Track-by-Track: From Please to Nonetheless

[NotInvisible]

I mean we're going to get onto crossing that line with the next track but your point about your 21-year-old self being rather underwhelmed by them is key. If their own fanbase who'd grown up with them weren't that bothered, the new pop kids certainly weren't going to get into them.

I guess enough of them did do put Very at #1 and wring out a few Top 10 hits, but yeah, music was changing away from synth pop and Neil turned 40 that year. There's always an expiration date for pop. If you're lucky, you get the "not really charting anymore, but still part of the culture" era like McCartney, Elton and Bruce. I don't really see this as a problem.

What I find interesting are the groups that somehow don't wrestle with this - nobody complains about Saint Etienne being failures on some level because they couldn't crack the Top 10.

[markus]

I mean we're going to get onto crossing that line with the next track but your point about your 21-year-old self being rather underwhelmed by them is key. If their own fanbase who'd grown up with them weren't that bothered, the new pop kids certainly weren't going to get into them.

I guess enough of them did do put Very at #1 and wring out a few Top 10 hits, but yeah, music was changing away from synth pop

Erasure managed to squeeze in a final super hit with Always in 1994 by simply releasing a great song they wrote themselves. I’ve often wondered what might have happened if the Pet Shop Boys had been a bit more daring and just released their best tracks—maybe something from Relentless—instead of letting old fossils at EMI dictate the rules, or whatever compromise between band and label led to those choices.
They clearly didn’t pick the most worthy or hit-ready songs in the last few years when they still had a real chance to stay contemporary. Once the hits stopped, they were quickly labelled an “80s band.”
Getting Jam & Spoon to remix a single reeked of desperation and was totally unnecessary. They already had strong dance tracks that could have worked perfectly on MTV’s Party Zone and helped them get a real foot into 90s rave and dance culture, where they belonged.
If Love Were All, even as a B-side, feels more like taking the piss from a commercial point of view than anything else. Frankly, nobody wanted their musical numbers. With that attitude, it does make you wonder how much effort they really put into the A-sides.

[NotInvisible]

Erasure managed to squeeze in a final super hit with Always in 1994 by simply releasing a great song they wrote themselves.

Yep - but then they drop off a cliff right after, for the reasons outlined above.

I’ve often wondered what might have happened if the Pet Shop Boys had been a bit more daring and just released their best tracks—maybe something from Relentless—instead of letting old fossils at EMI dictate the rules, or whatever compromise between band and label led to those choices.

They probably wouldn't have had three Top 10 hits in the Very era if they were putting out Dreaming of the Queen and The Man Who Has Everything, though. Singles need radio play, and that's a specific art.

They clearly didn’t pick the most worthy or hit-ready songs in the last few years when they still had a real chance to stay contemporary.

There's obviously no connection between song quality and chart hits, though.

Once the hits stopped, they were quickly labelled an “80s band.”

Were they ever really labeled an '80s band? I don't think so. They never really went away, and it's worth remember they were still landing songs inside the Top 20 through 2009.

Getting Jam & Spoon to remix a single reeked of desperation and was totally unnecessary.

Not really - it was perfectly on brand for the group that had The KLF do a remix.

If Love Were All, even as a B-side, feels more like taking the piss from a commercial point of view than anything else. Frankly, nobody wanted their musical numbers.

Their last musical number was a Top 10 hit - and so was their next one. A b-side is exactly where you put non-commercial tracks.

[Disco.]

And now they have 10 million listeners on Spotify, not bad at all !

[markus]

And now they have 10 million listeners on Spotify, not bad at all !

Sounds impressive on paper, but most of those listeners are there for the same Big Five tracks, as if they’re on a safari— the familiar hits everyone already knows. They only go to the concerts for the same reason.

[NotInvisible]

Sounds impressive on paper, but most of those listeners are there for the same Big Five tracks, as if they’re on a safari— the familiar hits everyone already knows. They only go to the concerts for the same reason.

Your telepathy is on the blink again.

[Drico One]

And now they have 10 million listeners on Spotify, not bad at all !

Sounds impressive on paper, but most of those listeners are there for the same Big Five tracks, as if they’re on a safari— the familiar hits everyone already knows. They only go to the concerts for the same reason.

That's the very definition of success, though: having a clutch of culture-defining hits that you can dine out forever on.

[NotInvisible]

That's the very definition of success, though: having a clutch of culture-defining hits that you can dine out forever on.

I always think of someone like Dolly or Cher, who nobody would claim are unsuccessful and yet the average person can count the songs they know on one hand. They still show up anyway - not just to hear those songs live, but to see someone they like perform.

[markus]

And now they have 10 million listeners on Spotify, not bad at all !

Sounds impressive on paper, but most of those listeners are there for the same Big Five tracks, as if they’re on a safari— the familiar hits everyone already knows. They only go to the concerts for the same reason.

That's the very definition of success, though: having a clutch of culture-defining hits that you can dine out forever on.

Did Lady Gaga name her album ARTPOP, inspired by the Pet Shop Boys? I’d like to think so. By studying their career alongside Madonna’s, perhaps she learned something from their mistakes. She’s defying all the rules that say you’re only allowed an imperial phase for a few years before leaving the stage for someone younger.

