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.”
The Pet Shop Boys perform in Irvine, California.
They perform ‘Miracles’ at a live televised ‘AIDS Gala’ in Berlin.
They kick off a Latin American ‘mini-tour’ at the Altos de Chavon in the Dominican Republic.
Neil gets a haircut at Bill’s Downtown Barbers in Denver. That evening they perform at Denver’s Paramount Theatre. Meanwhile, an exhibition of portraits of the Pet Shop Boys opens at the National Portrait Gallery in London.
Chris and Neil attend a Rufus Wainwright concert at Hammersmith Apollo. Backstage after the show, Rufus presents Neil with a gold record for Rufus’s album Release the Stars, which had been executive-produced by Neil.
The Boys are guests on Graham Norton’s BBC2 radio show. Along the way, Chris chooses to play Eric Carmen’s ‘All by Myself,’ Neil chooses The Church’s ‘Under the Milky Way’ and says that a revival of Closer to Heaven is under consideration, and they state that they’re not planning to retire but that Chris would like to take a bit of a break. Of course, their brand new single ‘Together’ is also played.