August 1981
On August 19th, Neil and Chris met by chance in an electronics shop on the Kings Road, London.  Realising they had a common interest in dance music, they began to write together. To begin with they called themselves West End ; later they came up with the name Pet Shop Boys, a name derived from some friends who worked in a pet shop in Ealing. "We thought it sounded like an English rap group".

August 1983
Neil is sent to New York by Smash Hits to interview The Police.  By this time the Pet Shop Boys were obsessed by a stream of hi energy records made by New York producer Bobby Orlando, known as Bobby O'.  "I thought well, if I've got to go and see The Police play then I'm also going to have lunch with Bobby O'".  They shared a cheeseburger and carrot cake at a restaurant called The Applejack on August 19th (two years to the day since Neil and Chris had met) and Bobby O', flattered by Neil's compliments, suggests making a record with the Pet Shop Boys. 

April 1984
The first version of 'West End Girls' is released.
It is a club hit in Los Angeles and San Francisco and a small hit in France and Belgium.

October 1984
They made their first ever stage appearance at the Fridge Nightclub in Brixton, singing and playing over tapes.

March 1985
They signed to Parlophone Records after long negotiations with Bobby O', who relinquished his contractual rights over them in return for a substantial royalty on future record sales.

April 1985
On April 5th, Neil leaves Smash hits. In the next issue an 'obituary' is written, bidding him a sad adieu and predicting that in a matter of weeks Neil's pop duo, the Pet Shop Boys will be down the dumper and he'll come crawling back on bended knees.  "I spoke to my mum on the telephone and said how we'd signed with EMI and she said "But you're not going to give up your job, are you?" and I said actually I did last week".

July 1985
On July 1st, the first version of 'Opportunities' is released. It reaches #116 in the UK.

August 1985
They play a short set as part of the ICA Rock Week in London, Chris showing off his skills on the trombone. Neil and Chris are interviewed on stage by Max Headroom.  They re-recorded 'West End Girls' with producer Stephen Hague the same month.

October 1985
'West End Girls' is released on October 28th and goes to #1 in the UK in January. It was subsequently #1 in USA, Canada, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Israel, New Zealand and Norway, selling 1.5 million copies. "People endlessly ask us what it's like having a #1" said Neil at the time. "But what it feels like is vaguely nothing. It feels like having a cup of tea". 

February 1986
On February 24th, 'Love Comes Quickly', still one of their favourite songs, is released, reaching a disappointing #19 in the UK.

March 1986
On March 24th, their first LP 'Please' is released. "It's so people can go into the record shop and say can I have the Pet Shop Boys album, please?".

April 1986
'West End Girls' reaches #1 in USA.

May 1986
On May 19th a new version of 'Opportunities' is released. "The point of that song is that the humour is black, it's like a joke. The impression is that the people in it are not going to make any money".

June 1986
The Pet Shop Boys announce, then cancel, a tour of Europe and America ; the cost of using a theatre design and playing fairly small venues proves prohibitive.

September 1986
On September 22nd, a re-recorded version of 'Suburbia', a song inspired by the Penelope Spheeris film of the same name about a group of disenchanted rebellious youths in suburban Los Angeles, is released. "It's about a riot happening in some decaying suburb. It's just the description of the riot happening and then the aftermath".  On the B-side was the first version of 'Paninaro', named after an Italian youth cult and featuring a quote they both liked that Chris had said on a TV show: "I don't like country and western, I don't like rock music, I don't like rockabilly... I don't like much really, do I? But what I do like, I love passionately".

November 1986
On November 17th 'Disco', an LP of disco remixes, is released.

February 1987
The Pet Shop Boys receive the Best Single award for 'West End Girls' at the BPI Awards.  "It's a bit like the school prize giving day, isn't it?", muttered Neil who turned up to receive the award from Boy George.  Chris stayed at home and watched it on TV. Meanwhile, they had been working on the next LP and considering, once more, whether to tour.  "I can't see the point really", said Neil at the time.  "I quite like the idea of being on the coach, having the meal beforehand, the party in the room afterwards, going in the swimming pool, signing the autographs in the lobby, and wrecking the mini-bar.  The only thing I don't like the idea of is being on the stage and having to sing for rather a long time".  He now dismisses this comment as flippant; it had been inspired by his happy memories of going on tour with Depeche Mode for Smash Hits in Autumn of 1984.

May 1987
The Pet Shop Boys receive the Best International Hit award for 'West End Girls' at the Ivor Novello Awards.  Vera Lynn performed at the lunch.

June 1987
On June 15th, 'It's a Sin', a song that originally appeared on the demo Neil had in his pocket when he took Bobby O' out to lunch, was released.  "It's about being brought up as a Catholic.  When I went to school you were taught that everything was a sin".  It reached #1 and caused several notable rumpuses.  Jonathan King accused them of plagiarism (he later apologised and paid damages to a charity at their request).  A teacher at Neil's old school, St. Cuthbert's Grammar School, Newcastle, got very steamed up about the picture Neil painted of his education and castigated Neil in the press.  The Salvation Army magazine, War Cry, put the Pet Shop Boys on the front page and noted, approvingly, "It's interesting that someone's raised the concept of sin in our modern life again".  Neil was also asked to appear with Cardinal Hume in a press advert for CAFOD ; he politely declined the offer, explaining that he wasn't a practising Catholic.  The song's video, a sombre tale of guilt and punishment featuring the seven deadly sins, was the first time the Pet Shop Boys worked with Derek Jarman. 

August 1987
On August 10th, 'What Have I Done To Deserve This?', a duet with Dusty Springfield, is released.  They had actually wanted to record the song with Dusty - Neil's favourite female singer - for 'Please' but had not been able to arrange it in time.  "She sounds right because her voice has got that world-weary quality".  On August 16th, the Pet Shop Boys appeared on a Granada TV special, Love Me Tender, commemorating the tenth anniversary of Elvis Presley's death.  They were asked to perform an old song he had made famous so they sifted through some Elvis cassettes and decided to do both a house version of 'Baby Let's Play House' and 'Always On My Mind'.  In the end, they only did the latter.  At the time they had no plans whatsoever to release it.

