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.”
Exactly one week after filming the ‘U.S. scenes’ for their ‘Suburbia’ music video, the Boys are in Kingston-upon-Thames to film its ‘U.K. portions.’
Alternative debuts on the U.S. album chart at its #103 peak.
As part of their ongoing research for writing their musical, Chris and Neil watch videos of Annie, Oliver!, and Carousel.
Neil records background vocals no fewer than forty times for ‘The Sodom and Gomorrah Show,’ creating a falsetto chorus of ‘Sun, sex, sin, death, and destruction.’
The Pet Shop Boys perform at the State Theater in Minneapolis.
They perform the first of two consecutive nights’ shows at the Beacon Theater on Broadway in New York City.
‘Say It to Me’ is released as a single. The Boys also appear as guests on Chris Evans’s morning show on BBC Radio 2.
The London luxury fashion house Burberry uses a full program of PSB music for its September 2017 show this afternoon. Meanwhile, one day after the PSB show at Rock in Rio, Neil and their musical assistant Pete Gleadall are robbed while out taking a walk in Rio de Janeiro. Reports differ: some say that they were mugged at knifepoint, but Neil himself states on their website that merely his pocket was picked and he lost his iPhone.