Big Mountain: "Baby I Love Your Way"

25 May 1994

"UB40? Chaka Demus? Big Mountain?"

— Damon

"And the saxophone!"

— Trey

"That's a great vibe."

— David

2 Unlimited, Aaliyah, Abigail, Absolutely Fabulous, Ace of Base, Aerosmith, Alex Party, All-4-One, Tori Amos, Carleen Anderson, Animal, Anticappella featuring MC Fixx It, Arrested Development, Arrow, Aswad, Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic Starr, BC-52's, Bad Boys Inc., Michael Ball, Duke Baysee, The Beastie Boys, The Beautiful South, Big Mountain, Blackgirl, Blast featuring V.D.C., Blind Melon, Blondie, Blur, Michael Bolton, The Boomtown Rats, Boyz II Men, Brand New Heavies, Bravado, Toni Braxton, Bobby Brown, Jocelyn Brown & Kym Mazell, Kate Bush & Larry Adler, C&C Music Factory, Cappella, Mariah Carey, China Black, Clock, Clubhouse, Joe Cocker, Alice Cooper, Corona, Cracker, Crash Test Dummies, Crowded House, Chaka Demus & Pliers, D:Ream, DJ Duke, DJ Miko, Deep Forest, Degrees of Motion, Marcella Detroit, Tony Di Bart, Dinosaur Jr, Direckt, EYC, East 17, Echobelly, Enigma, Kim English, Erasure, Eternal, Aretha Franklin, Future Sound of London, Peter Gabriel, Galliano, Gloworm, The Grid, Gun, Guns N' Roses, Sophie B. Hawkins, Hed Boys, Helicopter, House of Pain, House of Virginism, Ice Cube featuring George Clinton, Janet Jackson, Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince, The Jesus & Mary Chain, Jodeci, Joe, Elton John, KWS & Gwen Dickey, K-Klass, R Kelly, Kerbdog, Killing Joke, Kristine W, L7, Let Loose, Level 42, CJ Lewis, Lighter Shade of Brown, Livin' Joy, Lisa Loeb & Nine Stories, Lucas, Lulu, M-Beat featuring General Levy, Magic Affair, Sean Maguire, Manchester United FC, Manic Street Preachers, Richard Marx, Maxx, Bitty McLean, John Mellencamp & Michelle N'Degecocello, Dannii Minogue, Kylie Minogue, Morrissey & Siouxsie, Mr V, Youssou N'Dour featuring Neneh Cherry, Shara Nelson, Nine Inch Nails, Oasis, PJ & Duncan, Robert Palmer, Pearl Jam, Ce Ce Peniston, Dawn Penn, Pet Shop Boys, Pink Floyd, Pizzaman, Pop Will Eat Itself, The Pretenders, Primal Scream, Prince, The Prodigy, Public Enemy, Pulp, Bonnie Riatt, Eddi Reader, Red Dragon with Brian & Tony, Reel 2 Real featuring the Mad Stuntman, Roachford, Juliette Roberts, The Rolling Stones, Rollins Band, Diana Ross, Roxette, SWV, Salt 'N' Pepa, Sasha with Sam, Mollison, Seal, Shampoo, Shed Seven, Nina Simone, Skin, S*M*A*S*H, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Soundgarden, Sounds of Blackness, Spin Doctors, Status Quo, Dave Stewart, Stiltskin, Sugar, Swing Out Sister, Take That, Terrorvision, Therapy?, The Three Tenors, Time Frequency, Tinman, Tin Tin Out featuring Sweet Tee, Two Cowboys, UB-bloody-40, Utah Saints, Volcano, Warren G & Nate Dogg, Crystal Waters, Whitesnake, Wildhearts, The Wonder Stuff, Worlds Apart, Wrecky-N-Effect

Just as I had with Our Bryan a while back, I have chosen to provide a list of every "artist" who appeared on the UK Top 40 during the very extended reign of Wet Wet Wet's "Love Is All Around" in the number one spot. There are similarities between it and "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You", both in terms of their status and the way the hit parades behaved during these two periods. Canada's favourite sandpaper-voiced son had a sixteen week stranglehold of the top spot while the Wets came just a week short of tying him. Neither one seemed particularly cool at the time and their extended reigns at the top only encouraged more of a backlash against them. (I visited the UK during that summer at the height of its popularity and returned to Canada before I could get completely fed up with it)

The two mammoth records also held off a pair of unlucky number twos. Right Said Fred's "I'm Too Sexy" ended up stuck in the runner up spot for an extended period as did "I Swear" by All-4-One. (I suppose the fact that they both managed to make it to number one on the American Hot 100 made up for this disappointment though) Indeed, the upper placings on the charts during these periods seemed remarkably static. In '94 in particular it seemed like The Grid's "Swamp Thing" (still an incredible single), The BC-52s' "Meet the Flintstones" (as godawful as ever) and Aswad's "Shine" (better than I remember it being) took up spots in the Top 5 and just refused to budge.

Another link is that they were both aided by being in popular films: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves in the case of "Everything I Do..." and Four Weddings & a Funeral for "Love Is All Around". As was the present Single of the Fortnight Best New Single, a cover of "Baby I Love Your Way" performed by Big Mountain from the acclaimed 1994 picture Reality Bites. Hmm...one of these parings of movie and song is not like the others, is it?

(Before moving on, yet another thing that the two massive hits share in common is that Smash Hits didn't want to have anything to do with either of them.)

While it was mercifully free of lutes and the sort of tune that would get your average morris dancer on their feet, "Everything I Do..." had a woodsy quality to it that went well with the Robin Hood flick; it no doubt helped that the gravelly-voiced, lumberjack Bryan Adams was behind it as well. "Love Is All Around" had a triumphant bombast (again, aided in large part to the unsubtle Marti Pellow on vocals) that suited the runaway joy of what is still one the finest rom com's ever made. "Baby I Love Your Way", however, hardly seems to work as part of what is considered to be one of the quintessential Generation X films. Such was it's status as an odd one out that it quickly became overshadowed by Lisa Loeb's "Stay (I Missed You)", which doubtless benefited from the singer-songwriter's unique status as an unsigned act with a number one hit.

Ethan Hawke's Troy is one of those movie characters who seemed to spawn real life imitators, even though he could be an insufferable twit. (Surely I'm not the only one out there who thinks Winona Ryder's Lelania would have been better off had she managed to work things out with Ben Stiller's Michael) Prior to 1994, I wasn't aware of anyone who gave a toss about "selling out"; afterwards, it became a matter of utmost concern to virtually everyone I knew. Kurt Cobain wasn't able to do as much as Troy when it came to a whole generation suddenly becoming scared about our creative endeavours winding up in the hands of corporate elites in exchange for a buck or two. (How glad I am that I have managed to avoid selling out this blog in spite of all the moneyed interests who've been sniffing around) It's strange, then, that a little-known reggae group hailing from San Diego would take their cover of a Peter Frampton number and have it used in a picture all about young people's alienation with the real world. People like Troy who were obsessed with "authenticity" would not have been pleased.

