On March 19 two books by Chris Heath – Literally from 1990, and Pet Shop Boys versus America from 1993 – were reissued by the Penguin imprint Cornerstone, completely redesigned by Farrow design, and new introductions and afterwords written by the Pet Shop Boys and Chris Heath.
On April 21, Discovery, the film of the Pet Shop Boys 1994 South American tour – “the tour I enjoyed the most,” Chris notes – is released on DVD, accompanied by the release for the first time of a CD of their performance.
On May 7, a new Pet Shop Boys song, the ten-minute “Cricket wife”, is released on CD (accompanied by “West End girls (New lockdown version)”) with the periodical Annually 2021. “Cricket wife”, written during lockdown, began as an extended piece of music created by Chris. “My mum asked me if I would write a piece of classical music for her,” he explains. “I thought, ‘Well, I’ve got nothing else better to do.’ ‘Classical’ in inverted commas, obviously – I’m no classical composer. In the style of classical music.” When Neil received it, it struck him that it might fit a poem he had written some years before. “It’s really about my parents,” he says. “My father played cricket for many years.”
On December 26, the Pet Shop Boys host a three-hour radio show, Pet Shop Boys, Takeover, on BBC Radio 2 between 9pm and midnight, playing a selection of favourite songs; a broadcast also billed by Radio 2 as “Neil and Chris’s Unpredictable Party Playlist”. (The show has been pre-recorded on the afternoon of December 13.) The Pet Shop Boys have recorded five new jingles for the show, titled “Takeover”, “Strings”, “Beautiful”, “Boxing Day” and “Electric”, and introduce a joyously eclectic selection of music, including records by Matt Monro, Alcazar, Paul Weller (their recent remix of his song “Cosmic Fringes”), Gloria Ann Taylor, Eric Prydz, Françoise Hardy and The 1975. “We’ve only ever done radio when we can play records that we want,” says Chris. “I love doing radio. There’s something very satisfying about broadcasting to the nation.”
BPI awards a U.K. gold record to Very. This same evening, Chris and Neil appear on BBC2’s The O Zone, talking to interviewer Andi Peters about the album.
Kylie Minogue’s eponymous album, featuring ‘Falling,’ written by the Pet Shop Boys, debuts on the U.K. chart at its #4 peak.
After watching part of the remake of Psycho, the Boys rewrite ‘Screaming.’
They perform live at the MTV Designerama Show in Berlin.
Johnny Marr is back in the studio recording guitar parts, this time for ‘Building a Wall,’ ‘More Than a Dream,’ ‘Pandemonium,’ and ‘Did You See Me Coming?’
The Pet Shop Boys perform at the Auditorio Nacional in Mexico City.
The U.S. premiere of the Boys’ musical Closer to Heaven opens this evening, staged by the Uptown Players at the Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas. It’s scheduled to run a little over three weeks.
In Berlin, they start work on a new track, ‘Bolshy.’ Neil also does a telephone interview with the MTV Style website.
Neil and Chris arrive in Seattle to begin (with a show there the following evening) the North American West Coast leg of their Electric Tour.
After having spent most of the past month in Los Angeles working with Stuart Price on their next album (soon to be titled Super), the Boys fly back to London.
The Super Tour comes to Monterrey, Mexico.