Pet Shop Boys Community

Yeah, there are several PSB tracks that reference the homeless, but I'm baffled by how anyone can listen to The Theatre and miss the actual subject of the song. It's right there: "It's another world here, below shop windows" and more explicitly "we're the bums you step over as you leave the theatre".

Pavarotti in the park
Then you walked back up the Strand
Did you catch my eye?

You never heard of cruising?

Did you catch my eye? is purely about how avoiding eye contact with beggars.

Neil is gay. After coming out his lyrics stopped being subtle about it. So the truth must be the truth unvarnished in its telling.

Neil is fully capable of writing about non-gay things.

If we discover in his autobiography he picks up street beggars on the way home from Les Misérables, I'll stand corrected.

jasonjohn wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 12:16 am Neil is fully capable of writing about non-gay things.

If we discover in his autobiography he picks up street beggars on the way home from Les Misérables, I'll stand corrected.

So am I.

The next track on Very is a generic pop song as far as I'm concerned. And I can't for my life come up with anything intresting to say about it. It'a all yours jasonjohn.

markus wrote: Tue 09 Dec 2025, 8:54 pm Pavarotti in the park
Then you walked back up the Strand
Did you catch my eye?

You never heard of cruising?

Of course, and in a song about cruising, that line would mean something specific. But The Theatre is very clearly a song about homelessness, the line in context is referring to the way we often go out of our way not to catch their gaze. Do you honestly believe Neil is pausing his tone poem on homeless youth to remark on cruising? Jesus Christ, we really do live in the dumbest possible timeline.

NotInvisible wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 1:26 am

markus wrote: Tue 09 Dec 2025, 8:54 pm Pavarotti in the park
Then you walked back up the Strand
Did you catch my eye?

You never heard of cruising?

Of course, and in a song about cruising, that line would mean something specific. But The Theatre is very clearly a song about homelessness, the line in context is referring to the way we often go out of our way not to catch their gaze. Do you honestly believe Neil is pausing his tone poem on homeless youth to remark on cruising? Jesus Christ, we really do live in the dumbest possible timeline.

You haven't provided a proper point of view with valid arguments on how the song's clearly about homelesness, unlike I did with my explanation.

markus wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 1:37 am You haven't provided a proper point of view with valid arguments on how the song's clearly about homelesness, unlike I did with my explanation.

Shall we refer to the source? From the Very Further Listening liner notes:
I lived in London in the early 90s and I confess I stepped over, rushed past and refused to make eye contact with these folk on many occasions, and there were LOADS of them. They were problematic enough to get a specific mention in the Somewhere documentary - about having to keep a particular exit of the Savoy Theatre closed at all times because of the smell from the homeless. Oh, the irony.

No doubt some of them were smalltown boys pushed out of their homes for being gay but the primary focus of this song is homelessness.

petshopgrrl wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 4:41 am

markus wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 1:37 am You haven't provided a proper point of view with valid arguments on how the song's clearly about homelesness, unlike I did with my explanation.

Shall we refer to the source? From the Very Further Listening liner notes:

very-fl-the-theatre.jpg

No doubt some of them were smalltown boys pushed out of their homes for being gay but the primary focus of this song is homelessness.

Yes, obviously it's the pirmary message, no doubt about it. The user notinvisible just feels the world reached a new level of dumbness because someone offers a second layer of interpretation. Seems like trolling rather than discussing.

I remember what I heard first time listening to the lyrics, they were "how erotic in the park...when you walk up to the strand"

markus wrote: Wed 10 Dec 2025, 5:16 am Yes, obviously it's the pirmary message, no doubt about it. The user notinvisible just feels the world reached a new level of dumbness because someone offers a second layer of interpretation. Seems like trolling rather than discussing.

I remember what I heard first time listening to the lyrics, they were "how erotic in the park...when you walk up to the strand"

There is definitely some weapons-grade trolling going on in this thread today. Good, well I'm glad we've cleared that up - primary focus is homelessness, and gay darkness is your particular interpretation, probably influenced by that misheard lyric there.

*Sigh*

Did One in a million get its moment in the sun yet? Is it time to move on?

telys wrote: Tue 09 Dec 2025, 3:00 pm Neil's got a soft spot for the homeless? Good to know...

…

In I Get Excited:
We're both in the gutter but we're looking at the stars

That particular lyric is actually a paraphrase of an Oscar Wilde quote.

NotInvisible wrote: Mon 08 Dec 2025, 9:00 pm

markus wrote: Sun 07 Dec 2025, 9:20 pmDreaming of the queen and The theater were the strongest tracks after the 3 first singles, right? But both containing too much gay darkness Parlophone perhaps thought.

What is the "gay darkness" in The Theatre?

In any case, I can't see either of those playing on the radio in 1994. In what reality is The Theatre (a song I adore) a Top 20 hit? Did we really expect Dreaming of the Queen (another song I love) to perform better than Liberation (a song I don't really like, but I can see why it was a single)? Really?

NOBODY75 wrote: Mon 08 Dec 2025, 3:54 pm I think that with a number 1 album and a number 2 single, the chart position of the third single proves it wasn't the right single.

I can't agree with this at all. Post-album singles almost always perform worse, because you already have the album. Which is why Absolutely Fabulous rocketed to #6 between the later singles.

This, of course, is why post-album singles were being released in remixed single edits: Heart, I wouldn't normally do this kind of thing, Yesterday, when I was mad, A red letter day. It encouraged fans who had already bought the album to still buy those singles.

(Probably wouldn't count Suburbia in that list, as the single version is just so clearly better, and would, I'm sure, have been the version they wanted on Please given additional time in working on the debut).