"Baby I Love Your Way" is one of those songs that seems to have lasted in spite of its overall lack of quality. While it gave its composer a sizable hit when plucked from his staggeringly successful Frampton Comes Alive concert set, it really wouldn't become a rock standard until Miami dance act Will to Power merged it with Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Freebird" on a memorable, if tasteless, medley at the end of 1988. Funnily enough, it was the former that came out of it better than the latter in spite of the chasm separating the original versions. This had to have been down to the vocalists: while Suzi Carr sang "Baby..." like she was one of the Wilson sisters from Heart or Taylor Dayne or someone equally competent from the era, longhaired brute Bob Rosenberg had, to quote David Anthony in Smash Hits, a "weedy voice" which did "Freebird" no favours. Imagine my reaction when I finally heard the originals.

Will to Power's version was at best adequate but it gave a second wind to a poor song. Big Mountain's idea of putting it to a reggae backing is so inspired that it's hard to believe no one had thought of it earlier. It sounds like this was how it had been meant to be all along. It probably doesn't hurt that a little ganja would've livened up something so trite. It's easy to picture members of UB-bloody-40 erupting in a jealous rage when they first encountered this record — and, to be sure, they would have messed it up where Big Mountain added some much needed spark and sunshine.

Beyond the three lads in E.Y.C. (I looked it up and it doesn't stand for Excellent Young Cannibals) and a handful of others, Big Mountain's "Baby I Love Your Way" has never been a critical favourite. I can't say I love it either but it deserves a little less scorn. They didn't have much to work with so it's commendable that they were able to get something reasonable out of it. I'm sure Troy from Reality Bites would have ripped into them for allegedly selling out but Michael would've been into it, Lelaina wouldn't have been bothered by it and Vickie and Sammy would've played the hell out of it — and who can blame them?

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

"Absolutely Fabulous"

Not unlike annoying self-titled albums, this Comic Relief single is credited to Absolutely Fabulous, which is also the name of the hit comedy series of the same time and the name of this "song". But I'm just going to mark it down as the title. I would say it saved me the effort of having to type it twice but here I am expending full sentences explaining why. Jennifer Saunders already had experience with Red Nose Day novelty hits but it was Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe who did the heavy lifting in this instance, right down to them plundering lines of Edina and Patsy to fill out the "verses". Complaints about references to "Pump Up the Volume" and "Ride on Time" being dated miss the point: how up on current techno music do you expect a pair of middle-aged drug addicts to be? Not exactly the finest moment for anyone involved but a good time nonetheless — and only slightly ruined by the "lyrics" printed in ver Hits which confirm that it is indeed "dull and soulless dance music" rather than "Donald Saunders dart music" as I had long been convinced. I still prefer it my way.

U2 / Frank Sinatra & Bono: "Stay (Faraway, So Close!)" / "I've Got You Under My Skin"

24 November 1993

"U2 are always willing to experiment, unlike many other rock bands."

— Tania

"Like Bono said, they're just four jerks with a police escort, haha."

— Jay

I was just eight years old in the summer of 1985 when Live Aid took place. To say I had better things to do was pretty much on the money. Music was fine but my life revolved around comic books, Lego, street hockey, wrestling and cartoons; I wasn't about to spend a whole day watching an over-long music festival which took place in two cities on separate sides of the Atlantic. One member of my family who did watch was my mum. Rather than appreciating the many stars from her younger days that performed (McCartney wasn't all that good, the Stones were boring, Dylan was self-serving and she's never been a fan of Queen) her fondest memories of Live Aid were of a handful of the newer acts on the bill. Paul Young and U2 are the two she always mentions being especially impressed by. In the case of the former, it was his silky-smooth voice that won her over, with the latter it was their memorable renditions of "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "Pride (In the Name of Love)".

Yeah, about that. U2 didn't play "Pride" at Live Aid. I'm sure they considered it and probably would have had (a) they'd done a set of four songs like many of the groups that day rather than two or (b) the tune Mum mistook for it had not gone on for so damn long. It was with a stirring twelve minute rendition of Unforgettable Fire deep cut "Bad" that U2 set themselves up for superstardom; it's just a pity that the song itself fell through the cracks along the way. Nevertheless, it managed to set a standard for what U2 songs were supposed to sound like. Not every one of their numbers sounded the same but they all seemed a bit like "Bad".

It has also been the one I've been singing to myself over the last several days as I've been gearing up to write this piece. "Bad" and "Stay (Faraway, So Close!)" (as an aside, what the hell is that exclamation point doing in there?!?) aren't terribly similar beyond both having those unmissable U2 stamps of that heartbeat rhythm, those clipped chords that The Edge has made a career out of and Bono's distinctive wail. On an emotional level, "Stay" strays because it doesn't lift me up the way a song like "Bad" does so effortlessly. I keep expecting true inspiration such as when Bono screams "I'm wide awake!"; "Stay" just pulls me along and then passes me by. It's nice to have on but when it comes to a close I forget all about it. I didn't know it was possible to listen to a U2 song this much and it not make the slightest impression; even their songs that I don't care for have melodies I can hum, even if I choose not to do so.

U2 becoming weird was something everyone had accepted by 1993. It no doubt helped that they were happy to remind people that they were still U2 every so often. After the genuine shock of "The Fly" near the end of '91, follow-up "Mysterious Ways" proved to be a welcome way to ease back into normal while maintaining their new found funk sound and overall sexiness. "One" neither harked back to the "2" of old nor suggested anything particularly new but it was so brilliant that it hardly mattered. Very justly, the remix of "Even Better Than the Real Thing" outperformed the standard version as the two competed with each other on the UK singles charts. Finally, their run of singles from Achtung Baby! ended with "Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses" a song that was horribly, painfully U2.

Achtung Baby! had been so hyped that it was one of those early nineties CD releases that people lined up for at midnight to purchase. This wasn't the case two years later with the more low key Zooropa. Videos for the first two singles were played a lot but there didn't appear to be the same degree of chart action involved. Unbeknownst to me, "Numb" was a video single and didn't qualify for the US and UK hit parades, though it did all right in my native Canada; "Lemon" wasn't readily available either. I wasn't exactly tickled by them at first but the two did grow on me but there was a sense that maybe the public had had enough of them. Luckily, there was "Stay" to put them back in the good graces of their fans. The only trouble was, it was at the expense of something truly memorable.

With records such as "Wild Horses" and "Stay", U2 managed to appease their longstanding cult base while at the same time drifting off into sonic adventurism elsewhere. (The blowback from their 1997 Pop project prompted a wholescale rethink with greater emphasis on retreating to their old sound which resulted in the highly popular and highly successful All That You Can't Leave Behind but as an on the fence listener this was where I pretty much gave up on them) While it ticks the boxes of how one of their singles ought to sound, it's an unsatisfying listen, particularly over time. It isn't so much a return to form as a reminder of how they used to be so much better.