September 1987
On September 7th, the 'Actually' LP is released.  The title was simply a word they say an awful lot.  "We were thinking of calling it Jollysight, actually", said Chris at the time "which was the name of a hotel we saw in Italy - so that, when people asked why, we could say because it's a jolly sight better than the last one..."

October 1987
On October 12th, 'Rent', a mercenary love song, is released.

November 1987
The Pet Shop Boys spend three weeks in Clacton and South London shooting 'It Couldn't Happen Here'.  What had originally been conceived as an hour-long video based around the 'Actually' LP, turned into a full-scale feature film to be released cinematically, directed by Jack Bond and co-starring Barbra Windsor, Joss Ackland and Gareth Hunt. "We just do what we normally do in videos", explained Chris, "walk around, me a few paces behind Neil...".  On November 30th, 'Always On My Mind' is released as a single; it becomes the Christmas #1.

January 1988
'I'm Not Scared', a song the Pet Shop Boys have written and produced for Patsy Kensit, is released as a single by her group Eighth Wonder, and is their first hit.

February 1988
At the BPI Awards, the Pet Shop Boys win the Best Group award.  They also mime to 'What Have I Done To Deserve This?' on stage with Dusty Springfield.  Afterwards Neil comments, "It's kind of macho nowadays to prove you can cut it live, I quite like proving that we can't cut it live.  We're a pop group, not a rock 'n' roll group".

March 1988
A different mix of 'Heart' is released as a single on March 21st and reaches #1 in the UK.  "It's a real disco song - the idea of 'heartbeat' the beat of the record and the beat of your heart.  It's actually pretty corny, to be honest, but I think the words are quite sweet and sincere".  The video, shot in Yugoslavia, was a resetting of the Dracula story with Ian McKellen in the title role.

May 1988
For the second year running, the Pet Shop Boys win the Best International Hit award at the Ivor Novello Awards, this time for 'It's a Sin'.

June 1988
Ian McKellen persuades the Pet Shop Boys to play live at an anti-Clause 28 benefit, Before The Act, at London's Piccadilly Theatre, performing 'It's a Sin' and 'One More Chance'. "A brilliant event", they said afterwards.

July 1988
'It Couldn't Happen Here' is released on July 8th to mixed reviews : it wins an award at the Houston film festival.

August 1988
The Pet Shop Boys win the Berolina award in Germany for 'Group of the Year'.  The award is presented to them by Miss Venezuela.

September 1988
On September 12th, 'Domino Dancing' is released, a song they recorded that February in Miami with Expose producer, Lewis Martinee.  They shot a video in Puerto Rico and appeared with a full Latin band on Wogan and Top Of The Pops.

October 1988
On October 10th, their new album 'Introspective' is released.  So called because "all the songs, although it's a dance album, are introspective".  The title was chosen after considering and dismissing 'f', 'Dogmatic', 'Bounce' and 'Hello'.  They reckon 'Introspective' sounds serious, like an art exhibition :  "Nick Rhodes", said Chris at the time, "will be so jealous".

November 1988
On November 14th, 'Left To My Own Devices' is released, "an exaggerated autobiography".  The second verse refers to a time when Neil's mother would worry about him because he'd wait in a corner of the back garden pretending to be a Roundhead soldier.

February 1989
On February 13th, 'Nothing Has Been Proved' is released as a single for Dusty Springfield, written by the Pet Shop Boys, produced by them and Julian Mendelsohn and taken from the film Scandal.  They actually wrote two songs for Dusty for the film - the other which the film-makers passed on because they thought it sounded too contemporary, was 'In Private'.  Meanwhile, they are busy producing - with Julian Mendelsohn - an album for Liza Minnelli.

June 1989
On June 26th, 'It's Alright' is released.  They originally heard this song - by Chicago House artist Sterling Void - when one of them popped out during the recording of 'I Get Excited' (The B-side of 'Heart') and bought 'Acid Tracks' : The House Sound Of Chicago Vol. 3' on CD and were both immediately impressed by this song.  For a single they re-recorded it in a more poppy style and Neil added a verse about the threat facing the world environment.  "It's about the power of music.  It's a bit cosmic really - it's saying that if people still make music then there's always going to be a good side to what people do so mankind is never going to be totally destructive.  It's very sincere and there's something about the song that makes perfect sense.  It has this beautiful line: 'I can hear it on a timeless wavelength, never dissipating and giving us strength'.  I think that's true.  Music is an inspiration to people and always has been an inspiration to people.  Music represents the good side of mankind; music tends to be a good force rather than a bad force".

June 1989
On June 29th, the Pet Shop Boys begin their first tour, visiting Hong Kong, Japan and Britain, playing 14 dates in all.  The tour, a lavish theatrical spectacle is directed by film-maker Derek Jarman.  He has specially shot several films to be back-projected, there are extravagant costumes and the cast includes six dancers (Casper, Cooley, Hugo Huizar, Tracey Langran, Jill Robertson and Robia LaMorte), four singers (Mike Henry, Jay Henry, Carroll Thompson and Juliet Roberts), an extra keyboard player (Dominic Clarke) and a percussionist (Danny Cummings).  "They asked for a theatrical concert and that's what we're doing", said Derek Jarman.  "I suppose some people think pop music and theatre shouldn't mix but I think pop music is theatre and I don't see why it shouldn't be so.  To my mind, there's two ways of doing it - you either just sit there and sing on a stool and do it the simple way or you go for it".

August 1989
The first single from the Pet Shop Boys' collaboration with Liza Minnelli, a hi-energy version of Stephen Sondheim's 'Losing My Mind', is released.  It is her first hit single. The collaboration was the idea of an executive in the American branch of Epic Records. Together they recorded an entire LP 'Results' (released in October).  "I just put it completely in their hands, the ultimate trust", said Liza. "It's weird, because I've been working for 30 years and to find somebody who you like enough and trust enough and respect enough to say forget it, I'll do whatever you want is quite amazing".

