Questions
About Pet Shop Boys
When and where did Neil and Chris meet?
How did they come to the name Pet Shop Boys?
Is Chris HIV+?
Who are Jonathan King and Roger Scruton?
Partial list of PSB synthesizers
About songs
What songs have PSB covered or remixed?
What PSB songs have been covered?
What's said at the end of the song It's A Sin?
In which songs is it possible to hear Chris?
In which songs does Neil play the guitar?
Songs based on classic compositions
Songs with literate links
Tracks mistakenly attributed to PSB on internet
About lyrics
Persons mentioned by name in lyrics
Terms and names in lyrics
Others
What sheet music have PSB (not) released?
Where can I find more MIDI files, chords and sheet music?
How can I get in touch with fans and get access to information about PSB?
Why is this site called "at dead of night"?
About PSB
When and where did Neil and Chris meet?
On August 19, 1981, in an electro-shop on King's Road in London. They found out that they both are interested in dance music and started to write together.
How did they come to the name Pet Shop Boys?
The name is derived from a pet shop in Ealing (UK), where worked Chris' friends. PSB were originally called West End (a district in London).
Is Chris HIV+?
No. In 1995, speculation appeared in popular press - because of death of Peter Andreas (1963 - 1994; the album Alternative is dediacted to him) on AIDS - that Chris is HIV positive. PSB won a lawsuit, but the libel lasts.
Who are Jonathan King and Roger Scruton?
Jonathan King accused PSB of plagiarism after they had released the single It's A Sin (1987). He later apologised and paid damages to a charity at their request.
Roger Scruton, British author and philosopher, wrote in his book called An Intelligent Person's Guide To Modern Culture (1998), that "sometimes, as with the Spice Girls or the Pet Shop Boys, serious doubts arise as to whether the performers made more than a minimal contribution to the recording, which owes its trade mark to subsequent sound engineering, designed precisely to make it unrepeatable". PSB asked Scruton to apologise and remove the passage from the book. He refused and PSB issued proceedings for libel. Scruton and his publishers backed down, a statement was read out in court and damages of £ 10 000 were paid.
Partial list of PSB synthesizers:
Akai S1000 Sampler, Alesis A6 Andromeda, E-Mu Emulator, E-Mu Emulator II,
E-Mu Emulator II+, E-Mu Proteus 1, Fairlight CMI Series II, Fairlight CMI Series III,
Korg MIR, Korg Prophecy, Korg Triton, Kurzweil, Nord Electro, Nord Lead 2, Nord Lead 3,
Oberheim Matrix 1000, Oberheim OB8, PPG Modular Synthesizer 300, PPG Wave 2.2, PPG Wave 2.3,
Prophet 5, Roland 700 Series, Roland PC-200 MKII, Roland A-50, Roland AlphaJuno 1,
Roland JD-800, Roland JP-8000, Roland Juno-106, Roland Jupiter-8, Roland JX-10,
Roland MKS50, Roland MKS80, Roland P300, Roland U110, Studio Electronics Midimoog,
Waldorf MicroWave, Yamaha DX1, Yamaha DX7.
About songs
(detailed information on this subject are available in regularly updated Lazlo's (Gaertner's) discography)
What songs have PSB covered or remixed?
Always On My Mind
What Keeps Mankind Alive
It's Alright
Losing My Mind
Where The Streets Have No Name
I Can't Take My Eyes Off You (part)
The Crying Game (production for Boy George)
Go West
Mr. Vain (part) *
Rhythm Of The Night (part) *
I Will Survive (part) *
Girls & Boys (remix and additional production for Blur)
If Love Were All
Hallo Spaceboy (production for Davida Bowieho)
Saturday Night (only a different vocal - Neil Tennant)
Somewhere
Sixteen Going On Seventeen *
Climb Every Mountain *
It's Not Unusual *
Song For A Guy & Believe (with Elton John) *
Sail Away
Je T'aime...Moi Non Plus (producion for Sam Taylor-Wood)
Homosexuality *
Break 4 Love (only a vocal - Neil Tennant)
Do Anything You Wanna Do *
Philadelphia *
Coverversions marked * haven't been released
What PSB songs have been covered?
