chicken KyivAI-generated press releases, and the annoyance of fans taking selfies while performing — there was a lot on the minds of fans. Pet Shop Boys as the iconic British duo prepared to release a new album. Their 15th studio album, neverthelesswill be released on Friday — 40 years (and 50 million record sales) after Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe They rose to fame with the single “West End Girls”.
Bands of any longevity—especially those with such a long one—are often asked the cliche question: “How do you stay relevant?” For them, it’s about never trying to be cool. “That’s something that a lot of people try to do, to be somehow cool, which is therefore completely uncool, because it’s trying too hard,” Tennant recently told The Associated Press. “So we’ve just followed our own instincts.”
“We will always be relevant in our world,” Lowe added, laughing. A sample of that relevance? classic hits of the Pet Shop Boys were used as plot points in two cult films last year: a karaoke scene in Saltburn featuring “Rent” and a key Christmas scene in All of us strangers set to “Always on My Mind.”
This is worlds away from Hollywood’s past, where, Tennant says, “It’s a Sin” was always overused for the young man walking into a gay club, “reducing us to this kind of gay disco cliché.” “Despite Everything” remains upbeat despite being written in the United Kingdom during the coronavirus pandemic, when most people were confined to their homes. “Well, the weather was nice, right?” jokes Lowe.
“It was a very productive time,” Tennant adds, noting that the cancellation of his tour eased the pressure. “I think that’s why it sounds quite optimistic in some ways, because life was different. It was a different kind of life with no pressure, other than not trying to catch the virus,” he says. The first single, “Loneliness,” addresses the social isolation of the pandemic but was written as a positive message.
Another lockdown-themed track, “Why Am I Dancing?”, was Tennant asking himself, “Why are you enjoying this situation of being alone so much that you can actually dance?” “And I’m probably cooking at the same time,” he hastens to add. “Cooking and dancing, now that’s a little idea for a podcast, right?” jokes Lowe. And while Lowe says he’d pop a pre-made pie in the oven, Tennant would be making dal, brown rice and vegetables or a chicken kyiv.
“You’ve got a good story for that,” Tennant says, looking at his bandmate. “I wrote to (UK supermarket) Marks & Spencer… asking them to change the spelling of chicken kyiv to chicken Kyiv because of the war,” Lowe says. They eventually changed it. Despite experiencing major changes in the way music is consumed, the band remains philosophical. Despite new ways of listening to and discovering music, “music is still music.”
And as for Spotify, although Lowe says it’s helped him discover a lot of new music, they both hate the app’s recommendations. “With us, the Pet Shop Boyswill say: ‘If you like this, you might like this Duran Duran‘So he thinks it’s all from the ’80s,’ Tennant explains. “And if you’re us you’d say, ‘You might like Years and Years electronic pop music or Kraftwerk from before us.’”
“Sometimes they might just think, ‘Well, you’re gay, so you might like Boy George because he’s gay too.’ He is very, very stupid,” he says. Pet Shop Boys will perform five special performances at London’s Royal Opera House in July, but please don’t run to the front of the stage and then turn away for a selfie. “I just deliberately move out of the way. “I’m sorry for being a killjoy but I find it really, really rude,” Tennant says.
However, cell phone users are not all bad for business. “Now you know when something is working because all the phones come out,” Tennant explains. “Lighters being replaced by telephones for a ballad looks really quite beautiful, it’s really quite moving,” he adds. Artificial intelligence is changing the industry, but the band has no plans to use it anytime soon — well, at least not in their music.
When their publicist called to request a quote about the album for a press release, they turned to ChatGPT, which described the album as “a celebration of the unique and diverse emotions that make us human.” They accepted it. “It’s a great date,” Tennant admits. “In a way we agree with her. Normally we make some flippant comment, while ChatGPT gave us this very honest description that is actually accurate.”
Source: AP