November 1989
The Dusty Springfield single 'In Private' is released on November 20th.  Written and co-produced by the Pet Shop Boys, it was originally also intended for the film Scandal but was adjudged it to sound too contemporary. "It's about someone having an affair with a politician and being found out", Neil explained, "the politician is saying different things in public and in private".

December 1989
'Getting Away With It', the first single by Electronic, the group formed by New Order's Bernard Sumner and The Smith's guitarist Johnny Marr, is released on December 4th.  The words are co-written by Neil who also sings on the record and appears in the video.  The collaboration had come about after Neil had sent a message through a mutual friend earlier in the year saying that he'd like to be involved.  Both Neil and Chris also travel to Manchester to collaborate on another song called 'Patience Of A Saint'.

April 1990
The Pet Shop Boys begin recording their new LP in Munich with producer Harold Faltermeyer.

July 1990
Dusty Springfield's first LP since the Pet Shop Boys recorded 'What Have I Done To Deserve This?' with her is released.  It is called 'Reputation' and one half of the LP is a collaboration with the Pet Shop Boys.  "She's very much a pop singer", said Neil, "and her voice instinctively goes very well with our music".  He explained they also admired her melodramatic determination, "She looks at making records as like climbing a mountain, you have to grind yourself up, it's going to be quite a long journey".

August 1990
On August 4th, the Pet Shop Boys make their first public live appearance in America, guesting on two songs with Electronic at the Los Angeles Dodgers Stadium.  Electronic have been invited to play by the headline act Depeche Mode.  They repeat the same performance the following night.

September 1990
On September 24th 'So Hard' is released.  It is about "two people living together; they are totally unfaithful to each other but they both pretend they are faithful and then catch each other out".  The black and white video is shot in Newcastle and co-stars Paul Gascoigne's sister, Anna.  A second twelve-inch mix is released featuring a virtual re-recording of both 'So Hard' and the B-side 'It Must Be Obvious' by the KLF.

October 1990
'Behaviour', the Pet Shop Boys fifth LP, is released on October 22nd. It is recorded in Munich and co-produced by Harold Faltermeyer who they originally chose because they were interested in using old analogue synthesisers.  On two songs, 'This Must Be The Place I Waited Years To Leave' and 'My October Symphony', Johnny Marr plays guitar.  Though at the time of release they didn't consider it to reflect a substantial shift in mood, later they conceded it had been.  "It was more reflective and more musical-sounding, and also it probably didn't have irritatingly crass ideas in it, like our songs often do".

November 1990
In Lost Angeles, at the Mayan Theatre on the night of November 6th, the Pet Shop Boys play their first American concert using a collection of performers (Casper and Hugo Huizar dancing, Dominic Clarke playing keyboards and operating the computer equipment, and two backing singers) with whom they had appeared the previous day on the Arsenio Hall Show.

The second single taken off 'Behaviour' is 'Being Boring' released on November 12th.  The song is inspired by a party invitation from Neil's Newcastle days which quoted Zelda Fitzgerald's line "She was never bored, mainly because she was never boring".  Its video was the first to be made by photographer and film-maker Bruce Weber, "I loved the lyrics", he explained "and really felt it was something I wanted to be part of... in it there's the feeling that times are different today, and the feeling of abandoness we can't have today because of the way the world is".  It was shot in one day at a house in Long Island, near New York, with a cast that included a selection of Weber's beautiful friends, a horse and a chimpanzee on roller-skates. Though MTV in America, and several British TV shows refused to show it because of the nudity included, it won Music Week's Best Video Of The Year Award.  On the same day, a book about the Pet Shop Boys, 'Pet Shop Boys Literally', written with their consent and based around their 1989 concerts is published.  At a London bookshop on November 23rd they sign over 800 copies before the police break up the waiting crowd.

December 1990
'Highlights', a video of eight songs from the 1991 tour, is finally released.  An earlier plan to release footage of the entire show had to be cancelled because Neil and Chris thought the footage disappointing.

March 1991
The plan is to release 'How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?', a sharp dig at "the aspirations and pomposities of pop stars" as the first Pet Shop Boys single of 1991.  They drastically remix it in conjunction with British dance duo Brothers In Rhythm and film a video in which they parody a number of stars.  Meanwhile they have recorded another track, initially to release much later in the year : a hi-energy version of U2's 'Where The Streets Have No Name' segued with the Frankie Valli standard 'Can't Take My Eyes Off You'.  Eventually they resolve to release both songs as a double A-side on March 11th, and make a complementary video for 'Where The Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes Off You)'.  "It worked as a concept: one song is about rock stars so to have a U2 song with it serves as a further comment".  (Pressed for comment on this new cover version, U2 issued the wry statement "What have we done to deserve this?").  The Pet Shop Boys second tour, 'Performance', also begins on March 11th in Tokyo.  After Japan it visits the USA, Canada, France, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Holland and the United Kingdom and Eire.  It is put together in conjunction with director David Alden and designer David Fielding, best known for their avant garde opera productions. "It's going to be more theatrical than the last tour", Neil announced.  "We felt that with the last tour there were still elements of a rock concert that we'd like to get rid of".  There are no musicians on stage, (though two, guitarists J.J. Belle and keyboard player Scott Davidson, do skulk in the wings), just three singers (Pamela Sheyne, Derek Green and Sylvia Mason-James) and ten dancers (Petee Aloysius, Trevor Henry, Craig Maguire, Catherine Malone, Mark Martin, Leon Maurice Jones, Suki Miles, Katie Puckrick, Sarah Toner and Noal Wallace) choreographed by Jacob Marley.

May 1991
The first album by Electronic, 'Electronic' including the collaboration with Neil and Chris, 'The Patience Of A Saint', is finally released on May 27th.