A total number is obviously untraceable. Here is a list of at least some of them. More detailed list is available in regurarly updated Lazlo's (Gaertner's) discography)
It's A Sin - Gamma Ray
Being Boring - Merril Bainbridge
Rent - Carter USM
West End Girls - East 17
I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind Of Thing - Robbie Williams
Jealousy - Dubstar
You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You're Drunk - Arab Strap
So Hard - Momus
What's said in the end of the song It's A Sin?
Confiteor Deo omnipotenti vobis fratres, quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, verbo, opere
et omissione, mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.
English translation: "I confess to Almighty God and to you oh brothers, that I have sinned greatly in
thought, in word, in deed, and in ommission, my guilt, my guilt, my greatest guilt!"
In which songs is it possible to hear Chris?
Paninaro
I Want A Dog
It's Alright
One Of The Crowd
We All Feel Better In The Dark
Music For Boys
Postscript (the 13th track on CD Very - after Go West)
Euroboy
Paninaro '95
Metamorphosis
Somewhere (extended mix)
Happiness Is An Option
Radiophonic
Lies
Home And Dry
In which songs does Neil play the guitar?
Domino Dancing
It Must Be Obvious
How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?
The End Of The World
The Truck-driver And His Mate
Hit And Miss
You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You're Drunk
Boy Strange
Out Of My System
Home And Dry
I Get Along
Birthday Boy
and probably the bass-guitar in I Want a Lover
Songs based on classic compositions
Delusions Of Grandeur
The chord progression is derived from the first movement Ludwig van Beethoven's 1802 work
Piano Sonata Opus 27 No. 2, better known as the Moonlight Sonata. In fact, the Boys' pre-lyric
working title for the track was "Moonlight."
Go West
Courtesy of the Village People, the chord progression and melody of this song are derived from the well-known Canon in D by the 17th-century German composer Johann Pachelbel.
Happiness Is An Option
The music playing behind the spoken verses is from Russian composer Sergey Rachmaninoff's 1915 work Vocalise.
Jack The Lad
Neil describes the opening piano motif as "a pastiche of Erik Satie", and indeed that as well as the song's overall chord progression are highly reminiscent of Gymnopedie Number 1 - one of the Trois Gymnopedies written in 1887 by French composer Satie.
A Red Letter Day
The chord structure comes from the choral "Ode to Joy" in the fourth movement of Beethoven's Symphony Number 9 in D Minor (1824).
Liberation
This one stretches it, but Neil has noted that the first two notes of this song - "just the first two notes" - were taken from the theme for Friar Lawrence in the ballet Romeo and Juliet by the twentieth-century Ukrainian/Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev.
Songs with literate references
Being Boring
The title and spirit of this song were inspired by a line from a 1922 article written by Zelda Fitzgerald (wife of the American author F. Scott Fitzgerald) - "...she refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn't boring."
Can You Forgive Her?
The title is borrowed from an 1864 novel by the British author Anthony Trollope.
Don Juan
The legend of the amoral Spanish nobleman received its earliest known literary treatment more than 350 years ago in a drama written by Gabriel Tellez, using the pseudonym Tirso de Molina.
I Get Excited (You Get Excited Too)
The line "We're lying in the gutter, but we're looking at the stars" is a paraphrase of Oscar Wilde, who actually wrote "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars" in his 1892 play Lady Windermere's Fan.
It Couldn't Happen Here
A slight variation on It Can't Happen Here, the title of a 1935 novel by American author Sinclair Lewis.
Jack The Lad
The line "To feast with panthers every night" is again adapted from Oscar Wilde, who in his 1897 apologia De Profundis wrote of his scandalous life: "It was like feasting with panthers. The danger was half the excitement."
To Step Aside
The title is borrowed from a 1939 collection of short stories by Noël Coward.
Up Against It
Not only is the title borrowed from that of an unfinished screenplay by British playwright Joe Orton, but the lyrics make passing reference to another twentieth-century British playright, Harold Pinter.
