PSB website:-

It’s A Sin, a song that originally appeared on the demo Neil had in his pocket when he took Bobby O’ out to lunch, was released. “It’s about being brought up as a Catholic. When I went to school you were taught that everything was a sin”.

It reached #1 and caused several notable rumpuses. Jonathan King accused them of plagiarism (he later apologized and paid damages to a charity at their request). A teacher at Neil’s old school, St. Cuthbert’s Grammar School, Newcastle, got very steamed up about the picture Neil painted of his education and castigated Neil in the press.

The Salvation Army magazine, War Cry, put the Pet Shop Boys on the front page and noted, approvingly, “It’s interesting that someone’s raised the concept of sin in our modern life again”. Neil was also asked to appear with Cardinal Hume in a press advert for CAFOD; he politely declined the offer, explaining that he wasn’t a practising Catholic.

The song’s video, a sombre tale of guilt and punishment featuring the seven deadly sins, was the first time the Pet Shop Boys worked with Derek Jarman.

It entered the charts at #5 and then went to #1 where it spent three weeks.  It was also #1 in Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – It’s A Sin
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – You Know Where You Went Wrong

A really long track for a b-side, coming in at not far short of six minutes.  It’s a hypnotically, catchy number with a touch of Latino to the tune.  It was an early indication of the road that the duo would travel on their next again album. It’s long been a favourite of mine.

What Have I Done To Deserve This was released on 10th August 1987. It was a duet with Dusty Springfield, a much loved and appreciated UK singer but whose last hit single had been back in 1970. PSB had the song ready in time for the release of their debut album some eighteen months earlier, but an initial approach to Dusty’s management hadn’t worked out.  The success of West End Girls changed everything, and the singer flew from her California home to London to record her vocal.  It reached #2 and brought her to a new audience. In 1990, her new album Reputation went Top 20, giving her solo success again after two decades.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys with Dusty Springfield – What Have I Done To Deserve This
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – A New Life

For once, the b-side was a tad anti-climatic, but then again, this release was all about the majesty of the a-side, a song that one critic, writing retrospectively in 2017 said it was “possibly the greatest pop song in history”.

Rent was released on 12th August 1987. It was the third single to be lifted from the album Please, and perhaps this affected the sales of the 45 as it ‘only’ made #8.  It was, however, a slightly different mix from the album version and the 7″ version was some 90 seconds shorter.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Rent
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – I Want A Dog

Back in 1987, Rent was really under-appreciated.  There was a sense that PSB were at their best with the bombastic, dancey type numbers, certainly when it comes to 45s.  A mid-tempo, bittersweet love song about a one-sided relationship caused a bit of head-scratching.  There was also a reluctance among some daytime radio DJs and producers to feature a song which was seemingly about male prostitutes  – as it turned out, in one of the few instances where Neil Tennant chose to give an explanation to a song; he (many years later) said he had always regarded it as being about a kept woman in America, possibly the secret lover of a high profile politician.

The b-side is another excellent piece of mid-tempo music. The song would become better known a while later when an Italian-style disco beat was added to it for inclusion on the 1988 album Introspective.

JC

 

My huge thanks to those of you who gave such warm welcomes to this new series.   Just to clarify on the Bobby Orlando releases that I mentioned last week but didn’t feature, the 45s will consist only of those had UK releases AND are mentioned on the PSB official website.

Part Two covers October 1985 – September 1986 and the four singles lifted from debut album Please, itself released in March 1986.

West End Girls was released on 28th October 1985 and went to #1 in the UK in January. It was subsequently #1 in USA, Canada, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Israel, New Zealand and Norway.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – West End Girls
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – A Man Could Get Arrested

Strangely enough, the 12″ contained a shorter version of A Man Could Get Arrested alongside a near 7-minute dance mix of West End Girls.  I’ve long thought this particular b-side is decent enough but has more than a few similarities to Opportunities, which suggests the duo were still trying to find their feet, musically.

Love Comes Quickly was released on 24th February 1986.  After the success of West End Girls, hopes here high of achieving something similar.  It only reached #19 while New Zealand and Spain were the only countries where it went Top 10. 