Finally, unremarked and possibly unnoticed by Tania and Jay of Eurodance sensation Culture Beat is that "Stay" was a split single or double A side (depending on how you choose to classify it). It shared the spotlight with "I've Got You Under My Skin", Bono's contribution to the popular Frank Sinatra Duets album that came out for that year's Christmas rush. U2 had already done an outstanding cover of "Night and Day" for the 1990 Red, Hot + Blue AIDS benefit charity album — a recording which anticipates their new European/indie-influenced sound a year later — so clearly the former Paul Hewson knew a thing or two about Cole Porter's songbook. Still, this one isn't nearly as good. While Bono is the perfect singer for U2, he sounds completely out of his league when paired with Sinatra; his once powerful vocal chords now reduced to sounding like a croaky old whimper. The recording is also harmed by some pointless production touches that try to add a faint tinge of current "2" to the jazz arrangement. It's as if they wished to add some of the current U2 sound to one song while trying to add some of what they used to do on to another. Perhaps they go together better than I ever would've thought.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Pet Shop Boys: "I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind of Thing"

"They don't express themselves," reports the rapper from a group whose creative shots were being called by German studio boffins. Ironically, "I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind of Thing" is meant to be about a reserved individual being open with their feelings for the first time but how can that hold up alongside years of pop in inverted commas? There's a fair amount of Pet Shops backlash in the Hits by this point though it's worth noting that Tania considers it to be one of their better efforts of late. I can't help but feel that people were getting sick of Tennant and Lowe and this affected the critical standing of their early nineties releases. That said, this one isn't a big favourite of mine. Tennant has subsequently complained that the album version is much cleaner and he's absolutely right. Plus, the Very album isn't all that well served by its 45's: I'll happily take the likes of "The Theatre", "Dreaming of the Queen" and "One in a Million" (not to mention some choice B sides from the same time) over the stuff they had in the charts. Yet, even when they were coasting — and apparently not expressing themselves — the Pet Shop Boys were still way above the competition.

Pet Shop Boys: "DJ Culture"

16 October 1991

"Pump up the posh people time as Neil and Chris gird their designer-clad loins and topple headfirst into the swirling frenzy that is nightclub culture."

— Miranda Sawyer

This October, 1991 issue of of Smash Hits includes a Gordon Bennett! feature about the precarious state of the single. "Top of the Pops no longer features a Top 40 rundown. Sales of singles have reached an all-time low." Ver Hits proceeded to ask youths from all over Britain about it.

Their answers vary (some prefer not to have B sides, others like them and wish for more extras; some would like to buy more 45's, others seem content to wait for albums to come out) but they all seem to agree that singles had become a rip off and were no longer worth bothering with. While the Hits seemed concerned by this development, it's likely that the big record labels were happy with their prediction that "by the end of the century singles may no longer exist". In Britain they were allowed to grow prohibitively expensive for the average youngster while in the US they were being gradually phased out so that listeners would be forced to buy albums just for one song (aka to pull a Chumbawumba). CD formatting would revive the single somewhat in the mid-nineties but the days of kids snapping up 45's on a weekly basis en masse were drawing to a close.

And they certainly weren't snapping up many of the new releases in this same issue. Of the twenty-two records either reviewed by Miranda Sawyer or mentioned in the Also Released This Fortnight sidebar, not one managed to make the Top 10. Only eight were able to crack the Fun Forty — and the bulk of them aren't especially memorable. "The Show Must Go On" is mostly notable as the last Queen single released during Freddie Mercury's lifetime; "Caribbean Blue" (not reviewed since they evidently had to make room for the likes of Five Star and The Osmond Boys) is perhaps Enya's second or third best remembered song, so that's something I guess.

This even goes for "DJ Culture", Sawyer's Single of the Fortnight. There had been a time when the release of a new Pet Shop Boys' single meant a guaranteed Top 5 smash but this was no longer the case. Following the success of "So Hard" (their tenth Top 10 hit on the bounce) a year earlier, they had struggled to keep the megahits coming. The much-loved "Being Boring" proved to be their lowest charting single since the original version of "Opportunities" flopped back in 1985. In a move that smacked of desperation, they put out a cover of U2's "Where the Streets Have No Name" which returned them to the upper reaches of the chart but this also prompted a backlash. Then, the magnificent "Jealousy", closing track and one of many highlights on their album masterpiece Behaviour, only got to number twelve. There's nothing wrong with peaking within the Top 20 but for sure this was a come down.

With the coming Pet Shops' greatest hits package Discography: The Complete Singles Collection it was decided to tack a pair of new tracks to the end of it, just as Madonna had done a year earlier on her Immaculate Collection. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe agreed to do so but weren't overly keen on it. "Chris spent the whole time saying, 'Obviously they'll both be flops'," recalls Tennant. Putting new material on best of's is supposed to be a good incentive for potential purchasers but it sets up an unwinnable situation: people flock to the compilation at the expense of one of the supposed 'greatest hits' on it.

"DJ Culture" failed to dent the Top 10 — while Discography proved unable to give them that long sought after number one album; quite why it didn't become one of those mega-selling comps like Eurythmics' Greatest Hits or The Beautiful South's Carry on Up the Charts is anyone's guess — but the song was ahead of its time in at least one respect. Having been composed in the aftermath of the First Gulf War, Tennant observed that supposed war hero leaders like George Bush and John Major began using Churchill as a way of bigging themselves up. Instead of speaking their minds, they relied upon "samples" of quotations, just as DJ's and remixers sampled other records.

What Tennant wasn't to know at the time is that through television syndication and social media everyone began sampling the words of others in order to pass themselves off as wits. (I am by no means being judgmental: I am as guilty as anyone of quoting Seinfeld, The Simpsons and The Office as a means of trying to be funnier than I actually am) The 1995 VHS reissue of the Star Wars trilogy (as well as the subsequent 'Special Editions' that hit theatres a couple years' later) resulted in a lot more people becoming familiar with lines from these iconic pictures. Oddly enough, it was around this point that the famous misquote "Luke, I am your father" became much more prevalent in the culture; thinking about this blog post has made me wonder if misqotes are as accidental as we make them out to be.

Quoting Churchill went from something that only the lettered would do to an idiot's favourite passtime. Knowledge of the source mattered little. My own Churchillian quote choice is the one about the female MP (possibly the UK's first though I have no idea) who was critical of the prime minister being intoxicated. He shot back that while, yes, he was drunk, he would be sober in the morning but her unattractive state would be harder to clear up. Is this even close to what he actually said? Who's to say? What matters is I used Churchill in my own words. Bully for me.

Tennant misquotes Oscar Wilde with the line "And I my lord, may I say nothing?". There's no place left for the true wit to thrive. They've been replaced by an endless stream of quotations and misquotations. Those individuals with a unique voice inevitably get drowned out by the din of everyone else getting a lyric wrong or repeating a famous person with garbled syntax. We're now coming to a point in which those with the largest platforms complain that they are being silenced while what they actually have to say is of little value. There's no room for the public intellectual when everybody has a voice that they don't even use responsibly.

With "West End Girls" capturing them on the cusp of stardom and "Left to My Own Devices" at a creative peak, it's only right that the Pet Shop Boys would bring their six year run of unbeatable singles to a close with a third in a series of brilliant half-rapped, half-sung records. It isn't quite as astounding as either of them but the song's bridge rates as one of their finest. The dreamy "indulge yourself, your every move" passage turns it into yet another certified PSB classic. Sawyer astutely observes that they're "at their best when they're wistful" — it just takes time for the wistfulness to settle in. (This could be explained by the song's cut-and-paste roots, having been pieced together over the past several months)

Amusingly, Sawyer manages to double down on her blasse attitude towards "Being Boring", a single she assessed a year earlier as lacking the "swooshy drama or singalong chorus that Pet Shop Boys songs are made of". She didn't trash it but her lack of enthusiasm for what many — myself included — rate as Tennant and Lowe's greatest moment is still baffling. Much as I love "DJ Culture", I couldn't possibly say that it "knocks spots" off of "Being Boring". There's a reason one of these two songs remains a firm part of Pet Shop live shows to this day while the other has almost become an afterthought (to quote Sawyer, "sad but true"). 

