Instrumental delights

[Actually]

Love listening to Pet Shop Boys instrumentals. They bring a new dimension to the listening experience of quality songs.
My best one is More than a dream. The part where "driving through the night, just you and me...."is simply pure musical perfection.

Any chance of the boys releasing ALL their albums in instrumental format??

[Greendrake]

The content of this post has been reserved by the author due to the unprecedented, categorical and peremptory exercise of censorship that took place on 20 May 2021.

Whereas this content can be restored, the author neither intends to do so, nor to publish any further posts to avoid any possible perception as "passive agressive", "pointless", "unhelpful", "homophobic" or "bigoted".

[MikeyC]

My best one is More than a dream. The part where "driving through the night, just you and me...."is simply pure musical perfection.

I still get chills from that part!!

[Bulldog]

The instrumental version of Winner is AMAZING.

[df118junkie]

The instrumental version of Winner is AMAZING.

It's certainly the best version

[Zog]

Even for people who don't like "Hold On", the instrumental version is excellent. It has a slight "Modern Jazz Quartet" feel.

(I'm not into jazz generally, but the MJQ is/was excellent, with their rather stripped-down Bach-like sound, and interesting occasional Chris Lowe-like chord progressions).

-Zog

[Bulldog]

The instrumental version of Winner is AMAZING.

It's certainly the best version

I mean it's not the song in itself, it's that Neil sounds really clunky and out of place in the vocal (no pun) mix. Several Elysium tracks, it seems, have that issue, in particular Hold on and Give it a go. His voice works best with booming vocalists like Sylvia, because a lot of the time they just belt out everything, making sound Neil more refined by contrast; but in the context of Elysium, where the backing singers are not that powerful but VERY nuanced (and songwriting moves in that direction too - see Give it a go), the overall effect is sometimes brilliant (Leaving) but mostly kind of redundant and forced. And Neil must have realized that when he pushed EMI to release the bonus cd of instrumentals, though you can say it was a way to admit they weren't that successful with the main aim of the record - i.e. vocal experimentation and a different way of doing vocals than the usual double tracking or Neilatron (remember the album was going to called "Vocal" at some point...).

[Tom Angel]

The instrumental I'd most like to hear is Groovy! I LOVE this track more and more, and I'd love to hear more of the instrumentation

I also agree re: Neil singing Winner, it just doesn't really work, but the track is otherwise lush.

[Palpatine]

The instrumental I'd most like to hear is Groovy! I LOVE this track more and more, and I'd love to hear more of the instrumentation

I also agree re: Neil singing Winner, it just doesn't really work, but the track is otherwise lush.

Totally agree about Groovy and Winner. I wish they'd release instrumentals of all albums.

[Paninaro]

After we had the special vinyl release of the instrumentals from Yes, the special edition of Elysium with an instrumentals disc, and all the instrumentals of the Electric singles... why none whatsoever from Super?

[df118junkie]

The instrumental version of Winner is AMAZING.

It's certainly the best version

I mean it's not the song in itself, it's that Neil sounds really clunky and out of place in the vocal (no pun) mix. Several Elysium tracks, it seems, have that issue, in particular Hold on and Give it a go. His voice works best with booming vocalists like Sylvia, because a lot of the time they just belt out everything, making sound Neil more refined by contrast; but in the context of Elysium, where the backing singers are not that powerful but VERY nuanced (and songwriting moves in that direction too - see Give it a go), the overall effect is sometimes brilliant (Leaving) but mostly kind of redundant and forced. And Neil must have realized that when he pushed EMI to release the bonus cd of instrumentals, though you can say it was a way to admit they weren't that successful with the main aim of the record - i.e. vocal experimentation and a different way of doing vocals than the usual double tracking or Neilatron (remember the album was going to called "Vocal" at some point...).

I agree. I find the lyrics trite. I'm surprised that they passed the quality control screening. But I also think the same about I'm With Stupid. Anything that could be a cheap t-shirt logo is a mistake.

[richwill]

What about an album of acapella versions?

[ZiggyPSB]

I agree. I find the lyrics trite. I'm surprised that they passed the quality control screening. But I also think the same about I'm With Stupid. Anything that could be a cheap t-shirt logo is a mistake.

That goes for a third of Super. Made into a T-shirt.