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Love Comes Quickly
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – That’s My Impression

This b-side was, as it turned out, ahead of the curve as it offered up a sign of Pet Shop Boys as a club/dance act.  It’s certainly the first time you could link their sound with that of New Order. The song was certainly more than good enough to be included on the debut album, but didn’t make the cut, which I think was a mistake.

A month later, debut album Please entered the chart at #3.  It was the highest new entry that week, and the only two albums above it were Brothers In Arms by Dire Straits (which had been kicking around the top of the album charts for almost a year) and Hits 4, one of those compilation albums that sold in the millions back in the 80s.  

Fun fact 1.  West End Girls was included on Hits 4, which meant the song was on records sitting at #1 and #3 on the album chart.

Fun fact 2.  Please would spend 37 weeks on the album chart.  But it never got higher than its first week position of #3.

A new version of Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of Money) was released on 19th May 1986. It was a slightly edited version of that included on Please.   It reached #11 in the UK.

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of Money)
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Was That What It Was

Another quality b-side, if perhaps a bit PSB by numbers, but far superior to what many others were offering as a-sides.

On 22nd September 1986, a re-recorded version of Suburbia was released.  It reached #8 in the UK.  I won’t say any more as the single was feature on the blog just two weeks ago.  If you want to read more about the release, as well as listening to/downloading the tracks, just click here.

JC

I genuinely pay close attention to feedback via the comments section, which is why the plan for a new Sunday series looking at selections from the many hundreds of 7″ singles sitting in a very large cupboard space in Villain Towers will now be put to one side.  I’ve already written around a dozen of proposed posts, but I’ll make use of these over the coming weeks and months.

Instead, Sundays are now going to be devoted to the singles released by the Pet Shop Boys. 

The thing is, if I was to do it at the pace of one single per week, I’ll still be working my way through them well into 2024 and probably have lost all sorts of enthusiasm for getting to the end.  So, what’s going to happen is that the singles will more often than not be broken up on an album-by-album basis, with just a few short facts about each song so as to avoid any one posting becoming too lengthy.  Oh, and for clarification, I’ll only be featuring singles that were released in the UK and are mentioned on the PSB website.

Which means neither of the Bobby Orlando produced singles will feature.  It’s just as easy to quote from the ‘Early Years’ section over at wiki:-

“Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe met in a hi-fi shop on King’s Road in Chelsea, London, in 1981. Tennant had purchased a Korg MS-10 synthesizer which sparked a conversation with Lowe. Discovering that they had a mutual interest in disco and electronic music, they became friends. In particular, the pair had a shared love of two electropop records: Souvenir by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD); and Bedsitter by Soft Cell, which reflected their lifestyles at the time. According to Tennant, he and Lowe would listen to “pioneers of electronic music”, including OMD, Soft Cell, Kraftwerk, the Human League and Depeche Mode.

“The duo began to work together on material, first in Tennant’s flat in Chelsea, then, from 1982, in a small studio in Camden Town. They say that their band name was taken from friends who worked in a pet shop in Ealing and were known as the “pet shop boys”. In August 1983, Tennant, who was an assistant editor at Smash Hits, went to New York to interview Sting. While there, he arranged to meet hi-NRG producer Bobby Orlando and gave him a demo tape containing It’s a Sin and Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots of Money).

“From 1983 to 1984, Orlando recorded 11 tracks with Tennant and Lowe.  In April 1984, the Orlando-produced West End Girls was released, becoming a club hit in Los Angeles and San Francisco.  It was a minor dance hit in Belgium and France, but was only available in the United Kingdom as a 12” import.

“In March 1985, after long negotiations, the Pet Shop Boys cut their contractual ties with Bobby O, with a settlement giving Bobby O significant royalties for future sales. Hiring manager Tom Watkins, they signed with the London-based Parlophone label. In April, Tennant left Smash Hits magazine – where he had progressed to the position of deputy editor – and in July, a new single was released.”

Which takes us to Part One of the series.

Released on 1st July 1985. It came out on 7″ vinyl as well as two different 12″ versions. 

7″

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of  Money)
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – In The Night

12″ (version 1)

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of Money) (Dance Mix)

12″ (version 2)

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots Of Money) (version Latina)
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Opportunities (Dub For Money)

Produced by J. J. Jeczalik (of Art of Noise) and Nicholas Froome, it was a flop, getting no higher than #116 in the UK charts.