I picked up Discography that November. I was grateful to have "DJ Culture" and other new track "Was It Worth It?" but I was even more thrilled by singles mixes of "Suburbia", "Heart", "Left to My Own Devices" and "It's Alright". (I was even excited to finally have "Where the Streets Have No Name": those kids in Smash Hits weren't the only ones who seldom bought singles) The two tracks at the end felt like a bonus, which in effect they were. The Pet Shop Boys had been such an important part of my life but I was now beginning to wonder how I might cope without them. (Was it even a certainty they'd carry on past this greatest hits they'd just put out?) It was time for them to step away for a while so that we might be allowed the opportunity to miss them. And just like "Liz before Betty, She after Sean", they were set for a rebirth of their own.

 

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

MC Buzz B: "Never Change"

Bunny's runner-up for SOTF and one she seems to gush over more than the Pet Shops — "he's the Shakespeare of rap (only not as boring)". This MC Buzz B bloke (aka Sean Braithwaite) made significant use of Bruce Hornsby & The Range's "The Way It Is" thus putting him ahead of the curve of rapper's using samples of MOR adult contemporary, a trend that would continue throughout the nineties. He maybe could have dialed back on piano loop a bit but otherwise this is a splendid effort that deserved better than going absolutely nowhere. Really the only other decent single reviewed this fortnight in a batch of flops that aren't much fun to listen to.

Pet Shop Boys: "So Hard"

19 September 1990

"Bloody hell! If he think's smoking's fatal, he should try walking through the streets of Moss Side in Manchester at midnight haha!"

— MC Tunes

It was clear looking at the cover of their latest single — and, indeed, all the more so a month later when the Behaviour album came out. It was clear with their glum, passive presence in the single's accompanying video. It was clear in interviews they were giving at the time, including one with Richard Lowe in this same issue of Smash Hits. It was clear by the way Neil Tennant had rid himself of his perm. Clearly the Pet Shop Boys were getting old.

This will no doubt sound strange given that the combined age of Tennant and Chris Lowe in 1990 was sixty-seven, a number now exceeded by the singer alone nearly a third-of-a-century later. But the Pet Shops had been chart regulars since 1985 and things were changing. "Five years in pop music is a long time," observes Tennant.

With the singer's background as a writer and editor at ver Hits, the Pet Shop Boys were naturally the darlings of this top pop mag. "So Hard" is their fifth Single of the Fortnight (sixth if you include Dusty Springfield's "Nothing Has Been Proved", a Tennant/Lowe composition that they also produced) and they may well have had a couple more if not for critics be reluctant to be seen giving them a nepotistic rub in their first year. But a backlash of sorts was brewing. The group's sniffy profile covering their tour of Asia in Smash Hits back in the summer of '89 prompted one Alison Taylor to write in to the letters page to complain about their "obnoxious" attitude, ending her lengthy tirade with the prediction that "the dumper beckons". (This, in turn, led to another disgruntled fan to write in complaining about her complaint and a memorable moment in Chris Heath's wonderful book Pet Shop Boys, Literally in which they're aghast read about young Alison's disgust towards them). At about the same time, Harriet Dell admitted to not thinking much of their latest single "It's Alright".

Tennant and Lowe returned at a time when the pop world no longer had much use for them (Richard Lowe asks them in this issue if they're worried that people might be "getting bored" of the duo). For their part, they appeared not to have as much use for the pop world. Although it's unlikely it was ever discussed, Behaviour is their first album to date in which they could've pulled the old Beatles/Floyd/Zeppelin trick of not having any singles released from it. It's a moody, mature, autumnal disc that for some took a bit of getting used to (not for me but a lot of other people have confirmed this). The only obvious single happened to be "So Hard".

"You can just hear a number one as soon as you hear it, can't you?" asks Brit rapper MC Tunes at the start of his review. In a way he's right. I, too, was convinced this was an enormous, Earth-shattering song because that's how ecstatic it made me feel. Alas, it failed to reach the heights predicted by myself and Tunes. It got plenty of airplay and the video got shown a lot but it didn't seem to be attracting any new fans. The loyalists snapped up the single and album but no one else could be bothered. It wasn't even cool to like them anymore.

Despite the comments above, Tunes has his quibbles with "So Hard". It would've made a "better instrumental", Tennant's voice not being suited for such a potential dancefloor hit, or so the speed demon rapper would have you believe. Perhaps he was able to enjoy the David Morales Red Zone remix — which barely resembles the original — or the one pretentiously credited to 'The KLF vs. Pet Shop Boys' which are both low on the vocals. He also seems to think they're becoming old hat by this point ("...when I hear the name Pet Shop Boys, it suggests to me middle-aged people listening to their CDs in their nice homes...") even if this fact doesn't stop him from making it his Single of the Fortnight.

While Lowe has admitted that he's not crazy about it ("a blot on [the] album"), Tennant likes his lyrics which suggests a return to the more personal, lived-in material of songs like "Later Tonight" and "Why Don't We Live Together" on their debut album Please. Even setting aside the double entendre in the title, there's a lot to work with in the words. Tennant is sounding sad on this one (as he does on much of Behaviour) and his words are the retelling of a story about a pair of friends of his who couldn't stop cheating on each other. And yet, it's a funny song in a peculiar way. This mistrusting pair go to absurd lengths to hide their dalliances from each other, as if they're trying to outdo each other. Depending on one's mood, it is either a tragedy or a farce.

Tunes has a laugh at the line about giving up smoking near the end and he's right to do so. It's another funny line and one that has recently led me think up a fan theory that I will share right now. The narrator of "So Hard" is cheating but his partner isn't. Sure, they both gave up smoking but why wouldn't you assume that one of them had lapsed back into nicotine use rather than discovering matches (why don't they use a lighter?) and concluding that they belong to this person that they're allegedly shagging on the side? The song's protagonist is feeling guilty about cheating and has come up with some anecdotal evidence to "prove" that his lover is similarly up to no good in order to clear his conscience. Do we know for sure that this bad behaviour is running in both directions? Nope. Does our hero know for sure? Again, not at all.

It sounded to me at first like another hi-NRG "It's a Sin" type number and that was more than good enough for someone starved of Pet Shop Boys' material in 1990. I had no idea about them going to Munich to work with Harold Faltermayer so they could use old school analogue synths and sequencers — for the love of god, I didn't even know Donna Summer's "I Feel Love" back then. The idea that a synth-pop group would be making a most unlikely rootsy return was not on my radar in the least. It was simply an incredible song from my favourite group, one who had several more on offer making up their masterpiece Behaviour. My teenage angst would find a deeper connection with the likes of "Being Boring", "This Must Be the Place I Waited Years to Leave", "Only the Wind" and "My October Symphony". That said, "So Hard" remains one of their key singles in my mind. It's one that affirms that they still have it while subtly suggesting that things aren't quite the same as they had been during their imperial period of the late-eighties. Five years is indeed a long time in pop; good thing the Pet Shop Boys were still around because I needed them more than ever.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

AC/DC: "Tunderstruck"

Back in 1990 you weren't supposed to like both Pet Shop Boys and AC/DC. You were supposed to conform and take a side. I wasn't having it. I still really liked a lot of rock (though it wouldn't be long before I began to give it up). I could already tell how stupid all the rock 'n' roll posing was and Jesus I hated those bloody metal videos in which they faked performing a concert. Nevertheless, that guitar intro is brilliant, the chanting could go on for hours and the throat-ripping vocals of that guy who isn't Bon Scott is a thing to behold. (Is it just me or is it strange that the singer who was only with them for only a short time is better known than the chap who screamed his way through all those head banging hits of their's over several decades?) Hard rock and metal have a lot to answer for but not when it comes to "Thunderstruck".