May 1991
'Jealousy', re-modelled to include a real orchestra, is released on May 28th.  It is a song that they had actually written nine years ago, in the spring of 1982, and is, quite simply about jealousy.  "There's some good lines in there", observes Chris, "like 'you didn't phone when you said you would'.  You know when you stay in and they say they're going to phone at eight o'clock and they don't all night and you go absolutely bonkers?"  The twelve inch version contains a quote from Shakespeare's tragic study of jealousy, Othello.  In the video, shot in a west London car showroom, the Pet Shop Boys stand by as a roomful of dining villains move from jealousy to violence. The video is subsequently banned on MTV.

June 1991
The third collection of Pet Shop Boys promotional videos, aptly titled 'Promotion', is released on June 3rd and includes videos for all their singles from 'Left To My Own Devices' to 'Jealousy'.

June 1991
In Dublin on June 17th the Pet Shop Boys play the final date of their tour.

August 1991
Neil and Chris are invited to take over Simon Bates' mid-morning show on Radio One, Britain's national pop radio station, for a week.  They choose all the records, principally dance music.  Chris only swears on air once, and they are invited back to fill the same role in July 1992.

September 1991
The Pet Shop Boys launch their own record label Spaghetti with a single 'Heaven Must Have Sent You Back To Me', by a 21 year old Scottish singer, synthesiser player and songwriter called Cicero.  They first met him when he came backstage at the Pet Shop Boys' Glasgow concert in 1989.

October 1991
A single, 'DJ Culture', co-produced by British dance music duo Brothers In Rhythm, is released on October 14th.  "It is about how facile and pretentious modern life is", Neil explains, "just as in DJ records everything is sampled to sound authentic, so in a lot of aspects of modern life - for instance in politics - it is almost as though attitudes are sampled.  People pretend to sound concerned ; everyone pretends that the Gulf War was a real war, and that President Bush or John Major are successful war leaders.  In fact they sample the past - the Second World War, or a war movie - and the public also samples their response from wars in the past.  The whole thing is sort of fake". In the video Neil and Chris appear in appropriate costumes : as soldiers and doctors; as a referee and a soccer player; as Oscar Wilde and his trial Judge.

October 1991
The Pet Shop Boys play a one off concert at the London Nightclub, Heaven, at a party after the Premiere of Derek Jarman's latest film, 'Edward II' on October 15th.  It is a deliberately un-theatrical, straight-forward concert, for which they are backed by the three singers from this year's tour, J.J. Belle on guitar and Lawrence Cedar on keyboards.  They are introduced by Derek Jarman, and supported by Cicero.

November 1991
'Discography', a collection of the Pet Shop Boys' hit singles from 'West End Girls' to the forthcoming 'Was It Worth It?', is released on November 4th.  Only six of the eighteen songs have previously appeared on an album in their single versions.  At the same time a video compilation, 'Videography', is also released.

December 1991
'Was It Worth It?' is released as a single on December 8th.  "It's a reaffirmation of the worth of love" remarks Neil, "an 'I am what I am' sort of song".  The video mixes footage from the "Heaven" concert with the Pet Shop Boys amongst a clubland crowd mostly recruited from the London Club event "Kinky Gerlinky" also held at "Heaven".

February 1992
On February 16th an hour-long film about the Pet Shop Boys is broadcast by the TV arts programme The South Bank Show.

May 1992
The Pet Shop Boys play a concert at the Hacienda Nightclub in Manchester on May 13th to coincide with an exhibition of Derek Jarman's paintings at Manchester City Art Gallery and with the Hacienda's tenth anniversary.  They perform with J.J. Belle and Sylvia Mason-James. In rehearsals they decide they want to play a suitable cover version and - after tinkering with, then discarding The Beatles' 'Fool On The Hill' - choose the Village People's 1979 hit 'Go West'.  The following month, on June 8th, the Pet Shop Boys performed with the same line-up at Roseland in New York, a benefit for Lifebeat, an organization for people in the music business with AIDS.

June 1992
Neil co-writes and sings on a new Electronic single 'Disappointed'.  The title came to him when Johnny Marr and Bernard Sumner's backing track reminded him of 'Disenchantee', a song liked by French singer Mylene Farmer.  "'Disappointed' is", he says, "sort of a love song, about not being disappointed". 

September 1992
Eric Watson's film of the 1991 Performance tour - also titled 'Performance' - is released on video on September 28th.  It has been delayed after a copyright wrangle with one of the owners of 'I Can't Take My Eyes Off You', and all traces of that song have been ruthlessly excised.

October 1992
On October 26th, the soundtrack to the Neil Jordan film 'The Crying Game' is released on Spaghetti Records.  Earlier in 1992 the Pet Shop Boys had been asked whether they would be interested in helping with songs for the film, at that time titled 'The Soldier's Wife'.  After seeing, and loving, a rough edit, they agreed to release the soundtrack on their Spaghetti label, and to contribute songs produced by them and performed by Cicero and Carroll Thompson.  At the last moment, it was suggested that they also produce a new version of Dave Berry's 1964 single, 'The Crying Game', with Boy George singing.  They had lunch with him, and a week later it was recorded.  'The Crying Game' subsequently became the film's theme tune.  It is a British hit single in September 1992 and then, in the Spring of 1993, it became an American hit in the wake of the film's immense American success.  "I'm as happy as a sandboy", Boy George will comment, and plans will be hatched for he and the Pet Shop Boys to work together again on his next LP, in true Pet Shop Boys style of course, this never happens.

June 1993
A single, 'Can You Forgive Her?', is released on June 1st.  The song, which takes its title from a novel by Anthony Trollope, "is a sort of a short story.  It starts with a man being awake in the night, and he can't get to sleep because he's been made a fool of by his girlfriend, who thinks he's not masculine enough.  In the first verse he's embarrassed and annoyed at his girlfriend.  In the second one he reveals that the girlfriend thinks he's a complete wimp, even in bed.  Then in the third verse he goes back in time to his first sexual experience at school, and you realise that he's gay but can't face up to the fact".  For the accompanying photographs and video, the Pet Shop Boys appear in orange body suits and dunces caps designed by David Fielding, who designed the 1991 Performance Tour.  "We wanted to do something that is the opposite of what everyone else is doing", Neil explains, "Everyone else is being real", so we're being artificial".

