Absolutely Fabulous

I saw the Pet Shop Boys in concert on Thursday. (If you don't know why the entry title goes with this, your homework is to do some googling.)

The concert, which was the last one on their US tour, was awesome! The Pet Shop Boys have always been one of my favorite bands, and I finally had a chance to see them in concert. Add in the fact that it helped take my mind off things (which is something I've needed the last few days) and that one of my problems got solved while I was at the concert (though I found out only upon my return) and that I had another idea for how to mostly solve another one during the concert (it would turn out to work as well) and Thursday was a good night (though there is still one other thing about which I'm gnawing at myself constantly).

There was no opening act. Instead, the Pet Shop Boys played slightly longer than they otherwise might have and had an intermission. They did a really good job with their special effects, which included a very brief glimpse of George Bush II on-screen during the song "I'm With Stupid" and a background with lots of tanks and stuff during "The Sodom and Gomorrah Show." These two songs are both on the new album, Fundamental, which goes back to the Pet Shop Boys' new wave roots more than most of their recent albums. I suppose I should have reviewed that album here at some point---in general, it's very good and has several very strong tracks (a couple in particular), but it doesn't really have any truly spectacular songs. Arguably the coolest song on the album is the "duet" with Elton John called "In Private." The Pet Shop Boys have done some pretty funky collaborative songs before (such as one with Liza Minelli), and this one is also special.

Anyway, back to the concert... There were a number of songs from the current album, a lot of really old songs, and a few "in between" ones as well. The two most notable absences, among songs one might expect them to perform (so deep album cuts that happen to be awesome don't count here, though there were obviously song of those I would have loved to hear), were "Being Boring" (I really wish they sang that) and "What Have I Done to Deserve This." The other mild disappointments were that the version of "Opportunities" they sang was somewhat abbreviated (it would have been nice if they included all the verses) and they sang a remix of "So Hard" which though cool was not as cool as the original. As they sometimes do, they changed the words to one or two songs slightly. ("Left To Our Own Devices" had some minute changes that come to mind.)

One of the things the Pet Shop Boys did exceptionally well was segue from one song to another and at a couple points, the riff to one song included parts of another song (or 3-4 in the case of the ending part of "Go West," which was very appropriately the last song of the show). These also tended to be songs that go well together (thankfully). Unsurprisingly, the biggest cheer was for "West End Girls," which was their first single---it originally came out in 1984 but it was the second version of the single, released at the end of 1985, that became their first and still biggest hit. (Actually, I like the original version of the single better because the pace is faster. My brother owned it on record, though it was lost years ago. I have yet to be able to find this version of the song online.) I agree the song is awesome, but it probably doesn't even rank in my top 10 list of Pet Shop Boys' songs because they have recorded so much good stuff. (For what it's worth, wikipedia claims that this song is the first UK #1 single that was rapped rather than sung.) The song that highlighted my evening was "It's a Sin." I love that song, and they performed it especially well on Thursday!

One last thing worth mentioning: At one point, somebody from the audience tossed something on-stage that appeared to be some sort of underwear. Once the current song was over, lead singer Neil Tennant picked it up, smiled, gave the audience a thumbs up in the general direction from whence the article of clothing was tossed, and handed it to somebody offstage. My point here is that unlike, say, Madonna, some artists actually roll with the punches instead of having hissyfits.