Your Instant Classics

[Gabby]

For me I think it was Paninaro.

I'm a little fuzzy on this but think the first time I heard it was on Disco, and hearing that whole album was really the clincher for me on PSB fandom. But Paninaro was the real standout track.

Even now I can't get enough of it. The updated version is great too, but I always end up going back to the original to really pump my tyres. It's simply not an option to play this anything but LOUD.

Honorable mentions to Domino Dancing (Introspective version) and the extended version of This Must Be The Place...

There are plenty of stone cold classic PSB songs, but if these come on heaven help the person who presses the skip button...

[telys]

For me I think it was Paninaro.

I'm a little fuzzy on this but think the first time I heard it was on Disco, and hearing that whole album was really the clincher for me on PSB fandom. But Paninaro was the real standout track.

Even now I can't get enough of it. The updated version is great too, but I always end up going back to the original to really pump my tyres.

Oh yes. Disco and Paninaro. All the songs on Disco were each a particular journey. Wished they'd done more of that. Etc was the closest I guess.

[new_love]

This is hard, because the memory plays tricks on you. Some of those that sounded like instant classics at the time got a bit dull later.

Agree with the above somewhat.
This is hard. There’s so many classics that make me want to get up and dance and others that make me want to fall to the floor and sob. Both having special places in my heart. For me personally, much depends on mood, feelings, life events at the time perhaps. My mum had not long died, still in a lockdown of sorts. I couldn’t get to hug her. Boy I needed something to help the madness and sadness! Someone suggested I listened to Pet Shop Boys. It felt like magic, I could breathe, the lyrics of pretty much everything I listened to I could relate to with in some way. Then I listened to fundamental the one that really grabbed my attention. Think my fan-ness was sealed after this. Also the ‘correct’ meaning for many songs have different meanings for me. Why I love music so much, can be subjective. If I really had to choose..

Indefinite Leave To Remain - only a few seconds in and I’m tearing up.. I adore this song I find it incredibly cathartic.

Suburbia - my escape. My song to forget the mundaneness of life. I find it an incredibly sexy song! On repeat a lot!

I made my excuses..! (Special mention - just beautiful)

I could go on and on with classics to me and reasons why. I’d probably bore you all silly

Lovely thread Drico.

[Gabby]

For me I think it was Paninaro.

I'm a little fuzzy on this but think the first time I heard it was on Disco, and hearing that whole album was really the clincher for me on PSB fandom. But Paninaro was the real standout track.

Even now I can't get enough of it. The updated version is great too, but I always end up going back to the original to really pump my tyres.

Oh yes. Disco and Paninaro. All the songs on Disco were each a particular journey. Wished they'd done more of that. Etc was the closest I guess.

I know it's not quite the same (since it's not a remix album per se) but Introspective has the same kind of vibe to Disco for me. Maybe it's just having 6 top drawer extended songs that does it. Electric might be a close 3rd for similar reasons - some lengthier tracks that pack a punch - maybe it should have only be a 6 track album too. Less is more...

[TwizzleUK]

For me I think it was Paninaro.

I'm a little fuzzy on this but think the first time I heard it was on Disco, and hearing that whole album was really the clincher for me on PSB fandom. But Paninaro was the real standout track.

Even now I can't get enough of it. The updated version is great too, but I always end up going back to the original to really pump my tyres.

Oh yes. Disco and Paninaro. All the songs on Disco were each a particular journey. Wished they'd done more of that. Etc was the closest I guess.

I know it's not quite the same (since it's not a remix album per se) but Introspective has the same kind of vibe to Disco for me. Maybe it's just having 6 top drawer extended songs that does it. Electric might be a close 3rd for similar reasons - some lengthier tracks that pack a punch - maybe it should have only be a 6 track album too. Less is more...

Also same vibe with 'Relentless'

[Pj72BPSBFan]

Trying to think of tracks that others might not have included so far, some of my instant classics would be:
Two Divided by Zero
Later Tonight
One More Chance
I Want to Wake Up
I’m not Scared
Only the Wind
End of the World
Young Offender
It Always Comes As a Surprise
For Your Own Good
Closer to Heaven
Love is a Catastrophe
The Sodom & Gomorrah Show
Luna Park
More than a Dream
King of Rome
Invisible
Breathing Space
Fluorescent
The Dictator Decides
Into Thin Air
Hoping for a Miracle
Brick England

I tried to avoid classics such as singles, and classic b-sides. There are, of course, a stack of those and other album tracks that have been mentioned.

[Gabby]

Oh yes. Disco and Paninaro. All the songs on Disco were each a particular journey. Wished they'd done more of that. Etc was the closest I guess.

I know it's not quite the same (since it's not a remix album per se) but Introspective has the same kind of vibe to Disco for me. Maybe it's just having 6 top drawer extended songs that does it. Electric might be a close 3rd for similar reasons - some lengthier tracks that pack a punch - maybe it should have only be a 6 track album too. Less is more...

Also same vibe with 'Relentless'

good call!

