Pet Shop Boys ~ West End Girls

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1. england/london has changed since the mid 80s, when this record came out. how would/should the record have changed lyrically/contextually if it was released today?

2. i link it in my mind with absolute beginners. why is this? do you?

― gareth, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I once learned all the words of this song. But I have no idea what it's about. Can you explain?

― N., Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

i don't know either. its more of a feeling (i don't actually like the song that much, but thats another thread)

― gareth, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I think this song is something to do with Lenin, hence the line "from lake Geneva to the Finland Station". The Finland Station is in St. Petersburg. This is the journey Lenin made by train when he returned from exile in Switzerland.

― MarkH, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

b-but it DID ger re-released in the '90s when E17 did their cover of it! so i guess it got rejigged as "'ard as nails wiv 'earts of gold east end scruffbags chase the posh totty" or something. now though you'd get atomic kitten covering it and it would mean no more than "yet ANOTHER soulless and horrible cover of classic '80s song by talentless bints whose bosses are out only to make a buck".

― katie, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

Daniella Westbrook isn't posh totty so they messed that one up.

― Emma, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

haha kwite korrekt Emma. they chased the posh totty but they got... Daniella Westbrook haha!

― katie, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

Atomic Kitten ROCK Katie.

― Graham, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I now have a mental image of Atomic Kitten throwing rocks at Katie.

― Dan Perry, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

They are just jealous cos they wanted to play the New Bands tent at Glasto.

― Emma, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

it was a key song for me. in my head it is about the simultaneous loneliness and collective ennui of the single person out on the pull, looking for connection with another soul and only able to interact in ways devoid of any emotional dimension.

― Alan Trewartha, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

" they chased the posh totty but they got... Daniella Westbrook" = metaphor for the outcome of the bolshevik revolution?

DW's septum represents the control of the means of production

― mark s, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I was in a Cultural Studies lecture (the one where it wasn't about chomsky) and we'd had a few pints before it and the lecturer (whom I fancied, but that's not part of the story) gave out this interview with the Pet Shop Boys where they basically bitched about modern popular culture. Anyway we started singing West End Girls. It was a sufficently big lecture hall that everyone didn't hear. I would have preferred It's a Sin obviously.

― Ronan, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

ATOMIC KITTEN ARE BINTS WHO CANNOT SING OR DANCE OR DO ANYTHING THAT POP STARS ARE SUPPOSED TO DO AS PROVEN BY SIMON COWELL. I MEAN EVEN IF I LIKED POP WHICH I DON'T ESPECIALLY THEY ARE STILL AN AFFRONT TO ALL THAT IS DECENT AND PURE BECAUSE THEY JUST SIT THERE BEING BINTS AND I HATE THEM WITH A PASSION!

*ahem*

― katie, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I agree actually. Their songs have all been fucking terrible dirges. And once they were presenting Select MTV and their accents, personalities(tv wise anyway) and layers of makeup made me want to break things.

― Ronan, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

Atomic Kitten rock EXACTLY as much as you Katie.

― Graham, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I have still not heard Tompaulin so I cannot intervene in this crucial debate. AK are fine when they stay away from the covers and I dig their checkout-girl looXoR.

― Tom, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

i have more ROCK in one little bass-playing finger than all of atomic kitten AND THEIR MUMS!

― katie, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

anyone singing "do it to me right now, do it to me slowly, right up the shitter" (i think those were the words) is alright by me

― Alan Trewartha, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

*helpless with laughter*

― Dan Perry, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I've been listening to the first two Pet Shop Boys albums lately and they're both great. I don't suppose you could call them timeless, but a lot of the pointedly eighties references still hold true today, and the underlying *essence* of the songs still feels spot on to me. They feel my pain.

I like the new one too, the one that sounds a bit like 'Sowing the Seeds of Love'. And I liked the last one, 'Home and Dry', that had the same *essence* I was talking about. I think the word is 'poignance'. Time has been less kind to the later 'housey' records, I feel.

Gareth, perhaps it reminds you of 'Absolute Beginners' because of the Patsy Kensit connection. I know that's why it reminds me of Big Audio Dynamite.

― PJ Miller, Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

*also helpless with laughter*
but alan, is that the pet shop boys or atomic kitten?

― Dave M., Thursday, 20 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

I have always thought it's about working-class boys on the make, breaking down old class structures (hence "east end boys and west end girls") and pissing on the consensual model of British life: the line "got no future, got no past" is key.