July 1993
The Pet Shop Boys travel to Moscow for the opening of MTV Russia, "We had to cut a log in half", explains Neil, "live on Russian television to officially open it".

September 1993
'Go West' is released as a single on September 6th.  It is the song they originally chose to cover at their Hacienda concert the previous year.  "I was at home in my flat", recalls Chris, "playing, as I often do, The Village People's Greatest Hits album and I though 'Go West' would be a good song to play at a Derek Jarman event, a song about an idealistic, gay utopia.  And I knew that the way Neil would sing it would make it sound hopeless ; you've got these inspiring lyrics but it sounds like it's never going to be achieved".  The video, which combines footage filmed in Moscow's Red Square with an oblique tribute to A Matter of Life And Death, finds them in a new set of costumes : Neil in blue, Chris in yellow, and both of them wearing blue-and-yellow domes on their heads.

September 1993
A new Pet Shop Boys album, 'Very', is released on September 27th.  It enters the UK album charts at #1.  It is produced by the Pet Shop Boys, with additional production by Stephen Hague, and is mixed by Stephen Hague and Mike 'Spike' Drake.  "It is called Very", says Neil, "because it is Very Pet Shop Boys : It's very up, it's very hi-energy, it's very romantic, it's very sad, it's very pop, it's very danceable, and some of it is very funny...".  At the same time as they recorded 'Very', the Pet Shop Boys also recorded six further songs which they describe as "non structured" and which appear as a limited edition accompanying 'Very'.  This second album is titled 'Relentless', "because", Neil explains, "it is".

October 1993
On October 24th the Pet Shop Boys appear at the London Palladium as part of The Equality Show, a benefit as part of Stonewall's campaign to equalize the age of consent for gay and heterosexual people in Britain.  They are introduced on stage by Boy George and Janet Street-Porter, and perform four songs : 'Can You Forgive Her?', 'To Speak Is A Sin', 'One In A Million' (incorporating Culture Beat's 'Mr. Vain') and 'Go West'.  For the final song they are joined by the London Gay Men's Choir.

November 1993
On November 4th, 'Pet Shop Boys versus America', a book detailing their 1991 tour, written by Chris Heath with photographs by Pennie Smith, is published.

'I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind Of Thing' is released as a single on November 15th.  The single version, remixed by the Beatmasters, is radically different to the album version : longer, more epic and more upbeat. In the accompanying videos they wear new costumes (pink and white for Chris, pink and black for Neil) and sixties wigs, and they do things they wouldn't normally do. "The song itself", says Neil, "is about a reserved Englishman falling in love and going bonkers. He decides he couldn't care less anymore, and throws caution to the wind. It's a funny song, but it's sincere. I'm so bored with people seeing us as ironic that I'm quite keen on being sincere at the moment". They also appeared on the annual BBC charity raising event "Children In Need" performing the new single to a specially edited "3-D" version of the video.

December 1993
A video is released of all the films Derek Jarman has made as backdrops to live Pet Shop Boys performances, both for their 1989 tour and their 1993 Hacienda performance.  It is called 'Projections'.

February 1994
On February 14th the Pet Shop Boys appear at the Brit Awards, performing 'Go West' dressed as miners, backed by a Welsh choir, an idea which they had originally conceived for the 1992 Royal Variety Show as a protest against a wave of coal pit closures.

April 1994
On April 4th 'Liberation' is released as a single.  "The song", says Neil, "is trying to reconcile the idea in a relationship that you are liberated, because you feel fabulous because of the love, with the idea that you also feel constricted and obligated.  It's one of my 'live for today' songs".  In the video, the fourth of their computer enhanced collaborations with director Howard Greenhaugh, the Pet Shop Boys appear almost entirely as computer generated entities.  During April a virtual reality ride based around the video tours Britain's major cities.

May 1994
On May 31st, a single 'Absolutely Fabulous' (the artist's name, too, is nominally Absolutely Fabulous) is released.  It features snippets of dialogue spoken by Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley, from the TV series Absolutely Fabulous, set to a Pet Shop Boys euro-disco backing track (Jennifer Saunders also went into the studio to add some further irreverent chatter, such as "techno, techno bloody techno" and "it's the bloody Pet Shop Boys sweetie").  "We had the idea because we liked the programme so much", says Neil.  "We thought it would make a funny record, and we quite fancied meeting them".  The record's profits are donated to the British Charity Comic Relief.  "I know some people are horrified that we did a charity record", says Neil, "but it just seemed a way of dealing with it.  It made it simple, because we did the record for fun, not as a major artistic statement".

June 1994
The first ever mix the Pet Shop Boys have done of another artist's record - Blur's 'Girls and Boys' - is released.  (In Britain it appears on Blur's 'To The End' single ; in some other countries it is released in it's own right).  They did it because they thought it would be fun. "And", says Chris, "we thought it could be more of a dance track".

August 1994
'Yesterday When I Was Mad' is released as a single on August 29th, in a new version remixed by the Pet Shop Boys and Julian Mendelsohn.  "I started the words on the last tour", remembers Neil, "on the tour bus when I was in a bad mood, and it was just about the kind of things people say to you after the show.  On tour it's very difficult to believe in anyone's sincerity.  You get quite a lot of damning with faint praise, and it struck me it would be quite a funny idea for a song just to have lots of bitchy remarks which drive you mad. I don't think anyone's actually ever said to us 'you've made such a little go a very long way', but we do tend to get patronizing reviews.  As for the competition winners, hotel rooms and arguing about dinner, see 'Pet Shop Boys versus America'.

