Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

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leesmapman
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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#16 Post by leesmapman »

This one is a bit odd... The biggest complaint was that they were not camp enough.

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#17 Post by Suburban_Boy »

*****
The Guardian

https://t.co/Eq1mjYpQ8a

Judging from the demographic here, the 2022 Pet Shop Boys audience stretches from 18-year-old girls to middle-aged men in suits, hen parties to arty intellectuals. Their vast constituency reflects the electro-pop pair’s status as British pop’s biggest-selling duo, and a musical reach that stretches from Italian house to Tchaikovsky samples.

Singer Neil Tennant and synth man Chris Lowe are also premier pop showmen. This latest outing begins relatively minimally – with street lamp-posts staging for early hit Suburbia – before Left to My Own Devices unveils the live (electronic) percussionists and retina-combusting computer graphics powering their spectacle.

The two-hour, 26-song extravaganza spans a 40-year career and springs some surprises. Tennant, presumably selecting his various bonkers costumes from a box marked “genial Bond villain”, becomes an unlikely acoustic guitar balladeer for Drunk. He reveals that Domino Dancing was inspired by a friend’s “victory dance” after playing dominoes in a cheap hotel in Saint Lucia and that 2020’s excellent Monkey Business is titled after something said to them by a cheeky Texan cowboy.

Their songs are like miniature kitchen sink dramas – the couple struggling with fidelity in It’s Hard, the painful reminders of a break-up in Losing My Mind, or the power imbalances in Rent. Tennant, unfeasibly now 67, brings delicate thespian touches – a shrug of the shoulder or wagging finger (in It’s a Sin) – and is one of our most unmistakable vocalists, his inimitable tones somehow capable of expressing excitement and yearning at the same time.

There’s a tender moment as the singer dedicates a gentle Being Boring to the lives lost in the pandemic and this venue’s bombing, five years ago this weekend. Otherwise, classic bangers come along with indecent regularity. Lowe dons his 80s “BOY” cap for West End Girls, while other highlights include a beautifully melancholy Love Comes Quickly and an insanely catchy Heart. Band member Clare Uchima excels in the Dusty Springfield role for a sublime What Have I Done to Deserve This. “Fabulous!” yells Tennant, and this is.

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Vince
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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#18 Post by Vince »

"It's Hard" :lol:
H.A.P.P.I.N.E.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.S.

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#19 Post by psbnyc »

Wow, what a great review! Can’t wait to see them in NYC in September!

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#20 Post by daveid »

Vince wrote: Sat 21 May 2022, 4:08 pm "It's Hard" :lol:
I hope Messrs Townshend and Daltrey were pleased.

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#21 Post by 303krs »

"...Many roads will cross through many lives
but somehow you survive..."

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#22 Post by Nickname »

Suburban_Boy wrote: Sat 21 May 2022, 2:10 pm *****
The Guardian

https://t.co/Eq1mjYpQ8a

Judging from the demographic here, the 2022 Pet Shop Boys audience stretches from 18-year-old girls to middle-aged men in suits, hen parties to arty intellectuals. Their vast constituency reflects the electro-pop pair’s status as British pop’s biggest-selling duo, and a musical reach that stretches from Italian house to Tchaikovsky samples.
Happy to see young people going to their concerts. :D

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#23 Post by oakey »

leesmapman wrote: Fri 20 May 2022, 7:56 pm
This one is a bit odd... The biggest complaint was that they were not camp enough.
Yes, saw that one too. The Guardian is very positive though :)

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#24 Post by rashomon »

yup just another 5 star review ... the love is so strong for this tour ... they are going to absolutely smash Glastonbury

https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/musi ... 01695.html
you could say conventional ... and I could claim intentional


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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#26 Post by stussyboy »

The Times, Telegraph, Guardian, Standard and Attitude all dishing out 5-star reviews! I’m not sure I have ever seen such positivity from the press. I guess it shows that a more ‘mainstream’ show with “the hits” garners better write-ups than the more obscure / newer material some of us fans may prefer

I hope such gushing feedback and sell-out shows will encourage our heroes to keep doing what they do. It won’t be too long before we hopefully see a PSB release with Neil in his 70s 👀
NewYork London Tokyo LosAngeles

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#27 Post by leesmapman »

Typical how the only not-positive review so far is from the Netherlands. You're welcome.

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Patrick Bateman
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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#28 Post by Patrick Bateman »

Another five-star review from The Times:

Pet Shop Boys review — a euphoric night of pop bangers

★★★★★

To think that at the start of their career Pet Shop Boys didn’t really play live, first touring in 1989, four years after their first hit. Now, though, their shows feel like the most Pet Shop Boyish thing about them: clever, stylish, sometimes poignant, often euphoric.

This was their postponed Dreamworld tour, masterfully produced by their frequent collaborator Stuart Price and subtitled: “the greatest hits live”. Boy they have a lot of them. So entrenched are they in our culture that one, It’s a Sin, gave its name to a Bafta-winning TV series, while another, West End Girls, was named by the Guardian as the best UK No 1 of them all.

They stepped on to the monochrome set dressed in blazing white: trench coat for Neil Tennant, anorak for Chris Lowe. Their appetite for outlandish accessories remains undimmed — they wore masks shaped like tall, stretched letter H’s and beside them were two lampposts, the kind that might light “the high street where the dogs run” in Suburbia, the opening song. It remains a surging piece of pop drama. Tennant’s voice found the sweet spot between aloof and expressive; Lowe didn’t move a muscle beyond his synth fingers.

Later we had the rum sight of Tennant picking up an acoustic guitar and singing solo. “Which greatest hit has an acoustic guitar?” he said, echoing our thoughts. The answer was You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk, which made the Top 10 in 2000, Tennant reminded us, delighting as ever in imparting a piece of trivia. A beautiful, wistful ballad, it let him tap into his Seventies folk roots with the band Dust.

The design palette having moved to glorious colour, the rest of the show was dominated by bangers. On What Have I Done to Deserve This? