On February 28 the Pet Shop Boys begin a short, four-concert Russian tour, visiting Moscow and St. Petersburg, inspired by their visit to St. Petersburg to see Brian Eno the previous summer. In Moscow they perform twice in one night, once in a large arena then later in the middle of an over-crowded nightclub. The local media ask them whether they speak Russian, “We’re very good at saying ‘nyet’,” they explain.
On April 13, Twentieth Century Blues: The Songs of Noel Coward is released. It is an album of Noel Coward songs covered by contemporary musicians, co-compiled by Neil, who has been working on it for the past eighteen months. He has loved Noel Coward’s music since he first heard it in about 1970. “I think as a songwriter he’s slightly underrated,” Neil says, “simply because his plays are so famous, and people forget.” The Pet Shop Boys do a version of “Sail Away”, and amongst the other interpreters are Elton John, Paul McCartney, Suede, Robbie Williams and the Divine Comedy. “We tried to choose artists,” Neil explains, “who somehow seem to be in the Noel Coward tradition of wit, theatrically and style.” To promote the album, Neil appeared along on TFI Friday where he sang along with a busker playing Pet Shop Boys songs on an acoustic guitar.
At the request of their former American record company, the Pet Shop Boys agreed to the release of ‘Essential Pet Shop Boys’, a compilation of early Pet Shop Boys songs recorded between 1985 — 1990, including a number of rare remixes, as part of a series of limited edition CDs by other artists.
At the behest of director Gus Van Sant, the Pet Shop Boys wrote a new song, with Tom Stephan, at extremely short notice for the soundtrack of Van Sant’s remake of ‘Psycho’. It is called “Screaming”. “It’s about an obsessive fan, written from the obsessive fan’s point of view,” Neil says. “Or actually just by someone obsessed with someone who doesn’t love them.”
After Neil and Chris help pay for a gay-supportive anti-Clause 28 newspaper ad, a spokesperson tells the Daily Mirror that ‘they support a variety of causes.’
The Boys perform in Berlin.
Neil finishes recording vocals for ‘Fugitive.’
The Pet Shop Boys had been nominated for two 2006 Grammy Awards—Best Dance/Electronic Album (Fundamental) and Best Dance Single (‘I’m with Stupid’)—but lose out to Madonna (Confessions on a Dance Floor) and Justin Timberlake (‘Sexy Back’), respectively.
Chris appears as a witness at St. Pancras Coroner’s Court in London during the inquest into the death of PSB friend and assistant Dainton Connell in an automobile accident the previous October in Moscow. He testifies how he’d seen Dainton only shortly before the accident at a dinner celebrating his (Chris’s) birthday.
Despite that he’s suffering from a nasty bout of either food poisoning or stomach flu, Neil is interviewed via telephone for a radio show on various subjects, including the upcoming new album Yes, the BRITS Awards, and submitting a song shortly before Christmas to Shirley Bassey, who’s in the process of recording a new album of her own.
They begin writing a new song titled ‘Vocal.’
Just as they had attended the first ‘preview’ show nearly a week earlier, both Chris and Neil attend the ‘official’ opening night performance of the second London run of Musik.
Neil posts on the official PSB website that he has just received the COVID vaccine.