Pet Shop Boys: "Left to My Own Devices"

16 November 1988

"According to this record, a day in the life of a typical Pet Shop Boy consists of getting up at half-past ten and going shopping, but somehow this single twists such everyday normalities into something distinctly threatening."

— Miranda Sawyer

The Christmas Number One sweepstakes of 1988 were heating up after a slow start a fortnight earlier. Bros, the hottest British act of the year, made their bid with the double A-side "Cat Among the Pigeons" / "Silent Night", a mix of yet another cut from their album Push and a seasonal favourite that might get more than the hardcore Brosettes to shell out. Rick Astley, the bookies choice a year earlier, was back with the SAW composition "Take Me to Your Heart". Michael Jackson was really starting to scrape the bottom of the Bad barrel with "Smooth Criminal". Kim Wilde taking the blubsome, heartbroken waif angle with "Four Letter Word". Phil Collins going all Motown on "Two Hearts". A-ha with yet another standard A-ha record "You Are the One". Ver kids were spoiled for choice when it came to buying presents for their brothers and sisters — and, indeed, for spending their prized Christmas record tokens from their uncles and aunties.

Also present is the Pet Shop Boys, who were the upset winners a year earlier. I don't know if them taking the best ever version of "Always on My Mind" to the top was a huge upset but Rick had been the one expecting it and a whole generation of pop kids are salty to this day that The Pogues didn't manage to pull it off so it seems at least a few people were upset by it. In any event, "Always on My Mind" proved to be one of the strongest non-festive Christmas number ones of all time and is frequently cited as the among the greatest cover versions ever recorded. It proved to be the apogee of their imperial period with a video that teased their upcoming film It Couldn't Happen Here with momentum aplenty to take the perfectly acceptable but still kind of underwhelming follow-up "Heart" to its own trip up to the top of the charts.

Their chances didn't seem quite as good the following year as they aimed to be the first group since The Beatles (back when it wasn't even a big deal) to nab back-to-back Christmas chart toppers. The following issue of Smash Hits did a feature in Bitz about the potential winners and they didn't like the chances of "Left to My Own Devices". They were "in poor form this festive season" and that "grannies won't have a clue what they're on about". In short, they were no longer content to make music that could appeal to as many people as possible; Tennant was beginning to write in a much more autobiographical fashion and Lowe was drawing upon house music for inspiration. Mass popularity had arrived and now it was time to guide the listeners and viewers to some new places.

"Left to My Own Devices" wasn't the biggest single that Christmas but it was the best tune on the charts. "Heart" had been an enjoyable let down but it led them towards their most creatively fertile period. Just being a standard synth-pop duo was no longer good enough. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe began approaching their albums thematically but Introspective arrived at a time when they could sacrifice LP cohesion in favour of an ambitious plan to record every track long. Other groups cut singles that would be extended for the 12" mix but they were interested in doing the reverse. "The idea," Tennant would later explain, "was to have an album where every track was a single". (Indeed, a companion EP could easily be compiled of the four singles from Introspective, as well as Eighth Wonder's cover of "I'm Not Scared" and the original b-side release of "I Want a Dog": suffice it to say it would be vastly inferior to the album itself) Introspective was met with mixed reviews (William Shaw thought they were guilty of "messing about a bit too much", while my mum was furious that there were only six songs on it) but it is now regarded as one of their finest works and the start of their creative peak.

Written in piecemeal fashion by Tennant and Lowe and with perfectionists Trevor Horn and Stephen Lipson producing, "Left to My Own Devices" took its time gestating before a proper song resulted. This could easily have turned the work into a mess but all concerned were on the same page in crafting their grandest number to date. It would be the first song they'd record with an orchestra and the video would be their first in ages to lack a narrative. But for all the new elements involved, it is classic Pet Shops. Tennant proved again that he's better at spoken word than singing (the trio of "West End Girls", "Left to My Own Devices" and "Being Boring" are all either rapped, narrated or whispered; it would only be until "Yesterday When I Was Mad" that he may have taken talking over their records a step too far) and their streak of pristine singles was in no danger of coming to a close. The only thing missing was that the eight minute album version was just that much more epic and over-the-top.

"Left to My Own Devices" peaked at a routine number four but it was out of the Top 20 by the time Bruno Brookes announced that year's Christmas number one. They would never be as popular as they had been in 1987 but their devoted fanbase remained and they happened to be at the peak of their powers. Loneliness, isolation, making a virtue out of not fitting it, dark humour: those of us who remained committed were set to learn a lot from them. Meanwhile, other pop stars would be factoring into the 1988 Christmas number one stakes including a certain synth-pop duo who were the chief rivals to the Pet Shop Boys.

The singles were reviewed this fortnight by Miranda Sawyer, another one of my favourite writers from the year I was a Hits devotee. In common with both Sylvia Patterson and Tom Doyle, she had the perspective of being a similarly obsessive fan of the magazine prior to working for it and it shows in much of her writing. Pop kids of the time could live out their fantasies of being pop stars, meeting pop stars, snogging pop stars, bashing pop stars and taking the mickey out of pop stars and this generation of hacks had that same mindset about them. The days of older, more serious critics lampooning Duran Duran were long gone and in their place were these young writers who loved pop and making fun of it as much as possible.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Neneh Cherry: "Buffalo Stance"

Not a favourite for the Christmas Number One, "Buffalo Stance" proved to be a slow burn up the charts and it didn't peak until the New Year by which point the Swedish singer/rapper and step-daughter of jazz trumpet player Don Cherry had made a name for herself with a legendary performance on Top of the Pops. The kids didn't know what a "Buffalo Stance" was nor were we clued in to the fact that the song seemed to be about prostitutes. The only stuff that mattered was that (a) it was a brilliant pop song and (b) Cherry was an awesome pop star. We'll be seeing her here again before long.

Pet Shop Boys: "Heart"

23 March 1988

"Unfortunately though, it's the best of a very bad bunch."

— Andy Bell

"I'd rather not pick one for best single — they're all terrible."

— Vince Clarke

So, what was it I was saying about Erasure being a pair of old grumps?

They were a pop group but one that seemed loath to play the pop game. Vince Clarke had already experienced that side of it and perhaps that explains their surprising lack of visibility in the pop mags of the time. Unbelievably, the pair never appeared on the cover of Smash Hits, despite racking up eighteen top ten hits, just three shy of the Pet Shop Boys. The music press reviewed their albums, singles and concerts but never went out of their way to celebrate them. They were a pop group that retained a mystery about them but as a consequence they became everyone's third or fourth or fifth favourite group but not the sort of act that thrilled the kids to pieces. Still, they got snagged for the task reviewing the singles for an issue of ver Hits at the end of March, 1988. Even so, they didn't do their standoffish image any favours by ripping into every single up for consideration. These people may have made pop music but they sure didn't seem to like it.