[Andie]

In no particular order.
Paninaro
Heart
Always on my mind
The way it used to be
Kings Cross

[Morrie]

A splendid idea for a thread Drico - thank you.

As many have said, there are so many fine songs to choose from; we're spoiled for choice. And depending on the day and the emotion this list could be very different but there are some songs that, for me, are compositionally beautiful - and all strike a deeply resonant chord because they crystallise key periods of life:

Love comes quickly - The sentiment expressed in this song, that love happens to everyone, was very powerful and important on first hearing it in 1986 whilst living in a dark, lonely, legal, psychological, and social closet

A new life - An ode to escape and the promise of happiness somewhere and with someone else also reverberated loudly at the time this song came out

Being boring - On the cusp of moving to the UK, everything connected with this song expressed the opportunities that I hoped would occur during the rest of my life - and the possible costs

You choose - After making a personal decision that proved difficult and damaging, this clear-eyed exposition of the need to take responsibility for one's own decisions if one is to continue was a bracing wake-up call at the end of an album that soundtracked (self-inflicted) heartbreak

Twentieth Century - A song that doesn't appear to attract a huge amount of affection but affects me deeply as the lyrics encapsulate exquisitely the cost and consequence of decisions we make based on passion, whether personally or politically, and the closing section is utterly sublime, in my humble opinion

Invisible - Articulated with a wry beauty the confusion and curiosity that has come with ageing

Leaving - The release of this song coincided with the death of my father and the deterioration of my mother through dementia and held in less than four minutes both the sense of loss but also the legacy of everything they gave that will support my family through the remainder of our own lives.

Reviewing this list, the songs and the situations all appear sad - and, while there is a strong vein of sadness, the beauty, humanity and generosity of these songs have suffused each of these life-changing times with joy and happiness. So, thank you Pet Shop Boys.

[Drico One]

Another lovely, post. Welcome, Morrie.

[jamie1978]

Axis

[dbaseboy]

So many. I thought Inner Sanctum was. But Loneliness definitely is. Some have knocked it oddly, but honestly the more you hear it, the more it grows.

[Dog]

It’s a sin - this was the song that made me a fan. I was 11 years old, and had begun taping my favourite tracks from the radio to make my own Hits style compilations. It’s a sin grabbed my attention immediately, with its huge sound and all its many component parts… it sounded head and shoulders above anything else… I loved the sense of drama and the sinister subject matter. Move over Five Star, Pet Shop Boys were my new favourite pop group.

Two divided by zero - my love for It’s a sin sent me shopping for more similar fixes, and I found my all-time high in Please’s opening track. Those amazing clattering electro drums and that positively funky bassline… orchestral stabs, a talking calculator, the sounds of the city… and those achingly romantic lyrics about the prospect of running away… It was almost too much. Nearly 40 years later this track never fails to excite me.

Rent - Actually was the first PSB release I bought on release day and I was blown away by its depth and scope. I think at one time or another each track has settled as my favourite from the 10. But somehow Rent always managed to stand out - fast but slow; slow but fast… a love song with a twist… my kind of ballad… that aching electro backing… the lone trumpet in the outro… this one still gives me shivers.

Left to my own devices - I knew we were getting something different from this album and sat hunched over my double deck ghetto blaster to absorb the first play in full, aware already that such events were to be savoured. From the start, Left to my own devices raised the bar on what I might reasonably expect from my favourite group; they’d roped in what sounded like a cast of hundreds to bring to life their vision, and Neil’s off-the-top-of-his-head lyrics and vocal sealed the deal. What an absolute monster.

Dreaming of the Queen - on purchasing Very Relentless, the teenage me quickly decided this was it was the best thing he’d ever bought. But in an album of out and out hyperpop moments, Dreaming of the Queen was a jewel in the crown. “There are no more lovers left alive” just seemed such a heart breaking idea… and then immediately bringing it back to the personal: “Look, it’s happened to me and you”. Coupled with the beautiful, swirling strings, this was another track that left me in bits.

Up against it - with Before and Se a vida e both immediately failing to ignite my touch paper, I approached Bilingual with some trepidation. In fact I was out of the country when the album came out, on holiday with my girlfriend in Minorca… my friend and fellow fan Paul hatched a plan to mail the album out to me… we didn’t think it would come off, but sure enough, the cassette arrived at my hotel just a week later! Consequently I got to hear the album for the first time in a suitably sunny setting and quickly realised that my concerns were unfounded… Up against it immediately leapt out with all the components of a PSB classic… arguably Bilingual’s Very moment, tucked away mid side two, it still exudes an exquisite undefinable nonchalant brilliance. I love Neil’s orgasmic ooo-ooo-ooos.

I don’t know what you want but I can’t give it any more - now in the world of work, I had to resort to a radio under my desk to hear their first radio plays. I don’t know what you want ironically gave me everything I wanted from a lead single. For me this is a complete marriage of Moroder and Kraftwerk and I hear that every time I listen. The perfect mix of strings and beats and another example of Neil’s ability to make pop out of the extraordinary; the dramatic out of the mundane; extracting the universal from the personal. Still my favourite single.