In what would become a feature of PSB singles over the years, the b-side was a song worth listening to.  The version of In The Night that was included on the 7″ could also be found on both of the 12″ releases.

It’s also interesting that, from the outset, the duo were keen to import a Latina element to their sound, something that would really come to the fore a few years later.

JC

Prior to deciding to go in randomly among the 7″ singles for the new Sunday series in 2023, I did give a brief consideration to Pet Shop Boys being the focus of an extended series in a similar fashion to The Fall in 2021/22.  I have been picking up second hand copies of a few of the 7″ singles in recent times, and there’s also the fact that many of their re-mastered and re-released CDs have been extended to include various b-sides and mixes from their singles.  In the end, I felt it would just be too tall an ask to actually track down everything, and besides, while I’m a huge fan, I appreciate not everyone who drops into TVV feels the same.

Here’s wiki on today’s offering.

Suburbia is a song by English synthpop duo Pet Shop Boys. It was remixed and released as the fourth single from the duo’s debut studio album, Please (1986), and became the band’s second UK top-10 entry, peaking at #8.

The song’s primary inspiration is the 1983 Penelope Spheeris film Suburbia, and its depiction of violence and squalor in the suburbs of Los Angeles; in addition, the tension of the Brixton riots of 1981 and of 1985 hanging in recent memory led Neil Tennant of the duo to thinking about the boredom of suburbia and the underlying tension among disaffected youth that sparked off the riots at the least provocation.

The various versions of the song are punctuated by sounds of suburban violence, riots and smashing glass, as well as snarling dogs on the re-recorded single version (extended even further on the music video), which were derived from typical scenes in suburbia. The Please version of the song sounds very sparse in comparison. The version used for the video was the song that appeared on the PopArt compilation in 2003.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Suburbia

The b-side has long been one of the duo’s most loved among the fan base, partly for the fact that the majority of the vocal, albeit more spoken than sung, is provided by Chris Lowe.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Paninaro

It is seemingly about an 80s Italian youth subculture whose members hung around US-style fast food restaurants and had preferences for designer clothing and disco music. Paninaro was actually released as a limited edition 12″ single in Italy in 1986.

JC

Those of you who drop into Adam‘s Bagging Area will have read his glowing take on the Pet Shop Boys performance at the Manchester Arena when they played there in late May.

He’s not alone in praising the show, with just about every reviewer rushing to give it five stars, whether it was the set they had seen in Manchester, London, Cardiff, Bournemouth, Newcastle, Birmingham, Glasgow or Hull.

I’m not going to waste your time by repeating what everyone else has said suffice to add that the Glasgow gig was jaw-dropping in many places. They are at Glastonbury this coming weekend, and while the festival goers are unlikely to get the full two-hour extravaganza, they will not be cheated as the set will no doubt be drawn entirely from the songs they aired during the recent sojourn around the UK.

Suburbia, 
Can You Forgive Her?
Opportunities (Let's Make Lots of Money)
Where the Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes Off You)
Rent
I Don't Know What You Want But I Can't Give It Any More
So Hard
Left to My Own Devices
Single-Bilingual / Se a vida é (That's the Way Life Is)
Domino Dancing
Monkey Business
New York City Boy
You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You're Drunk
Jealousy
Love Comes Quickly
Losing My Mind
You Were Always on My Mind
Dreamland
Heart
What Have I Done to Deserve This?
It's Alright
Vocal
Go West
It's a Sin
West End Girls
Being Boring.

Far too many highlights to mention, but if forced to choose just the one, it would be Left To My Own Devices, which really came into its own when blasted out at full volume in front of 12,000 ecstatic fans who had waited two years for a great night out – the tour had originally been scheduled for Spring 2020.  Neil and Chris stuck to the 7″ version that went to #4 in the singles chart at the end of 1988.  I’d have loved it if they had treated us to this take on things:-

mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Left To My Own Devices (Disco Mix)

Eleven plus minutes worth.  As made available on the 12″ version of the single.  It’s one I’ve long been on the hunt for a good quality copy at a reasonable price, but no joy.

JC