September 1994
On September 12th, the Pet Shop Boys released 'Disco 2', a mid-priced sequel to their 1986 dance album 'Disco'.  Edited together by London DJ Danny Rampling, it is a continuous mix of dance versions of their six most recent singles (including 'Absolutely Fabulous') and also incorporates 'So Hard' and the celebrated B-side of 'Being Boring', 'We All Feel Better In The Dark'.  "It's really good for driving to, and getting ready to go out to", says Chris.

October 1994
On October 26th the Pet Shop Boys begin their 1994 tour, 'Discovery', in Singapore.  Over the next six weeks they play concerts in Australia, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Argentina and Brazil.  The tour is inspired by a trip Chris made to Brazil in the summer, and by a July visit the Pet Shop Boys made to the Sound Factory in New York where they saw go-go dancers cavorting to the music, covered only by flimsy American flags, whilst live percussionists played along to the records.  The performers include four dancers (Flavio Cecchetto, Mirelle Diax, Paulo Henrique and Nicole Nisiotis), two percussionists (Liliana Chachian and Oli Saville), an additional singer (Katie Kissoon) and their regular in-studio programmer, Pete Gleadall, who also plays guitar on 'Suburbia'.  As well as a selection of Pet Shop Boys songs from throughout their career, they play Blur's 'Girls and Boys'.  By the end of the tour there are four medleys : as well as 'Where The Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes Off You)', 'One In A Million' incorporates 'Mr. Vain', 'It's a Sin' merges with Gloria Gaynor's 'I Will Survive' and 'Left To My Own Devices' contains an extract of the song which becomes the tour's unofficial theme : Corona's 'The Rhythm Of The Night'.  "We're much more free spirited on this tour", Chris announces beforehand.  "We do what we want.  We party on down.  It's not a totally choreographed, staged and rehearsed show.  I suppose it is more rock 'n' roll in its attitude.  You get to express yourself.  And take your clothes off". The final date is in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on December 12th.

March 1995
On March 6th, 'Various', a collection of the Pet Shop Boys' most recent videos, is released.

July 1995
On July 31st, the Pet Shop Boys release 'Paninaro '95', a new version of the song they first recorded in 1986.  It is based upon the new arrangement Chris performed on the 'Discovery' tour, and Chris' new, updated lyrics.

August 1995
On August 7th an album of Pet Shop Boys B-sides is released.  It is called 'Alternative' (a last minute change from the title which had always been saved for this record : 'Besides').  It contains thirty songs in chronological order from 'In The Night' to 'Some Speculation', and the first copies of the CD and album have a hologram on the cover which shifts between two photographs, one of Neil, one of Chris, both in fencing masks.  "They're some of our favourite songs", Neil explains, "and it just seemed like a nice idea to have them in one place".  On the same day, 'Discovery', a video of the Pet Shop Boys performing live in Rio de Janeiro, is released.

December 1995
On December 19th the Pet Shop Boys record a two hour radio programme, Merry Pet Shop Boys, for Radio One to broadcast on Christmas Eve.  They play their favourite records from the previous year, beginning with Livin' Joy's 'Dreamer' and ending with the Sleaze Sisters with Vicki's 'Let's Whip It Up', and including songs by Edwyn Collins, Grace, The Original, The Passengers, Dubstar, Gusto, Billie Ray Martin, and two by Oasis.  During the recording they drink champagne, and eat twiglets and crisps.  Neil leaves the band once, and Chris explains to a Radio One producer why he likes the records that he likes : "It's like art.  You like it because you like it.  You don't know why.  I like any song with the word 'love' in it.  I like any record with love in it because, as far as I'm concerned, right, love's the only thing that matters".

February 1996
'Hallo Spaceboy', a David Bowie song produced by the Pet Shop Boys, is released on February 19th.  The previous November Neil saw David Bowie perform at Wembley Arena and, backstage, met him for the first time : "He was very friendly, and we were talking about his album 'Outside' and I said that the track I liked best was 'Hallo Spaceboy'.  I asked him why it hadn't been released as a single and he said - jokingly I thought - "oh, you guys should remix it for a single".  And then a week later he phoned me at home".  The Pet Shop Boys effectively re-recorded the song, slowing it down, restructuring it to create a chorus, and using only a Brian Eno synthesizer line and some of David Bowie's vocals.  There weren't enough words for a second verse so Neil made one up by cutting up the lyrics to David Bowie's 'Space Oddity'.  "Then we phoned him up and told him we'd done that", Neil recalls, "and I think he thought it was a bit cheeky, but then he came into the studio and he really liked it.  When he hears the song he seems to smile.  What I liked about it is that it restates his major themes of a) space and b) sexual confusion.  They seem somehow appropriate again".  On the day the single is released the Pet Shop Boys perform the song with David Bowie at the Brit Awards.  Tina Turner's new album, 'Wildest Dreams' - released on April 2nd - contains a song, 'Confidential', written and co-produced by the Pet Shop Boys.

April 1996
On April 22nd 'Before' is released as a single.  "It's a love song", says Neil.  "It's about someone I know.  It's a song of encouragement".

August 1996
'Se a Vida e (That's The Way Life Is)' is released as a single on August 12th.  On December 12th, 1994, during the 'Discovery' tour, Neil bought some Brazilian CD's at a record shop in Sao Paulo.  Playing one of them - 'Filhos Do Sol' by Olodum - back in London, he was struck by the part of the song 'Estrada Da Paixao' which went 'Se a vida e...' That became the basis of a new Pet Shop Boys song.  "Having mistranslated the phrase as 'that's the way life is' it means something like 'if life is' in Brazilian Portuguese dialect - I was thinking what the lyric was going to be about", says Neil, "and a friend of mine at the time of writing this was very depressed about various things in his life, sitting around being miserable about the fact that his life is taking the wrong direction, and the lyric was trying to cheer him up.  And it did, in fact.  I thought about the line 'life is much more simple when you're young', a lot.  Chris, of course maintains that life is more complicated when you're young, and I sort of agreed with him for a while and I thought of changing it, but what I meant is that you see life as either black or white, you don't see the shading so much, so things appear totally depressing or totally wonderful".  A video for the song was filmed much earlier in the year; a wet, sensual romp shot at Wet 'n' Wild theme park in Orlando, Florida, on January 21st.  It is directed by Bruce Weber, only the second pop video he has ever made.