The video was shot at Waterloo, yes?

― Robin Carmody, Friday, 21 June 2002 00:00 (7 years ago) Permalink

9 months pass...

The line "From Lake Geneva to the Finland Station" is also a reference to Edmund Wilson's book on the beginnings of Communism.

― Chip Codeaux, Sunday, 23 March 2003 03:07 (6 years ago) Permalink

It's a goos line but 'from Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads' is perhaps more affecting.

― N. (nickdastoor), Sunday, 23 March 2003 13:54 (6 years ago) Permalink

not a goos line.

― N. (nickdastoor), Sunday, 23 March 2003 13:55 (6 years ago) Permalink

actually i think most of the lyrics of 'west end girls' are still relevant today - taken on their own merit; madman running around with a gun - check, underground dive bars - check, too many choices - check, feelings of no future and no past - check - the lyrics are vague enough to not seem dated themselves although the song as a whole is just perenially 1985 forever

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 23 March 2003 14:17 (6 years ago) Permalink

Erm, 1984, actually.

― suzy (suzy), Sunday, 23 March 2003 15:25 (6 years ago) Permalink

tail end of tho right?

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 23 March 2003 15:57 (6 years ago) Permalink

WEG was *hit*, at least, in '85. It might have been recorded in 1982 for all I know, tho'.

― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Sunday, 23 March 2003 15:58 (6 years ago) Permalink

actually no it was the first no.1 of 1986 - i remember hoping it would knock Shakey off the top spot and it did

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 23 March 2003 15:58 (6 years ago) Permalink

IIRC it was first released in 83 or 82, then re-recorded after

― Chupa-Cabras (vicc13), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:02 (6 years ago) Permalink

Ah... well, I'm not even much of a fan, but I had to check. There was an original release in Apr '84 which only got to 121 in the charts. Second release was Oct '85.

― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:06 (6 years ago) Permalink

The fact that it somehow seems *so* 1985 is obviously an associative illusion, innit. :)

― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:08 (6 years ago) Permalink

well i was talking about the re-recording then ;) that original version is SO 1982 tho...

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:10 (6 years ago) Permalink

Funny, I just read the liner notes to Pet Shop Boys 'Essential' as I put it on my hard drive last night. The boys met in '81 and almost immediately recorded the song, but I think it did end up being recorded in '82. FWIW. I'll double-check when I go home. (at work on sunday morning, pity me please!)

― teeny (teeny), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:13 (6 years ago) Permalink

So, does anyone think that Brian Molko sounds like Neil Tennant on speed? I heard someone say this once, and thereafter the analogy has rather haunted me...

― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Sunday, 23 March 2003 16:13 (6 years ago) Permalink

9 months pass...

My own belated followup answer to the question is...don't think so, if only because Neil doesn't really bleat or anything. (Why yes I have just finished watching the Pop Art DVD thank you for asking.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 11 January 2004 05:07 (5 years ago) Permalink

I have a pet shop boys memoir . . .

We were in assembly at school, and our head teacher, after he finished going on about how to be nice to people etc, decided to put on "Ge West". "Listen to the lyrics," he said in the kind of patronising way that head techers can muster "they speak of a better place where we can all go. I don't know if I was the only one in the hall to be aware of the hmoerotic undertones of the song - certainly our head wasn't.

Thank you for listening.

― Johnney B (Johnney B), Sunday, 11 January 2004 11:42 (5 years ago) Permalink

5 years pass...

Why is it so hard to find an mp3 of the 1984 version? dammit. The 7" version, that is. I don't need the extended 12" version. :(

― Johnny Fever, Saturday, 11 July 2009 21:55 (4 months ago) Permalink

(wait, why's this thread on ILE?)

― Johnny Fever, Saturday, 11 July 2009 21:57 (4 months ago) Permalink

Not anymore...

― Ned Raggett, Saturday, 11 July 2009 22:08 (4 months ago) Permalink

I'm going to see them in a couple months. Can't wait.

― \(^o\) (/o^)/ (ENBB), Sunday, 12 July 2009 08:19 (4 months ago) Permalink

eventually realised the other day that this is my fave psb song and all-time top 10 material. think i always knew, actually.

― or something, Sunday, 12 July 2009 08:40 (4 months ago) Permalink

Hmm, well all the frenzy about finding the original version paid off. I found it on slsk after wading through 5,000 remixes, extended versions, albums versions, dubs, etc. And... it's not that good. The familiar album version is superior in just about every way imaginable.