[Drico One]

I mean we're going to get onto crossing that line with the next track but your point about your 21-year-old self being rather underwhelmed by them is key. If their own fanbase who'd grown up with them weren't that bothered, the new pop kids certainly weren't going to get into them. It was a really exciting time for music - loads of dance music, exciting europop and indie was still really good and hadn't yet been Oasis-ed.

When the TOTP repeats were on, I remember that No Good by The Prodigy was out at the same time as Ab Fab. No contest, Neil darling.

https://www.officialcharts.com/charts/s ... 0605/7501/

The Prodigy were a good example of those newer acts that were, merely by existing, condemning Pet Shop Boys to technological obsolescence - at least in terms of perception. As much as I loved No Good and Out Of Space, I always favoured the Pets because it wasn't simply about the tech for me. It wasn't just the synths - almost a passé concept in 1994. They still had the one thing the Prodigy and all the other new kids on the block simply didn't: the songs. But strip away the song - as happened in Absolutely Fabulous - and you've got an old man's 2 Unlimited. Worse, they sounded like they were sneering at 2 Unlimited...

Perhaps it was Relentless that underlined this disappointment for me. That record was as exciting as anything in the charts of 1994. But when Neil and Chris decided to put a "dance track" out as a single, they gave us a camp little joke rather than something like Forever In Love - which, of course, was right down my street at 21 and, I suspect, would have made the top 10 with the required remixing. Didn't it even have the same sample that the Prodigy used in No Good the year after?

We're about to get on to Absolutely fabulous, but I think my issue isn't even with that on its own terms. I just felt that having made such a spectacular comeback in 1993 after the early 90s years of fear, they had a chance to push on and copper-fasten their presence in the front line of pop. And they threw it away with safe, unremarkable singles and a really naff charidee effort, thereby incinerating their manifesto in the process. For an old-school fan, that was...disorientating. In that sense, it's no wonder I thought not doing the Take That duet was a mistake. Objecting on the basis of naffness didn't really hold too much water after the pastry chef costumes...and they'd have had a proper hit with Barlow and the dancers. But we're a long way from The Prodigy now...

Drico.

[Drico One]

That's the very definition of success, though: having a clutch of culture-defining hits that you can dine out forever on.

I always think of someone like Dolly or Cher, who nobody would claim are unsuccessful and yet the average person can count the songs they know on one hand. They still show up anyway - not just to hear those songs live, but to see someone they like perform.

Exactly. As Neil said, you can headline Glastonbury with 8 songs that everyone knows. The Pets have at least 10.

Drico.

[NotInvisible]

Did Lady Gaga name her album ARTPOP, inspired by the Pet Shop Boys? I’d like to think so. By studying their career alongside Madonna’s, perhaps she learned something from their mistakes. She’s defying all the rules that say you’re only allowed an imperial phase for a few years before leaving the stage for someone younger.

Gaga isn't in her imperial phase anymore. How much music history do you know, anyway?

[markus]

Did Lady Gaga name her album ARTPOP, inspired by the Pet Shop Boys? I’d like to think so. By studying their career alongside Madonna’s, perhaps she learned something from their mistakes. She’s defying all the rules that say you’re only allowed an imperial phase for a few years before leaving the stage for someone younger.

Gaga isn't in her imperial phase anymore. How much music history do you know, anyway?

Yes she is.

[markus]

I mean we're going to get onto crossing that line with the next track but your point about your 21-year-old self being rather underwhelmed by them is key. If their own fanbase who'd grown up with them weren't that bothered, the new pop kids certainly weren't going to get into them. It was a really exciting time for music - loads of dance music, exciting europop and indie was still really good and hadn't yet been Oasis-ed.

When the TOTP repeats were on, I remember that No Good by The Prodigy was out at the same time as Ab Fab. No contest, Neil darling.

https://www.officialcharts.com/charts/s ... 0605/7501/

The Prodigy were a good example of those newer acts that were, merely by existing, condemning Pet Shop Boys to technological obsolescence - at least in terms of perception. As much as I loved No Good and Out Of Space, I always favoured the Pets because it wasn't simply about the tech for me. It wasn't just the synths - almost a passé concept in 1994. They still had the one thing the Prodigy and all the other new kids on the block simply didn't: the songs. But strip away the song - as happened in Absolutely Fabulous - and you've got an old man's 2 Unlimited. Worse, they sounded like they were sneering at 2 Unlimited...

Perhaps it was Relentless that underlined this disappointment for me. That record was as exciting as anything in the charts of 1994. But when Neil and Chris decided to put a "dance track" out as a single, they gave us a camp little joke rather than something like Forever In Love - which, of course, was right down my street at 21 and, I suspect, would have made the top 10 with the required remixing. Didn't it even have the same sample that the Prodigy used in No Good the year after?

Other classic 90s hits like Hold That Sucker Down by OT Quartet and Café del Mar by Energy 52 are so much Chris Lowe's territory that I wondered if he secretly wrote them under an alias. Pet Shop Boys could have easily found a second life on those Ministry of Sound compilation albums.

[leesmapman]

I was surprised to hear If Love Were All at a Rufus Wainwright gig years ago. I wonder if Neil suggested the track to him.

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