Their chosen Single of the Fortnight was from a familiar group that fans were passionate about. They were the favourite or second favourite group of a lot of young people in the late eighties. A group that did play the pop game. A group that had already appeared on the cover of Smash Hits on five occasions (including this very issue), with several more to come. Like Erasure, they were a duo with a curiously charismatic frontman and a stern keyboardist. Both groups played synth-pop but the similarities end there. While not exactly a world apart, Pet Shop Boys and Erasure couldn't have been more different. (There was sometimes a bit of a thorny relationship between Pet Shop Boys and Erasure, like a low-key version of the The Cure-Smiths rivalry. Bell once expressed dismay at the favourable treatment Tennant and Lowe tended to get from the press while Tennant didn't seem to respect Bell and Clarke too much. It was never discussed at length on either side and I don't think fans felt the need to back one side at the expense of the other. If there happened to be any ill will by this point, it happily isn't brought up by Erasure here, which is more than can be said for other pop stars who used critiquing the singles as a means to bash their rivals)

They say that following up a debut album is often tricky because an artist or group has a lifetime to draw upon to create that first work but only a few months to then come up with a second. Some, however, have a greater wealth of material to fall back on for a sophomore release. Noel Gallagher had accumulated enough songs over the course of his early-to-mid twenties to fill two LPs and so came the only good albums Oasis ever made, Definitely Maybe and (What's the Story) Morning Glory? Similarly, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe had been working together for five years before "West End Girls" gave them their first hit single and they had enough tracks to even see spill over to their third, fourth and fifth albums (early composition "It's Not a Crime" would eventually evolve into "Left to My Own Devices", "Jealousy" had been in limbo for nearly a decade before winding up on Behaviour and "To Speak Is a Sin" had been tried out early on only to be abandoned until 1993's Very). Nevertheless, most of the best songs were already earmarked for Please, leaving the swift follow up Actually as a bit more of a pick and mix collection. Tennant has said that it doesn't hang together as well as other albums of their's and it's easy to see why. It's sort of a less-than-the-sum-of-its-parts release with filler ("Hit Music", "I Want to Wake Up" and, yes, "Heart") alongside some of their strongest material with seemingly little thought given to track order — aside from "King's Cross" which had originally been slotted in as the album's opener before they wisely gave it a rethink and tacked it on to the end where it belonged.

Erasure's Andy Bell and Vince Clarke are in agreement with me, if much more avowedly so. I still really like Actually, I just don't think it's as strong as their other peak-period albums (on some days I'll even take later works like Fundamental and Electric over it too); for them, it's clearly a subpar effort following their impressive debut. And, certainly, Please is the better of the two. (Coincidentally or not, they would soon start approaching each album with a purpose. Introspective consisted of half-a-dozen stretched out 12" mixes of potential singles and Behaviour was meant to be a rootsy return utilizing analog synthesizers and being free — for the most part — of samples. They never did concept albums per se but the generic, whatever-is-available attempt at creating an LP would be a one time thing) Actually's first three singles — "It's a Sin", "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" and "Rent" — are superb but their options for a fourth were limited. That cheerful, irony-free love song on the second side would have to do.

Given that they made it their SOTF, you'd think Bell and Clarke would have plenty of praise for "Heart". The singer does make note of Tennant's deadpan vocals being a highlight (even if he undermines it soon after by knocking the "backing track with any old vocals slapped on top") but that's basically it. They don't knock the record as much as the others so there's that too. Otherwise, we've got a very unimpressive SOTF and, as Clarke states in the quotation above, it's a wonder why they even bothered.

I understand Erasure's take on "Heart" but I still can't get fully on board with them. Much as I kind of want to say otherwise, it's a plenty good enough pop song by any standard. That said, the standards of Tennant and Lowe were already high enough that "Heart" doesn't quite match up. The singer has admitted that it was a "one-off" for the group and they famously wanted to give it to Madonna before losing the nerve and deciding to record it themselves. Spruced up with a remix, the single version has a little more pop to it, a rare instance (along with "Suburbia") of a PSB single being superior to its album version. I would never consider it to be one of my favourites of their's and I don't think I'd miss it if it was somehow expunged from their catalog but try telling me that when I'm happily singing along with it. They didn't play it when I went to see them but I wouldn't have complained if they had,

Helped along by an outstanding video, "Heart" went to number one just as Bell predicted. While "West End Girls" was like nothing that had come before it and both "It's a Sin" and "Always on My Mind" were epic singles that couldn't not have topped the charts, the group's final number one is relatively characterless in comparison. But that's the thing with having an imperial period: even the so-so stuff manages to connect with people. This is something that happened to The Beatles with "I Feel Fine" and "Hello Goodbye", Blondie with "The Tide Is High", ABBA with "The Name of the Game" and "Super Trouper", Madonna with "Who's That Girl?": it's one thing to top the charts with a magnificent single but quite another to do so with something that's just sort of all right.

The end of an imperial period may coincide with a group's demise (see both ABBA and Blondie) but some are able to shrug off the sudden lack of guaranteed magahits in order to reach a creative peak. This would be where the Pet Shop Boys would be headed once this nice, inconsequential love song had been done and dusted. It won't be long before they're back (BACK!) on this blog. As for Erasure, they too will soon be back (BACK!) with something of a "Heart" of their own.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

a-ha: "Stay on These Roads"

While Erasure have little good to say about "Heart", they save their best jabs for other singles on offer this fortnight. Not unlike the Pet Shop Boys, Bell and Clarke used to like a lot of a-ha's stuff but they're super underwhelmed by their latest offering. I am happy to say that I strongly disagree. "Stay on These Roads" is one of a-ha's finest singles, a power ballad with some eerie Norse angst at its heart. Sure, Bell's correct that it's nigh on impossible to understand anything Morten Harket is singing about but that's nothing new. They're quick to dismiss the trio's move towards a more "serious and credible" side but this is hardly a nineties pop group going through a miserable R&B phase; "Stay on These Roads" is a hybrid: part stadium rock anthem (Clarke admits that he can imagine it being sung at a football match), part Blue Nile-esque sophisti-pop gem, part drippy love song for teens to awkwardly sway to at a high school dance. So very eighties, yet so very timeless. With all due respect to the Pet Shops, this is the rightful SOTF.

Pet Shop Boys: "Rent"

7 October 1987

"You can always rely on the Pet Shop Boys to write a good tune — even though half the time they (the tunes) vaguely sound as though they once belonged to someone else."

— Lola Borg

The Pet Shop Boys are back (BACK!) with their second Single of the Fortnight on the bounce. While "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" proved a big hit around the world and probably played a part in their cross-generational appeal, it isn't one of their signature numbers, the type that fans cry out for at concerts to this day. "West End Girls" had not only topped the charts everywhere but it quickly became a firm favourite among fans but there wasn't always this convergence of wide spread popularity and favour with the devoted. The punters may have sent "Heart" to number one but the fans preferred "Left to My Own Devices" which didn't manage to do so well.

Neil Tennant is credited with coming up with the term 'Imperial Phase', about then a singer or group is at the height of their popularity and has "the secret of contemporary pop music". Uniquely, The Beatles had it throughout their entire time as a popular act, Elton John had it through much of the early to mid-seventies and for much of the eighties it was all about the powerful trio of Michael Jackson, Madonna and Prince. For others, the Imperial Phase was much more fleeting. From July of 1987 through to the following summer, the Pet Shop Boys had five hit singles, a best selling album, made a feature film and began contributing songs to other artists. Their North American popularity hadn't yet waned and they were probably the most successful pop act in the world over those twelve months. You don't take a step wrong when you're at the peak of your imperial power — even if It Couldn't Happen Here had been mauled by critics, it said a lot of about their influence and level of success that they were able to have a film made at all.