London - what we might expect from Release had been well-trailed, and electronics didn’t seem to be top of the list, so London came as something of a surprise… a guitar ballad that quickly shrugs off its coat to reveal beats and subtle vocoder. For me, Chris Zippel is an unsung PSB hero and his work here particularly is outstanding.

Invisible - a teaser track before teaser tracks were such a thing, Invisible oozed its way across the internet and into my kitchen. The idea of Andrew Dawson as a producer had been intriguing and this first fruit made complete immediate sense of things, bringing happysad LA sunshine into my West Yorkshire home. Coupled with Brian Bress’s video, the package was peak PSB and straight into my top three tracks.

Will-o-the-wisp - from the early reviews Will-o-the-wisp was not what I was expecting from Hotspot’s opener and I was blown away from the word go. This was back to Two divided by zero territory - monster riffs coupled with escapist lyrics, a talky middle eight and possibly Neil’s down right sexiest vocal ever. A train ride never sounded so appealing.

[Drico One]

Yes, Will-o-the-wisp is my most recent instant classic. Of all of Hotspot's Berlin-related soundscapes, this is the one where Chris truly channels Fritz Lang in creating a rollicking serotonin-fuelled romp on the tracks of Metropolis. Living in Berlin, I felt the much vaunted "Berlin sound" was something of a myth on Hotspot, but Will-o-the-wisp captures something of this city in much the same way their most atmospheric songs capture something of London and New York.

Ever since Two Divided By Zero promised to spirit us away over New York's bridges and tunnels, our wandering protagonist has longed for escape. The train has so often been the romantic means of choice. The clackety-clack that accompanies us this time seems to set the rhythm of our growing excitement. To me, it's as if the "European train" of the wistful "In the Club or in the Queue" has finally stopped in Dreamland, and who is that we see in our carriage? Why, it’s our old friend, Unrequited Love, holding up surprisingly well “after many years.”

This has all the ingredients of classic Pet Shop Boys: yearning, nostalgia, escapism, no little wit, wry observation, intrigue, and there, lurking in the shadows, a soupçon of sleazy suggestiveness. Our protagonist may have escaped to Berlin, but he still hasn’t escaped his past – or his desires. He’s still searching and longing, still being misled.

This is a staggering opening to an album. However, from this lofty peak, the only way is down into the bowels of Berlin. How it wasn't a single, I'll never know...

Drico.

[TallThinMan]

I'm going to steer clear of the big singles even though most of them were instant classics for me, because plenty has already been written about them.

Later tonight - I think the first time I heard this delightful ballad may well have been a clip of the live Whistle Test performance during the 1988 'That was then, this is now' TV documentary in BBC 2's DEF II youth strand. Anyway, in amongst all the synths and electronics of the rest of 'Please' it sounded like Beethoven or something. Classy and almost classical. The minimalism of it was really appealing. A lovely palate cleanser before 'Why don't we live together?' I remember learning to play this song on my little home keyboard and being impressed by how great it sounded relative to how easy it was to play.

It must be obvious - Although I'd been a fan since 'West End girls', I didn't actually start buying the records until 'So hard'. As I was at school, my dad bought me the 7" during his lunch break on the day of its release. I was just as thrilled with this B-side as I was with the monster A-side. From the opening with its pounding 909 kick drum, the flight of the Von Trapps, the mad snare fills and the beautiful wistful spoken part at the end…it must be obvious that it’s got it all.

To face the truth - I was 16 years old and three months into studying for my A-levels when ‘Behaviour’ was released. It was the first Pet Shop Boys album campaign I’d followed from the start. I was of the age when my world was opening up in so many exciting and unexpected ways. One of these was a strange yearning feeling deep in the pit of my stomach when I saw a certain girl in the sixth form. Sadly, however I looked it was clear to see that I loved her more than she loved me. She also had a boyfriend who was vaguely a friend and who was bigger than I was. Such was my state of mental turmoil that the first few times I played this song in the privacy of my teenage bedroom I openly wept. I felt like a heartbroken Neil was there with me, going through unrequited love. I think this may well be the most underrated song in the entire PSB canon. It is perfect in every way.

Liberation - A wonderfully lush and impeccably formed song that captures the optimistic warm and sunny feeling of wellness that comes with requited love. At the time the computerised video somehow matched the pristine beauty of the music and was my favourite of the ‘Very’ videos.

The theatre - I’ve always been a sucker for a big, over-the-top production and I’m hard pressed to think of anyone who does it better than Pet Shop Boys. Pretty much every song on ‘Very’ is epic, but this one takes it a notch even higher. There’s something about the backing vocals in the chorus that’s always put me in mind of ‘Carmina Burana’, which some of you of a certain age might know better as the music from the Old Spice aftershave advert with the surfer cresting the wall of water. Just listen to that timpani roll in the final chorus! And I’ve always liked the reversal of who’s catching whose eye in the final verse.