Pet Shop Boys: 'Electric'

Details of the Pet Shop Boys new album were revealed today on the duo's official website. Electric will be released worldwide on July 15th, and is the first to appear on their own x2 label via Kobalt. Recorded in London, Berlin and Los Angeles, and produced by Stuart Price, Electric features eight new tracks and a cover version of Bruce Springstein's The Last To Die, whilst singer and rapper, Example performs on Thursday. 

Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe commented that the new work - their twelfth studio album - is a response to the reflective nature of previous release, Elysium, and Electric is "pretty banging!"

The album - with artwork (shown here) again by Farrow - opens with the new single, Axis, and the full listing is:

1. Axis
2. Bolshy
3. Love Is A Bourgeois Construct
4. Flourescent
5. Inside A Dream
6. The Last To Die
7. Shouting In The Evening
8. Thursday
9. Vocal

Pet Shop Boys: 'Elysium'

The Pet Shop Boys website this week officially confirmed the release of the band's new studio album, Elysium. Both CD and vinyl formats are issued by Parlophone/EMI on September 7th in the UK, and the iTunes version contains extra features. Produced in Los Angeles by Andrew Dawson, Elysium features cover artwork from Farrow, and the tracks are listed thus:

1. Leaving

2. Invisible
3. Winner
4. Your early stuff
5. A face like that
6. Breathing space
7. Ego music
8. Hold on
9. Give it a go
10. Memory of the future
11. Everything means something
12. Requiem in denim and leopardskin

Brian Bress' video for the song, Invisible was released online in June (view here via Vevo). The new single, Winner is issued on August 6th, and includes a cover version of the Bee Gees' I Started a Joke.

Noel Coward, the original lyrical gangster

"There Are Bad Times Just Around The Corner" (1952)
Lyrics by Noel Coward (1899-1973)
Performed by Robbie Williams
Released on Twentieth Century Blues (1998)

They’re out of sorts in Sunderland

And terribly cross in Kent
They’re dull in Hull
And the Isle of Mull
They’re seething with discontent
They’re nervous in Northumberland
And Devon is down the drain
They’re filled with wrath on the Firth of Forth
And sullen on Salisbury plain
In Dublin they’re depressed lads
Maybe because they’re Celts
For Drake is heading west, lads
And so is everyone else
Hurray! hurray! hurray!
Misery’s here to stay
There are bad times just around the corner
There are dark clouds hurtling through the sky
And it’s no good whining
About a silver lining
For we know from experience they won’t roll by
With a scowl and a frown we’ll keep our peckers down
And prepare for depression and doom and dread
We’re going to unpack our troubles from our old kit bag
And wait until we drop down dead
They’re nervous in Nigeria
They’re all going crazy in Crete
In Bucharest they’re so depressed
They’re frightened to cross the streets
In Maine the melancholia
Is deeper than tongue can tell
In Monaco all the croupiers know
They haven’t a hope in hell
In far away Australia
Each wallaby’s well aware
The world’s a total failure
Without any time to spare
Hurray! hurray! hurray!
Suffering and dismay
There are bad times just around the corner
The horizon is gloomy as can be
There are black birds over
The greyish cliffs of Dover
And the rats are preparing to leave the BBC
We’re an unhappy breed and very bored indeed
When reminded of something that Nelson said
While the press and the politicians nag, nag, nag
We’ll wait until we drop down dead
There are bad times just around the corner
And the outlook’s absolutely vile
There are home fires smoking from Windermere to Woking
And we’re not going to tighten our belt and
Smile smile smile
At the sound of shots
We’d just as soon as not
Get a hot water bottle and go to bed
We’re going to unpack our troubles from our old kit bag
And wait until we drop down dead
I like your story
Land of hope and glory
Wait until we drop down dead

Pet Shop Boys: Format

The Pet Shop Boys announced their new compilation album last month, and the CD artwork was unveiled today. Format is the long-awaited, second B-sides release, akin to the unofficial Beside, and follows Alternative (1995). 

Format

Pet Shop Boys will release a brand new b-sides compilation on February 6th, 2012, on Parlophone. "Format" celebrates the duo's prolific song-writing and recording by collecting 38 b-sides and bonus tracks originally released on singles from 1996 to 2009. The album will be available digitally and on double-CD. All tracks have been remastered and the CD booklet features an interview with Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe by Jon Savage (author of "England's Dreaming" and "Teenage"). Design is by Farrow.
Pet Shop Boys are currently working on their 11th studio album which is due for release in early autumn next year.
The full "Format" track-listing is as follows:

CD1
1. The truck driver and his mate
2. Hit and miss
3. In the night (1995)
4. Betrayed
5. How I learned to hate rock 'n' roll
6. Discoteca (New Version)
7. The calm before the storm
8. Confidential (Demo for Tina)
9. The boy who couldn't keep his clothes on
10. Delusions of grandeur
11. The view from your balcony
12. Disco potential
13. Silver age
14. Screaming
15. The ghost of myself
16. Casting a shadow
17. Lies
18. Sexy Northerner

CD2
1. Always
2. Nightlife
3. Searching for the face of Jesus
4. Between two islands
5. Friendly fire
6. We're the Pet Shop Boys
7. Transparent
8. I didn't get where I am today
9. The Resurrectionist
10. Girls don't cry
11. In private (7-inch mix): Pet Shop Boys with Elton John
12. Blue on blue
13. No time for tears (7-inch mix)
14. Bright young things
15. Party song
16. We're all criminals now
17. Gin and Jag
18. After the event
19. The former enfant terrible
20. Up and down

The History of Pop Music

Michael Putland's studio portrait of Dusty & the Pet Shop Boys, dressed as 1960's
journalists. The shoot was for the cover of the Nothing Has Been Proved
single, recorded for the film, Scandal (December 1988).