Their five hit singles from their Imperial period are still well-remembered, and not just by their core audience. Their chart positions were 1, 2, 8, 1 and 1, with "It's a Sin", "Always on My Mind" and "Heart" all hitting the top while "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" would have joined them if not for the colossus of "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley, giving them three chart toppers and one near miss. Yet, there in the middle of their imperial phase is that '8' that stands out like a sore thumb. That modest showing only dwarfs what it did in the US, where it failed to chart entirely. It might as well have reached 48. "Rent" would eventually go on to become one of their most popular singles but it was the runt of the litter in their hit singles basket. The album Actually having just come out a month earlier, some fans would have been hesitant to go out and buy it again, especially when they didn't do anything with the song itself aside from trimming it down to three-and-a-half-minutes for optimum airplay. Remixes of "Opportunities" and "Suburbia" a year earlier improved their chart fortunes but the edit of "Rent" wasn't as fortunate. It's kind of remarkable they chose it to be a single at all, as the simple but likable "Heart" was there on Actually's second side, a hit in waiting. The clever "Shopping" also had chart potential, as did "One More Chance". "Rent" is a much less obvious single, similar to the way "Jealousy" would end up as the fourth 7" pulled off of Behaviour: you wouldn't necessarily expect it but you're glad they went ahead with it.

Tom Hibbert called "Rent" a "mercenary love song" and that may be partially why it failed to do better with a wider audience. The song's narrator is, as Tennant has admitted, a kept woman who has been taken care of by her well-off boyfriend. She has a place to live, her expenses are paid for and she's never had to work for a living. She also has sacrificed true happiness for this life and is now resigned to a love that doesn't completely fulfill her. Tennant says he envisioned one of the Kennedys having this secret woman on the side that he has a long-term dalliance with. What we don't get is a sense of closure, as if her life will just go on being largely unhappy with just hints of a true relationship involved. The public doesn't want to have anything to do with such unromantic characters: if they were in a movie, they'd either discover true love with each other (kind of like in Pretty Woman) or she'd free herself of this affair and go it alone (like Muriel's Wedding). A bit of a wasted life, albeit one that is also acknowledged as not being so bad all things considered. The pop charts had no time for such bleak realism, imperial phase or not.

But being a man, I wondered about the other side of this tale. I had originally intended this entry to be a short story set in Jakarta about a young women who grew up in poverty but is now at the beck and call of a rich western businessman. She is able to provide for her mother and sisters and is the envy of her friends but she's grown depressingly resigned to this life. He flies in (I was imaging from either Hong Kong or Singapore) from time to time for business and that's when they can steal their moments together. I worked on this story for a while but hit a wall while trying to flesh out the character of the rich boyfriend. I wanted him to also have a sense that things weren't quite right but it never really rang true. He's the one perpetuating this lifestyle for the two of them so why on Earth would he want to change anything? And if he does want to end it, he has the money and the power in the relationship and he won't be affected long term.

At a time when glitzy American dramas like Dallas and Dynasty were peak (and British telly presented Bread as a comedic, working class answer to those two), few looked beyond the luxury goods and high living. At a time when it was still assumed that Charles and Diana were relatively happy (or perhaps 'weren't entirely unhappy' would be more accurate), many would have traded to have a similar swanky lifestyle. And at a time when Thatcher was busy selling off public utilities (which Tennant and Lowe spoofed in the aforementioned "Shopping") and claiming that there's no such thing as society, the establishment only saw power players and not the human beings lurking underneath. What few dared say was that there's a price for living a glamourous life but only the Pet Shop Boys — in all their imperial power — were there to document it.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

INXS: "Need You Tonight"

Groups from the Antipodes traditionally take longer to break in Britain than in the States and this was never truer than in 1987 when INXS began conquering America while still being little known across the Atlantic. Kick was their sixth album and was packed to the brim with potential hits yet they couldn't get themselves arrested in the UK, a country that just so happened to be falling for Neighbours and its generation of young actors and pop stars at the same time. "Need You Tonight" would soon go to number one in the US but it would require another year to really get going in Britain. What took them so bloody long to embrace the sextet? Having a dishy, charismatic frontman in Michael Hutchence wasn't enough, nor was the sexy rock produced by a tight, underrated group of musicians. They probably didn't even care for the state-of-the-art video first time 'round. At the time I was ten years old and rightly assumed that everyone in the world loved INXS. And they did, it just took some longer than others.

Pet Shop Boys with Dusty Springfield: "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" / Black: "Wonderful Life"

12 August 1987

"The brilliant thing about the Pet Shop Boys is that they get everything right — memorable tunes, perfect production, intelligent lyrics, excellent sleeves, loads of style and a self-deprecating sense of humour — a very rare combination."

"It's heartening to see someone who a) isn't particularly handsome, b) has a spook-name (ie Colin Vearncombe), c) has no discernible "image" and d) writes slightly odd lyrics, get into the charts purely on the strength of their music, which in this case is very strong indeed."

— Vici MacDonald

March 5, 1988. A fairly typical Saturday. I got up and fixed myself a heaping bowl of cereal which I gingerly carried down to the TV room in the basement. I got in as many cartoons as possible before my parents demanded I get ready to go to my 10:00 AM swimming lesson at the Y. Back home for a quick lunch, I set the VCR to tape afternoon wrestling and then it was back to the Y for basketball. We stopped at 7-11 for a slurpee which I enjoyed while watching two hours of wrestling before the late Saturday afternoon lull. We always ate dinner early because hockey was on at 6:00. I made it through the first two periods of the game, awaiting the bowl of popcorn that my dad always made for us. Once that had been kicked, I was done with my country's national sport and wandered up to the living room. Mum had recently begun listening to the Saturday night Top 30 singles countdown on CBC radio while doing her knitting and I joined her. And this was the night I first heard the Pet Shop Boys.

Neil Tennant worked at Smash Hits for about three years. He had previously been a British editor for Marvel Comics and had also done work proofreading cookbooks and TV tie-in books. Throughout that time, he had been honing his craft as a musician and songwriter and in 1981 he met a young architechture student and amateur keyboard player named Chris Lowe who he quickly partnered with. Being on a top pop mag had its benefits and Tennant's position undoubtedly aided his eventual career in pop, particularly when he went to New York to interview The Police and used the trip to meet Bobby O, the trendy club producer and singer.

Yet, many of his colleagues didn't think much of his budding pop career. They thought the name 'Pet Shop Boys' was rubbish (admittedly, it does take getting used to) and they weren't especially keen on the demos he'd occasionally play them. Nevertheless, Bobby O had produced an early version of "West End Girls", which somehow managed to nab a lowly chart position in Canada, and they would soon be signed to EMI. Figuring that the giddy carousel of pop beckoned, Tennant packed it in with ver Hits and made that unlikeliest of jumps — from pop journalist to pop star.

