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.”
The Boys perform at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C.
They perform ‘Liberation’ on Top of the Pops. David Walliams and Matt Lucas—who would later gain fame in Little Britain and still later guest-star in the PSB video for ‘I’m with Stupid’—are in the audience.
The Originals, a triple-CD repackaging of three PSB albums (Please, Actually, and Behaviour), is released in Europe.
Chris and Neil work with Pete Gleadall on a possible single edit of ‘No Time for Tears.’ Afterward they visit the National Film Theatre, where they run into singer Will Young.
They finish work in the studio on the song ‘After the Event,’ which they had originally written roughly four years before during the Fundamental sessions. They now plan to use it as a bonus track on one of the singles from Yes.
The second staging at Sadler’s Wells Theatre in London of The Most Incredible Thing completes its two-week run. The production will now prepare to travel to Sankt Pölten, Austria for two performances there the following weekend.
Neil and Chris fly from London to the San Francisco Bay area in anticipation of their concert the following evening in Oakland.