September 1996
On September 2nd, the Pet Shop Boys release their new album, 'Bilingual'.  Written and recorded over the previous two years, it was initially planned as some kind of Latin record.  Although there are many Latin moments on the finished album (rhythmically, linguistically and emotionally), as time passed this idea provided more an attitude and an orientation than a strict musical blueprint. "Another reason for doing the album like this", says Neil, "was as a reaction against Britpop. We like being part of Europe ; we are a very international group and we like that fact".

November 1996
On November 11th, 'Single-Bilingual' is released as a single.  (It has a different title to the album version because Everything But The Girl have just released a single called 'Single').  "The narrator is a very glib Euro businessman, a glib Eurocrat who flies business class and likes all his privileges", says Neil.  "He tries to pick up chicks at meet 'n' greets.  But he's not really communicating, and he knows it.  In actual fact he's a hopeless wreck.  That's why it ends with a reprise of 'Discoteca'.  He could be literally going to a club, but it's also saying he's a lost and frightened person".  These themes are played out in superficially comic video filmed at Stansted airport.  "That is", comments Chris, "what Neil is really like. It brings out Neil's true humour.  He's not acting.  Behind that sombre facade, that's what's there, personality."  To promote the single, the Pet Shop Boys make a rare semi-live TV appearance, performing two songs and being interviewed by Chris Evans on TFI Friday.  During the interview Chris is given a straw donkey.

November 1996
On the evening of November 7th, Neil gave an interview over the internet from a laptop computer in the offices of Parlophone records in London.  Neil said of the interview afterwards, "I enjoyed doing it.  It's the only interview I've ever done where you type the answers.  The best bit was afterwards.  You can see all these people talking about you, which is quite funny".

December 1996
A two-part radio documentary, About The Pet Shop Boys, is broadcast on BBC Radio One on December 8th & 15th.  Made with their co-operation, it features them at home, in the recording studio, watching TV, eating meals, discussing business and so on.  It also includes interviews with many of their collaborators over the years, and snatches of music from their first demos to new, unreleased songs.  "I was having dinner round my brother's house when that was on", says Chris, "and I slid off the chair and ended up listening to it under the table in Michael Jackson fashion, I was so embarrassed by it".  Neil also appeared onstage with Suede at the Roundhouse on December 15th.  He sang 'Saturday Night' as a duet with Brett Anderson, and then sang 'Rent' alone backed by the rest of Suede.  Chris was in the audience.  The tracks would later be released on the CD2 of Suede's 'Filmstar' single in July of '97.

March 1997
On March 17th, 'A Red Letter Day' is released as a single.  It was a song which began when the Pet Shop Boys were experimenting with taking the chord changes from famous pieces of classical music (in this case Beethoven's Song Of Joy) and putting them to a 4/4 beat, and it features the choir of the Choral Academy of Moscow.  "It's about waiting for someone to tell you they love you", says Neil.  The seven-inch version is a new mix, using elements from a Motiv 8 remix of the song, and the Pet Shop Boys are also particularly taken with the hypnotic 'Trouser Enthusiasts Autoerotic Decapitation mix'.

June 1997
On June 4th, the Pet Shop Boys begin a residency, 'Somewhere', at London's Savoy Theatre, staged in collaboration with the artist Sam Taylor-Wood.  On June 23rd they release a new single, a version of 'Somewhere' from West Side Story.  "Because we like it", Neil explains.  It reaches #9 in the UK charts.

June 1997
On June 27 the Pet Shop Boys play their first ever festival show, headlining the Roskilde festival in Denmark. “We’re playing fifteen hit singles and one obscure song,” Neil tells the press beforehand.  “We’re not taking any chances, “Chris explains.  After a fairly triumphant reception, Chris says “We didn’t look too keen, did we?  It’s easy to get carried away at moments like that and do things you regret later.”  Two days later they play at another festival in Turku, Finalnd.  During “Go West”, a preposterously large ship comes up the river, alongside the stage, as though choreographed.

July 1997
On July 5th the Pet Shop Boys headline Gay Pride, the all-day celebration on London’s Clapham Common, playing a brief three song set at the end of the evening.
On July 7th “Bilingual Special Edition”, a repackaged version of “Bilingual” in a cardboard slipcase and containing an extra CD of b-sides and remixes, is released.

August 1997
On August 16th the Pet Shop Boys headline the final night of the Stockholm Water Festival in Sweden.  The stage is on a man-made island floating on water which sways noticeably as they perform.

September 1997
On September 14th the Pet Shop Boys appear on the TV programme “An Audience With Elton John”, performing with Elton John an arrangement of theirs which melds together two of his songs, “Believe” and “Song For Guy”

October 1997
On October 26th the Pet Shop Boys headline Stonewall’s Equality Show at London's Royal Albert Hall, having agreed to do so at the last minute.  Before finishing with a hastily-arranged version of Tom Jones “It’s not Unusual”, they played a medley which included “Sixteen Going On Seventeen” (from The Sound Of Music), Being Boring, Climb Every Mountain (also from The Sound Of Music) and Go West.  “It was our greatest moment,” Chris declares. “Our finest hour.”

November 1997
On November 24th a video, “Somewhere : Pet Shop Boys In Concert”, is released.  Directed by Annie Griffin, it comprises of a half-hour documentary about the staging of the “Somewhere” show followed by a film of most of the show itself.

December 1997
For their fan club the Pet Shop Boys record a Christmas song, “It Doesn’t Often Snow At Christmas” and send it in silver bubble-wrap casing as their Christmad card.  “Originally I was trying to do this pretentious Christmas-y music thing,” Neil says, “but then I Said, ‘maybe we should do something really corny…’”  Though not released it is played several times on Radio One before Christmas.

