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 conclusion airs tonight of a two-part The O Zone special on BBC1 focusing on the Pet Shop Boys.
‘Paninaro ‘95’ falls from #4 to #6 on the Latvian radio airplay chart.
Neil, Chris, and the Dresdner Sinfoniker perform the Potemkin score in Berlin.
The Boys perform ‘Love etc.’ on the U.S. NBC TV show Late Night with Jimmy Fallon—although, since their appearance runs after midnight in all U.S. locations, it’s technically the next day, September 5.
The Electric Tour comes to Gdańsk, Poland.
Neil and Chris are in Glasgow, Scotland in preparation for their concert there the following evening.
Their website reports that they are currently on holiday following their summer tour, but will soon be back in the studio writing and recording their next album with producer Stuart Price. It adds that they’ve already written 21 new songs.
The Boys listen to Stuart Price’s remix of ‘Dreamland’ and later work with Mark Farrow on the album booklet artwork for Hotspot.