Pet Shop Boys - Tracks Poll

Wow very exciting! Except choosing only 20 tracks will be difficult.

lol going by my initial ballot I should just copy the tracklist to Alternative and call it a day

xp: tbh I've never really been convinced by "Can You Forgive Her?"; I think it's brilliant until the last verse

I love "One More Chance" but I don't know how you top "Can You Forgive Her?" as an opener.

You can't. Although "Love etc. " was the best attempt in a long time.

lol that's right, I'm the only person on ILX who liked "Home and Dry"

I don't think I'll include that many b-sides. Surely "Miserabilism" and maybe a couple more. But even though they were largely good, few were among their 20 best ever.

10 days -- I might have time to play enough catch-up to vote.

Same. I'm really familiar with the first three (proper) albums. I've heard everything else, but not enough for total recall.

I could easily put all of these on my ballot:

We All Feel Better in the Dark
I Want A Dog
Some Speculation
Jack the Lad
Don Juan
In the Night
Paninaro
You Know Where You Went Wrong
It Must Be Obvious
Do I Have To
I Get Excited (You Get Excited Too)
Bet She's Not Your Girlfriend
A Man Could Get Arrested
Too Many People
Miserablism
Shameless

Really looking forward to breaking my brain over this one at the weekend!

"The Truck Driver and his mate", the only song inspired by a Yorkie ad?

(OK, ignoring Cirrus and "Moving On", the only record issued in a brown oblong format)

I'm the only person on ILX who liked "Home and Dry"

You are not alone. That's a dead cert for my 20.

20 tracks is way way too few, Billy make it a top 50

hoping for high placings for My Funny Uncle and I Want To Wake Up

"The Truck Driver and His Mate" is so awesome.

this is going to be fun, there are 4-5 locks but there are dozens that could fill up the rest of the ballot.

First ballot in, so unless you want 'Absolutely Fabulous' number one you'd better get voting.

Disappointing lack of youtubes, I'm hoping these will get some love.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZip7Y_IDqQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNdfweCLbws

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mBS-9KP7_A&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pgl6zuHBrHw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGWnCEy4leE&feature=related

Are all the Paninaros going to be considered as one track?

"Young Offender" definitely going to be on my ballot. Probably "Your Funny Uncle" as well. I'm gonna have to spend all weekend listening to every Pet Shop Boys track.

Are all the Paninaros going to be considered as one track?

Yes, but if people want to specify a version I'll bear that in mind when doing the reveal.

yeah, time to drag out those Further Listening CDs that I paid so much damn money for and have barely opened since ripping them to digital.

I also hope "Home and Dry" gets some love.

How many are in the final countdown?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm6LLym2tE4

^^^underrated gem^^^

will also be voting for "Home and Dry".

How many are in the final countdown?

To be honest I don't know. It will depend how many tracks get votes, probably 50.

and this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-ga9jVZ8Tg

I like "I Get Along", but it's chorus is too close to Super Furry Animals.

I'll be interested to see how many people vote for newer tracks. Miracles, Flamboyant, I'm With Stupid, Minimal, Integral, and Love etc. are all on my shortlist.

Could seriously do a really awesome ballot of non-singles and b-sides.

I have a kneejerk ballot but need to go back through the newer albums before I send it

it is the ballot of someone inordinately in love with Alternative

Quick question: Should our ballots be numbered? If so, should the format be

1 - "Track 1"
2 - "Track 2"
.
.
.
20 - "Track 20"

?

?

also, soooo psyched abt this!!

"Young Offender" is one of the few songs about which I can, "OK, this is my life."

also, remember before they ruined it on Introspective "I Want A Dog" was a fucking great song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0yIJ7TLZeg&feature=related

It'll be close to impossible narrowing this to 20 tracks.

I could list twenty great songs and not even mention "West End Girls."

"West End Girls" didn't make my initial ballot

Neither did "Opportunities", "What Have I Done To Deserve This?", "It's a Sin", "Being Boring", "So Hard" or "How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?"

also if you don't love this song you may be dead inside:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDteRvSWkjc

The mystery of the world
For every boy and every girl
Who don't understand
What's going on anymore

Helena Springs and Tennant harmonizing is one of the best sounds in the world.

Should our ballots be numbered?

Yes, absolutely.

In format:

1. Track 1
2. Track 2
.
.
10. Track 10 (Dusty Minelli)
.
.
20. Track 20

DON'T FORGET THIS ONE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETMqQTMDgiE

Neil Tennant seems to write about my life all the time.
"Nervously", "Boy Strange", "Sexy Northerner", "Liberation", "So Hard", "It must be obvious", "The Way It Used To Be", "A Red Letter Day", and so many more.

I agree we should get 50 votes!

To me their only utter bore of an album is Yes, with Release close behind; and even then there's "The Way It Used to Be," "Home and Dry," "You Choose," and "Love, Etc."

I like "I Get Along", but it's chorus is too close to Super Furry Animals.

I'm a massive fan of both bands but had somehow never noticed this! It is "Something for the Weekend" though, huh.

Don't think this will make my 20, but I hope it gets a few votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHI7OHqKzW8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Roca7FVAIEs&feature=related

I'd actually forgotten how much I like this song; I should really get around to replacing this album soon

If "Being Boring" didn't exist, the album would still have "This Must Be the Place..." and "My October Symphony."

"So Hard" is great, too, and "End of the World"

Coming across a lot of tracks I had forgotten about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgiL6Gg5_wE

I was just listening to all the b-sides collected in "Beside," and damned if the PSB's output is not simply overwhelming in quality, even when the Boys are not operating at top level. I mean, "I Didn't Get Where I Am Today" .. is that their only rocker?