Yesterday, When I Was Mad
There's a bit of uncertainty about this one. The opening exclamation, "Darling, you were wonderful!" may be taken from a reference in The Orton Diaries by Joe Orton - which Neil is known to have bought and read while on tour in 1989 - or perhaps from the title of a 1990 play by Derek Lomas, Darlings, You Were Wonderful, which itself may be borrowed from Orton. Then again, it's certainly not inconceivable that someone actually did say those words to Neil regarding their Performance show, inspiring him to use them in this song.
Your Funny Uncle
The lines near the end of the song beginning "To wipe away the tears" and ending "These former things have passed away" are adapted from the Bible - Revelation 21:4 to be precise: "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."
Tracks mistakenly attributed to PSB on the Internet
Bizarre Love Triangle (1986) by New Order
I Wanna Be A Cowboy (1986) by Boys Don't Cry
Neverending Story (1985) by Limahl (Chris Hamill)
One Night In Bangkok (1985) by Murray Head
Pop Music (1979) by M (Robin Scott)
Send Me An Angel (1983) by Real Life
Tainted Love (1981) by Soft Cell
About lyrics
Link after the term leads to the lyrics of the song; link "commentary" leads to the commentary in the section between the lines
Persons mentioned by name in lyrics
Alexandr I, king of Yugoslavia (Don Juan)
Giorgio Armani (Paninaro, Paninaro '95)
Buddha (Friendly Fire)
Caligula (It's Just My Little Tribute To Caligula, Darling!)
Coco Chanel (Absolutely Fabulous)
Bing Crosby (It Doesn't Often Snow At Christmas)
Claude Debussy (Left to My Own Devices)
Diana, princess of Wales (Dreaming of the Queen)
Christian Dior (Absolutely Fabulous)
Disco-Tex and the Sex-o-lettes (Electricity)
Dr. Dre (The Night I Fell in Love)
John Edgecombe (Nothing Has Been Proved)
Elizabeth II, queen of Great Britain (Dreaming of the Queen)
Farouk, king of Egypt (Searching For The Face of Jesus)
Betty Ford (DJ Culture - "Betty")
Jean Paul Gaultier (Absolutely Fabulous)
Hubert de Givenchy (Absolutely Fabulous)
Samuel Goldwyn (Don Juan)
Che Guevara (Left to My Own Devices)
Jesus (Searching For The Face of Jesus)
Joan of Arc (Run Girl Run)
Christine Keeler (Nothing Has Been Proved)
Christian Lacroix (Absolutely Fabulous)
Karl Lagerfeld (Absolutely Fabulous)
T. E. Lawrence "of Arabia" (Jack the Lad)
Ute Lemper (Tall Thin Men - unreleased)
Magda Lupescu (Don Juan - "Marie Lupescu")
Madonna (Tall Thin Men - unreleased; DJ Culture - "she")
Mao Tse-tung (Run Girl Run)
Louis B. Mayer (Don Juan - "Mr. Goldwyn-Mayer")
Issey Miyake (Flamboyant)
Richard Nixon (Run Girl Run)
Elaine Paige (Tall Thin Men - unreleased)
Luciano Pavarotti (The Theatre)
Sean Penn (DJ Culture - "Sean")
Pet Shop Boys (Absolutely Fabulous, We're The Pet Shop Boys)
Harold Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby (Jack The Lad)
Harold Pinter (Up Against It) - see
Ferdinand Porsche (Call Me Old-Fashioned - but the reference is rather to the automobile)
Miuccia Prada (Call Me Old-Fashioned - but the reference is rather to the clothes)
Mandy Rice-Davies (Nothing Has Been Proved)
William Shakespeare (Discoteca (new version))
Joseph V. Stalin (some versions of West End Girls)
Phillippe Starck (Call Me Old-Fashioned)
Elizabeth Taylor (DJ Culture - "Liz")
von Trapp family (It Must Be Obvious)
Gianni Versace (Paninaro)
Virgin Mary (The End Of The World)
Stephen Ward (Nothing Has Been Proved)
Warner brothers (Don Juan)
Zog, king of Albania (Don Juan)
Terms and names in lyrics (in chronological order according to songs)
Zazou (In The Night)
Part of dissidents during German occupation of Paris in the World War II. They weren't in the resistance but didn't support Nazis. They opted out. They had long hair, with quiffs and greased, and they wore black.
