February 1986
On February 24th, ‘Love comes quickly’, which will remain one of their favourite songs, is released, reaching a disappointing #19 in the UK.
History
March 1986
On March 24th, their first LP ‘Please’ is released. “It’s so people can go into the record shop and say can I have the Pet Shop Boys album, please?”.
April 1986
‘West End girls’ reaches #1 in USA.
May 1986
On May 19th a new version of ‘Opportunities’ is released. “The point of that song is that the humour is black, it’s like a joke. The impression is that the people in it are not going to make any money”.
June 1986
The Pet Shop Boys announce, then cancel, a tour of Europe and America; the cost of using a theatre designer and playing fairly small venues proves prohibitive.
September 1986
On September 22nd, a re-recorded version of ‘Suburbia’, a song inspired by the Penelope Spheeris film of the same name about a group of disenchanted rebellious youths in suburban Los Angeles, is released. “It’s about a riot happening in some decaying suburb. It’s just the description of the riot happening and then the aftermath”. On the B‑side is the first version of ‘Paninaro’, named after an Italian youth cult and featuring a quote they both liked that Chris had said on a TV show: “I don’t like country and western, I don’t like rock music, I don’t like rockabilly… I don’t like much really, do I? But what I do like, I love passionately”.
November 1986
On November 17th ‘Disco’, an LP of disco remixes, is released.
On this day
1986
With ‘West End Girls’ entering the U.S. Top 40, Neil and Chris fly from London to New York on the Concorde.
1991
The Boys, in London, take part in shooting the video for ‘Where the Streets Have No Name (I Can’t Take My Eyes Off You).’
2007
‘She’s Madonna’ is released as a single, credited to ‘Robbie Williams with Pet Shop Boys.’
2017
An exhibition by German photographer/artist Wolfgang Tillmans (who had previously created the ‘Home and Dry’ music video for the Boys) has been at the Tate Modern gallery in London since mid-February. Today, as a special one-day event, it features a ‘sound installation’ described as ‘a reconstruction of ‘It’s a Sin’ by the Pet Shop Boys,’ which gradually builds, over the course of more than 2½ hours, from a single drum track through 30 layers that make up the entire recording. This ‘reconstruction’ occurs twice today.
- Facts collated by geowayne.com