"Dreaming Of The Queen" is great. I don't recall nearly enough expressions of love for it (though I seem to recall Stephen Merritt chose it to represent 1993 in his 100-recordings-of-20th century thing). Sadly excised from my own ballot at the last moment though.

"Dreaming Of The Queen" is great. I don't recall nearly enough expressions of love for it (though I seem to recall Stephen Merritt chose it to represent 1993 in his 100-recordings-of-20th century thing).

I'd always wished old-ILM had done a Taking Sides: Pet Shop Boys vs the Magnetic Fields - two bands I love to bits but never think to compare; both literate, queer, tagged as ironists, fluent in non-rock pop history and in a way both reviving earlier 80s synthpop while still in the selfsame decade.
I guess "I Thought You Were My Boyfriend" is the most PSBs-like MFs song, though "Rats In The Garbage Of The Western World" has the same sort of Soft Cell bedsit seediness found in Neil's delivery in Bobby 'O'-era PSBs (and possibly "We All Feel Better In The Dark").
Speaking of that Merritt list, I wonder what the Pet Shop Boys made of White Town's "Your Woman"?

Poll is now officially closed. If you haven't voted you've missed the boat.

I'll check and double check the results today and hopefully will start the roll out this evening.

Righto, Official ILX Ballot number two will be around shortly.

"I Thought You Were My Boyfriend" vs "Bet She's Not Your Girlfriend"

I'd always wished old-ILM had done a Taking Sides: Pet Shop Boys vs the Magnetic Fields

It's a close one. It's hard to beat Stephin Merritt as a lyricist, and he can certainly write good melodies. But Pet Shop Boys are infinitely better in the production/ arrangements dept. ... so them.

Results Happening Now

FACT: "Why Don't We Live Together" is a top five tune.

Every track on Please apart from 'Violence' has been "best song ever" for me at some point or another. A ridiculously strong debut. Everyone talks about Very or Behaviour, but Please ranks as one of my favourite ever synthpop albums.

for my money, they never bettered Please or Actually

I like thinking about this phenomenon sometimes, where an act comprehensively establishes itself so clearly early on that what follows is ultimately finesse, but where all kinds of varying fates happen after that. Pet Shop Boys had full imperial phase recognition and then settled into being a cult/oldies act (the former in the view of the fanbase, the latter in the view of the wider world) but with albums and singles that people can point to in terms of variety and experiment; an act like the Ramones establishes only a subcultural preeminence and never varies from it, and their later albums simply become curios.

in an interview with sw00ds from 2013 I asked him and Chris Mol@nphy how the North American perceived the PSB on the eve of Actually's release. There had been so many fluke English synth pop duos that I wondered if anyone thought this duo's second album would matter.

But we talk about the stellar career of Naked Eyes to this day

Three weeks ago a 20-year-old girl at the station was blasting their comp. I was like, the Bacharach-David one, 'Promises, Promises,' and, uh..."

There really is no shame in a 2 track CD release, if that's all that's needed.

for my money, they never bettered Please or Actually

― ¶ (DJP), Monday, 19 December 2016 02:18 (yesterday) Permalink

^this!

amazingly the first 2 albums were pretty much all from the early demos so not only did they arguably never better the first few years of recorded output they arguably never bettered the run of songs from before they were even signed.

nah. the first two albums ARE the best, but they have approx. 900 songs better than most of the songs on those albums.

(and Electric is their third-best album!)

'Jealousy' and 'Nervously' were both fairly old songs by the time they recorded. If I remember correctly, 'Nervously' was a Neil song that predated PSB, and 'Jealousy' was one of the earliest Tennant/Lowe things.

"What Have I Done to Deserve This?" wasn't an old demo.

no but they had it by the Please sessions so i mean.. early demos and early sessions covered a massive chunk of albums 1 and 2 and attendant B sides. so if one were to make the point that the very very early stuff was The Best then the point stands IMO.

i mean they're aware of this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLBN6CAs8oY

You've got your whole life to release your first album, and 6 months to release your second.

Proud history of bands like Cheap Trick, Pixies and Van Halen burning through their backlog.

The thing is, though, I really really dislike the idea of the Pet Shop Boys discography ending with Actually. At one point I would have said Bilingual would have been a great place to leave it, but I'd hate to be without Fundamental or Electric, so...

Saying their first two albums are the best is not the same as saying that they shouldn't have recorded their subsequent albums, many of which are great.

Of course not, but as much as Please is one of my favourite PSB LP's, and one of my favourite synthpop albums of all time, I don't really rate Actually as high. I'd reach for Very or Introspective (*hears the faint sound of DJP combusting*) over it.

Actually also contains 'Hit Music', which is probably one of the only "imperial phase" PSB tracks that I actively loathe.

It's the only song from this period that's HEY WE'RE THE PET SHOP BOYS LET'S WRITE TO CHARACTER

Hit Music is great, wtf

another excuse to post the 7" mix of this B-side:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS7-j4Wnw4k

^^^ one of their best full stop

that said I think Behavior/Very >> Please/Actually

xp - Yeah, also the Please/Actually-era B-sides is yet more proof of how on fire they were during this period.

I like plenty of later era PSB songs, but had they stopped at Actually (OK, let's say Introspective), their status of legends would stay intact in my book.

1986 to 1994 is a good run imo

xp -I am aware that, for me, part of the appeal of these to albums is the mid-80s sound, which I've always been partial to, above any other era.

'Hit Music' feels like more of a B-side than the B-sides of the period.