February 1998
On February 28th the Pet Shop Boys begin a short, four-concert Russian tour, visiting Moscow and St. Petersburg, inspired by their visit to St. Petersburg to see Brian Eno the previous summer.  In Moscow they perform twice in one night, once in a large arena then later in the middle of an over-crowded nightclub.  The local media ask them whether they speak Russian. “We’re very good at saying ‘Nyet’,” they explain.

April 1998
On April 13th, “Twentieth Century Blues : The Songs Of Noel Coward” is released.  It is an album of Noel Coward songs covered by contemporary musicians, co-compiled by Neil, who has been working on it for the past eighteen months.  He has loved Noel Coward’s music since he first heard it in about 1970.  “I think as a songwriter he’s slightly underrated,“ Neil says, “simply because his plays are so famous, and people forget.”  The Pet Shop Boys do a version of “Sail Away”, and amongst the other interpreters are Elton John, Paul McCartney, Suede, Robbie Williams and the Divine Comedy.  “We tried to choose artists, “ Neil explains, “who somehow seem to be in the Noel Coward tradition of wit, theatricality and style.”  To promote the album Neil appeared on TFI Friday where he sang along with a busker playing Pet Shop Boys songs on an acoustic guitar.

June 1998
At the request of their former American record company, the Pet Shop Boys agreed to the release of “Essential Pet Shop Boys”, a compilation of early Pet Shop Boys songs recorded between 1985 and 1990, including a number of rare remixes. It is only available in America and Japan.

November 1998
At the rehest of director Gus Van Sant, the Pet Shop Boys write a new song, with Tom Stephan, at extremely short notice for the soundtrack of Van Sant's remake of ”Psycho”.  It is called "Screaming".  "It's about an obsessive fan, written from the obsessive fan's point of view," Neil says. "Or actually just by someone obsessed with someone who doesn't love them."

June 1999
The Pet Shop Boys announce the initial stages of their first world tour in eight years.  After a one-off show headlining the dance festival Creamfields on August 28th, the tour will begin in America in the second half of October and will visit Germany, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Britain and Eire before Christmas.  The set and show will be designed by the celebrated architect Zaha Hadid, who they have asked to design a show with modular structure which could fit in venues of different sizes :  "She came up with the idea of having a structure that actually changes during the course of the show itself, and the backing singers we have actually are involved in making the set change."

July 1999
On July 19th, the Pet Shop Boys release a new single, "I Don't Know What You Want But I Can't Give It Any More", recorded in New York that March and co-produced by David Morales. "It's about the end of a relationship between two people," says Neil. "Where they are no longer communicating.  They don't understand each other."  Chris offers his own, perhaps not entirely accurate, interpretation.  "It's about someone being a bit demanding," he suggests.  "Not doing the washing up and stuff."  In its video they are seen being transformed into their new look, developed with the theatre designer Ian McNeil, whose work they have admired on productions of An Inspector Calls and Machinale.  They have decided that as the songs on their new album were less personal - "the lyrics are not necessarily reflections of me, Neil Tennant," Neil says - they will now appear less naturalistic.  This new appearance is partly inspired by a picture they saw in a magazine of Japanese men wearing samurai trousers.  "We didn't want the look to be just fashion, we wanted something that had an element of ritual in it," they explain.  "We just talked through ideas and we came up with a slightly samurai based look.  I like the way it has a slightly ceremonial look about it.  It makes you feel very different when you're wearing it, and sometimes when you're performing it's good to feel bigger, or different, than yourself.  And, also, it makes people look at you."

August 1999
Pet Shop Boys are asked by Radio One to perform a specially composed song for the Eclipse event, which is held by Radio One in Cornwall on August 11th.  They record a new song 'Casting A Shadow' and play it live at that day.  On August 28th, Neil and Chris headline the Creamfields festival.  They premiere several new versions of their hit singles as well as the new single 'New York City Boy'.

September 1999
On September 27th, New York City boy is released as a single and reaches #14.   Neil and Chris recorded this song with David Morales and constructed a disco epic.  It is a homage to the late seventies, where disco was very popular in New York.  In the video, the legendary Studio 54 is re-built and there are parodies of John Travolta and the Village People.  In the same month Neil and Chris leave Atlantic Records in the USA and sign to Sire Records.

October 1999
On October 11th the Pet Shop Boys release their new album, "Nightlife", which includes twelve new songs.  The songs are variously produced by Craig Armstrong, Rollo, David Morales and the Pet Shop Boys themselves.  On one song, "In Denial", Neil duets with Kylie Minogue.

January 2000
“You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk” is released on January 3. It is the first time that a PSB single is released on three CDs, including live tracks, remixes and b-sides.  The video was shot by the award winning director Pedro Romhanyi.  Neil and Chris perform the song live on TFI Friday and Top Of The Pops.

March 2000
“Mini Pet Shop Boys”, an eight track Japan-only album, is released on March 6th.  It contains some album tracks, b-sides, live tracks and a remix of the Nightlife era previously released elsewhere in the world.  It features unique design (with the Nightlife font).

April 2000
On April 28th, Neil and Chris appear alongside Madonna, KD Lang, Melissa Etheridge and others at the RFK Stadium, Washington D.C. at this years Equality Rocks Concert for gay and lesbian rights. During their 20 minute set, they play a new cover version of Modern Rocketry’s “Homosexuality”, a duet with Melissa Etheridge (“What Have I Done To Deserve This?”), “Being Boring”, “New York City Boy” and “Go West”.

June 2000
Pet Shop Boys start a 2 month "Fetivals" tour and  play at the largest UK Music Festival - GLASTONBURY for the first time.

December 2000
The boys perform "It Doesn't Often Snow At Christmas" on the last ever TFI Friday, with full boy's choir back-up and Chris in an unforgettable "Roy Wood as santa" costume.