― Johnny Fever, Sunday, 12 July 2009 10:52 (4 months ago) Permalink

The familiar album version is superior in just about every way imaginable.

Yes, absolutely. Although their second take on it preserves the overall feel of the first version, Julian Mendelssohn's production is vastly more polished. What really kills the original is Bobby O's "I've just bought a sampler" tomfoolery - in particular, taking a short vocal snippet and playing irritating, Chipmunky runs up and down the keyboard with it. ("Uh-uh-uh-UH-uh-uh!") It must have sounded cool to people at the time, because a bunch of electro records of that era are afflicted by the same problem.

― Vast Halo, Sunday, 12 July 2009 22:50 (4 months ago) Permalink

The original is closer to the sinister minor key atmospherics of "In the Night."

― My name is Kenny! (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 12 July 2009 23:16 (4 months ago) Permalink

Vast Halo, it was Stephen Hague, not Julian Mendelssohn, who produced the second version.

I'm glad there is a thread about my favorite song of all time!

― touch my bum / this is life (daavid), Monday, 13 July 2009 01:43 (4 months ago) Permalink

not very much of this video is actually filmed in the west end is it? its all waterloo station (amazing how it looks just like today) and the south bank. not really the west end. also, didnt see many girls.

― titchy (titchyschneiderMk2), Tuesday, 21 July 2009 16:52 (4 months ago) Permalink

2 months pass...

i'm kinda digging this bobby o version despite the annoying "lol i have sampler" moments. i especially love the absence of the diva vocals at the last bar of each verse. the way neil's last words just HANG there (esp. "which will you choose a hard or soft option") is an awesome tension raiser.

― guammls (QE II), Tuesday, 13 October 2009 23:53 (1 month ago) Permalink

"all your stopping, stalling, and starting / who do you think you are, joe stalin?"

― Mr. Snrub, Wednesday, 14 October 2009 00:34 (1 month ago) Permalink

The Bobby O version is medium-grade camp; the song demands the Cinemascope treatment.

― Roman Polanski now sleeps in prison. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 14 October 2009 00:42 (1 month ago) Permalink

I agree with Alfred here. Bobby O's version is still good but it was Hague who really transformed it into something outstanding.

― one boob is free with one (daavid), Wednesday, 14 October 2009 04:41 (1 month ago) Permalink

o o o o oo oo oo oo

― M. Grissom/DeShields (jaymc), Wednesday, 14 October 2009 06:42 (1 month ago) Permalink

2 weeks pass...

Yay, this is finally coming up on Popular.

― one boob is free with one (daavid), Thursday, 29 October 2009 00:45 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

one of the greatest songs ever

― FACK, Thursday, 29 October 2009 01:03 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

~~one of~~ the greatest songs ever

― one boob is free with one (daavid), Thursday, 29 October 2009 01:07 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

memories of listening to this on a grey morning in a northern melbourne suburb, 1986, with rather unseasonal snow trying to fall outside. earliest pop music memory i think!

― lad: "et tu, lady?" (haitch), Thursday, 29 October 2009 01:08 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

it was like the future, maaaaaaaan

i was 7!

― lad: "et tu, lady?" (haitch), Thursday, 29 October 2009 01:09 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

Will be amazed if this doesn't earn a 10. I've been enjoying Actually the past couple of days - these guys really hit on something.

― Ismael Klata, Thursday, 29 October 2009 11:38 (3 weeks ago) Permalink

it's up now

― Ismael Klata, Tuesday, 3 November 2009 17:40 (2 weeks ago) Permalink

That was superb.

― lihaperäpukamat (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 3 November 2009 18:12 (2 weeks ago) Permalink

Yup.

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 3 November 2009 18:17 (2 weeks ago) Permalink

Like Tom and several commenters, I regarded this song as a novelty for years – like "I Wanna Be a Cowboy," say. I understood "West End Girls" retroactively, thanks to the string of imperial hits to come. I "love" it without having strong feelings, so it's strange if reassuring to read that lots of ears pricked up when they first heard this; it didn't immediately sound special.

― lihaperäpukamat (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 3 November 2009 18:20 (2 weeks ago) Permalink

I've always loved this. Conjures memories of sleeping under the bench seats in my family's van on a christmas road trip.

― Trip Maker, Tuesday, 3 November 2009 18:22 (2 weeks ago) Permalink

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