I've only just found this article, originally published in The Guardian on June 11th this year. Caroline Sullivan's series on the Top 50 key moments in pop history, places the Pet Shop Boys at No. 33. On August 10, 1987, they resurrected Dusty Springfield's career:

"The Smiths were the first to collaborate with an iconic 60s female singer – Sandie Shaw – but the Pet Shop Boys struck gold by hooking up with arguably the most revered vocalist of her generation – Dusty Springfield. Their single together, What Have I Done to Deserve This?, was a win-win situation: the band got kudos for enticing Springfield into recording what was the classiest record the PSB ever made, her career got a new lease of life, and it reached No 2."

Pet Shop Boys News

Tickets are now on sale for performances of The Most Incredible Thing, a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. This new ballet (choreographed by Javier De Fruto) has original music by Messrs Tennant and Lowe. The first run at Sadler's Wells in London is from March 17-26 2011. Follow this link http://http://www.sadlerswells.com/standalonevideo.php? for a video about the ballet's inception, and a music demo. A double CD produced by the PSB and Sven Helbig, and a world tour are planned for next year.

The Performing Rights Society have organised an auction of handwritten lyrics by some of the UK's best songwriters and composers, including Paul McCartney and Gary Barlow. All proceeds will go to the Teenage Cancer Trust, and Neil Tennant has written the lyrics to It's a Sin, Being Boring, and Your Funny Uncle, in a leather-bound notebook (pictured above), which will be sold at Bonham's in London this Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the Boy's latest single, Together, only peaked at number 58 in the UK chart.

Pet Shop Boys 'Ultimate' Deluxe Edition

Received my pre-ordered copy of this new PSB greatest hits CD and DVD yesterday, and far from actually being their Ultimate singles collection, it's still faultless! The DVD contains many of their BBC TV appearances, from the Boys' first time on Top of the Pops, upto this years's glorious Glastonbury concert. For me, the best video here has to be Can You Forgive Her? Typical PSB! The CD of course includes the superlative new single, Together (released 29/11) which rounds off 25 years of hits in style. My favourite track though, remains What Have I Done To Deserve This! Left to their own devices, the Pet Shop Boys are the ultimate British pop band of the last 3 decades.

Renaissance of the Pet Shop Boys

2009 turned out to be a year of consolidation for Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe. At the BRITS in February they collected a well-earned Outstanding Contribution to Music Award. A month later saw the release of Yes, their best-selling album in 13 years, then in the summer they launched a worldwide stadium tour.

They could well ask What Have I Done To Deserve This? After 25 years of mixed fortune, the Pet Shop Boys are most definately worthy of such accolades.

Since West End Girls reached No. 1 (the first of 4 in the UK) in 1985, Messrs Tennant and Lowe have secured 43 Top 40 hits, and sold over 100 million records. The Pet Shop Boys are the most successful duo in UK music history, and the biggest British act on the US Dance Chart with 10 number 1's there. Next month, the Boys release Ultimate, their 17th album, and 56th single, Together.

Yes is the 10th studio album, and spawned 3 singles (Beautiful People was only issued in Germany). Personally, this is probably my favourite Pet Shop Boys album, the best songs being Did You See Me Coming? and should-have-been-a-single Pandemonium. For me, track 2, All Over The World (with it's brilliant Tchaikovsky sampling), typifies everything the Boys are about: this is a joyous celebration of their global appeal.

The 14-month Pandemonium tour took in 88 performances in 31 countries, and I was lucky enough to attend the Liverpool and Manchester dates. The London show at the O2 arena last December was filmed, and released on DVD this year.

And the greatest single of all time is... Being Boring!

Yes, according to the Guardian’s Music Blog Being Boring by the Pet Shop Boys is the greatest single of all time. “No one thought that when it came out” admits Neil Tennant himself. BB only peaked at number 20 in the UK chart of November 1990.

The Guardian is right in saying that this attempt at emulating the Stock Aitken & Waterman formula actually results in a mature and panoramic song. Key to it’s many themes for me, BB is indeed “about growing up” and I love the typically ironic title, since the Boys are usually perceived as “boring”. Although melancholic, the PSB have never seemed so hedonistic.

But greatest single ever? As a Pethead since Day 1 I’m biased, although I wouldn’t even consider BB to be the Boys best work. Some YouTube commentators insist that Jealousy is their best song, and I tend to agree that it’s amazing classical flourishes are grander.Personally, I prefer the (rather pretentious) Shakespearean intro of the Extended Mix of Jealousy to the hand-written prologue of BB. Here, Tennant delivers a line from Othello:

“Not poppy nor mandragora/Nor all the drowsy syrups of the east/Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep/Which thou owedst yesterday”.

The Killers frontman Brandon Flowers comments in A Life in Pop (DVD, 2006) that BB is a modern version of the Beatles' In My Life. Praise indeed. Apparently MTV didn't like the video for BB, because it was made in black and white, and it didn't really feature the artists. However, this fan-favourite (directed by Bruce Weber) is now regarded as a masterpiece.

My own favourite PSB track has to be the first of their collaborations with Dusty Springfield, What Have I Done to Deserve This? Released in August 1987, this single reached No. 2 in both the UK and the US.