His former employer would be one of their biggest backers but they weren't initially showered with praise. Tom Hibbert reviewed "Opportunities (Let's Make Lot's of Money)" by expressing surprise that this was a case of "former pop journalist in a case of rather good record shock!!" and compared it favourably to an already passe Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Nevertheless, Ramones and Prefab Sprout impressed him much more. Hibs also gave his thoughts on the reissued "West End Girls" at the very end of 1985. Here, he seems impressed with what they created but doesn't offer much in the way of appreciation or lack thereof. Again, he preferred the not bad/not great sounds of The Lucy Show. Next up, Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode considered "Love Comes Quickly" to be a "good follow up" to their breakthrough hit and reckons it's the second best single on offer (though he also wonders if he should get some revenge on the person who once described "Blasphemous Rumours" as a "routine slab of doom in which God is given a severe ticking off"). Their next two singles, a remix of "Opportunities" and "Suburbia", aren't held in much esteem by critics Ian Cranna and William Shaw respectively before we come "It's a Sin", their first release of 1987. Charges of plagiarism had famously been made by the nauseating Jonathan King but he seemed to have at least one ally in that regard with Tom Hibbert. Enjoying the song, he then points out how much it resembles "Wild World" by Cat Stevens "note for note". (Was Tennant so studious about pop that he couldn't help but copy others?)

So, that's six releases and they've been met with good to middling reviews. Fair enough, there's nothing wrong with that. Respect, though, to the Hits writers for not going out of their way to praise their old colleague The optics of "West End Girls" getting a Single of the Fortnight from a magazine that he'd only just worked at might not have been so good, even though it seems obvious now that it fully merited such an honour. Maybe they were holding out for Tennant and Lowe to craft something that they couldn't ignore. Make 'em earn it.

And earn it they did with "What Have I Done to Deserve This?". Intended as a duet, they had Dusty Springfield in mind and no one else would do. A fortnight earlier, the SOTF had been awarded to "I Just Can't Stop Loving You", a duet that might as well not have been one, which Michael Jackson had failed to recruit either Whitney Houston and Barbra Streisand to join him on. In that case, the lesser known Siedah Garrett guesting was probably for the best but here it's impossible to imagine anyone else being adequate. With Springfield's extraordinary vocals and Tennant's much more limited pipes, you'd think we'd be in for a mismatch but this is avoided due to his refusal to try to keep up. While she glides along with her slightly croaky whispered manner, Tennant does some of his Brit-raps from with some understated singing (one of my favourite bits is "you always wanted me to be something I wasn't" with his voice coming across like a sullen child at the end). George Michael really brought his A game to his duet with Aretha Franklin and Marc Almond would attempt to do the same when he paired with Gene Pitney on "Something's Gotten Hold of My Heart" but if one doesn't have the vocal chops to pull it off then it's best not to bother trying.

It's an irregular duet and an irregular song and one that there was considerable uncertainty about (it had initially been difficult to track down and convince Springfield to join them by which point Tennant and Lowe had gone off it) which is fitting for such uncertain subject matter. Tennant has said that the couple gets back together by the end of the song but that isn't exactly spelled out at any point (the closest is probably in her proto-scatting near the end: "we could make a deal"). If that is indeed the case, then it's an unstable detente that the two have reached. They aren't parallel to one another but going in separate directions. If they do indeed up back together, they'll only end up still not able to get through.

The song was a huge hit all over the world and was only prevented from reaching number one by Rick Astley. Beyond its commercial performance, it represents a turning point for the Pet Shop Boys. Having the cachet of Dusty Springfield as a guest aided their reputation among older listeners and it also helped them as they began to transcend irony. While critics always exaggerated their propensity for "writing pop songs about pop songs", it was a difficult label to shake. But this was a hit single that didn't rely on a knowing wink and perhaps the first time that the public became aware of this other side — and, significantly, their first to fully impress a Smash Hits critic.

March 12, 1988. Another typical Saturday. Cartoons, swimming, basketball, wrestling, hockey. I like music but I am still a year away from becoming obsessed by it (to the extent that it doesn't occur to me to buy the single or album). I don't know the first thing about Neil Tennant, Chris Lowe and Dusty Springfield. I have no interest in girls and heartbreak is completely off my radar. Writing about music — writing about anything — means nothing to me. I liked that song I heard a week ago and wish to hear it again. I was now a fan of the Pet Shop Boys and I remain one to this day. Those other interests of my childhood would all fade away.

~~~~~

"What Have I Don't to Deserve This?" deservedly was Vici MacDonald's pick but it had to share the honour with "Wonderful Life" by Black. The late Colin Vearnecombe had been toiling in obscurity for years before finally breaking through with the hit single "Sweetest Smile". Melancholy, stylish and with a typical soprano sax of the era, it's one to go either way on. While it makes for a nice closer to his debut album Wonderful Life, it isn't overly memorable and doesn't exactly scream "MEGA HIT!". Still, it took him into the top 10 even though it hardly feels like the start of a lengthy run of hits. It wouldn't last

"Sweetest Smile" did well enough but it isn't the song Black is best known for. (One only need look at the YouTube numbers in which his first hit is at close to 750,000 views compared with its follow up at just under 70,000,000) "Wonderful Life" had originally just missed the top 40 but was now back and it managed to equal its predecessor's chart placing the second time round. And it's the big one, the one that should have gotten his brief time as a chart factor going. The only Black song people are likely to know.

I remember once being shown a video in high school about suicide. A very messed up individual had slashed his wrists and was hopelessly trying to outrun the police. The cops soon had him cornered but it took three or four of them to nab him safely before carting him off to the police station. We then saw him in his cell, his wrists wrapped but he had by then calmed down. He said he was glad to still be alive.

There's a bit of that going on in "Wonderful Life". A cheerful sentiment, expressed with sorrow. Only someone who had reached the pits of despair can find joy in a meager life — and, even then, it may not happen. If "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" captures that dreadful uncertainty of a couple clinging to an unhappy relationship, then "Wonderful Life" puts the best possible face on a break up. That vague sense of relief that creeps in among a Niagara of unhappiness.

The song's sentimental connection is poignant enough that its limitations aren't initially apparent. After a while it drags a bit and the chorus gets repeated a bit too much. Rationally speaking, it's a good minute-and-a-half too long. And, yet, when I am in the mood, it can keep going for all I care. The song's refrain becomes a mantra and hammering the point home is its strength.

Black's output was rather up and down. Though not quite musically catholic, the Wonderful Life album manages to combine indie with goth and sophisti-pop and even some very eighties rock. Probably as a result, it lacks consistency. Yet, he got it right with the title track, a song that while still appreciated by many (70,000,000 YouTube views is nothing to sneeze at), ought to be a standard by this point. It's almost as good as the Pet Shop Boys.

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Also Reviewed This Fortnight

The Smiths: "Girlfriend in a Coma"

Philip Larkin considered jazz to be either about being a 'Wells' or a 'Gibbon': someone who felt that it was a genre that was always getting better or forever heading downhill. The Smiths are kind of the same: either they started off on a hot streak and then went into gradual decline or they just kept improving right up until the end. I'm a Smiths Gibbon and think they were never better than in their first year or so. "Girlfriend in a Coma" comes right at the tail end of their run ('Smiths Split Confirmed', as this issue's Bitz reports) and seems to show why things weren't as they used to be. Morrissey no longer put the same care into his lyrics and musically it is one of the simplest things Johnny Marr had done to date. The nice melody just about manages to make it seem better than it is and it does all right for itself on compilations but it's probably for the best that they threw in the towel when they did.