Le Select, La Colisée (In The Night)
Clubs in Paris the Zazous used to go to.
Le Select (1998)
Paninaro (Paninaro)
Cult, which PSB discovered in Italy in 1986. A very distinctive style of dress - baggy jeans (stopped at calf level), Timberland boots, sunglasses, coat.
House Of Commons (Shopping)
Lower House of the British parliament.
Roundhead general (Left To My Own Devices)
Supporters of the Parliamentary party during the English civil war (17th century). They cut their hair extremely short to distinguish themselves from Charles I's men, and thus became known as "Roundheads".
Like Liz before Betty, she after Sean (DJ Culture)
Names refer to Elizabeth Taylor, Betty Ford, Madonna and her ex-husband Sean Penn.
Rite of Spring (I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind Of Thing; commentary)
A composition by Igor Stravinsky (1882 - 1971); later remade into a ballet, which caused a scandal at the premiere because of naked male dancers.
P. l. c. (Single)
Public limited company
Disco-Tex and the Sexelettes (Electricity)
Disco-Tex and his Sex-o-lettes was a disco-group in the 1970's.
The Waiting For Godot (A Red Letter Day)
Tragicomedy by an Irish writer Samuel Beckett (1906 - 1989), originally written in French. Two bums, Vladimir and Estragon, are waiting for Godot, who will never come. Absurd drama, in which nothing happens.
Pinter (Up Against It)
Harold Pinter (* 1930). One of England's leading contemporary playwrights. Some of Pinter's plays: The Caretaker (1960), The Homecoming (1965), Old Times (1971), No Man's Land (1975), Betrayal (1979). Some of his film scripts: The Servant (1963), Accident (1967), The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981).
Ticker tape (New York City Boy; commentary)
Paper stripes which are used to throw into the streets of New York during celebrations.
V&A (Ghost Of Myself)
Victoria & Albert Museum in London (site of the museum).
Radiophonic workshop (Radiophonic; commentary)
A BBC workshop, where was made electronic music and sound effects (among others for the TV sci-fi series Dr. Who, which Neil liked as a child).
Others
What sheet music have PSB (not) released?
Songbooks exists to all standard albums, to Discography and to older singles. Sheet music to Where The Streets Have No Name (not included in Discography sheet music) and to Paninaro '95 was also released.
Released wasn't sheet music to Alternative, Battleship Potemkin, Disco, Disco 2, Disco 3, PopArt, Relentless, to b-sides released after Alternative and to the musical Closer To Heaven.
Where can I find more MIDI files, chords and sheet music?
More MIDI files are available for example on midisite.co.uk.
More chords are available for example on Ultimate Guitar or on 911tabs.
Sheet music is also available at Absolutely PSB site.
How can I get in touch with fans and get access to information about PSB?
You can join various PSB forums - some of them are listed in the links section of this site.
An interesting choice (but not for free) is to become a member of the official fanclub. Members receive three numbers of the PSB magazine (released irregularly) called Literally, a T-shirt and offer for fans (badges etc...). If you are interested in membership, you can send an addressed stamped (alternatively you can send an exchangeable coupon - which could be available at the post office - to cover the postal costs) envelope to the following address to receive the application:
Pet Shop Boys Merchandising, Finally Fan-Fair Ltd., P. O. Box 50, Stanmore, Middlesex, HA7 2US, United Kingdom.
More information about the official fanclub is available on this site in the Literally section.
Why is this site called "at dead of night"?
The name "at dead of night" is inspired by the first words of the song Jealousy - the lyrics are here.
Thanks to:
W. Studer (author of the site Pet Shop Boys Song-by-Song Commentary) for kind permission to use some information from his site for this section
For the question about Jonathan King, some information from the page Introspective PSB FAQ was used.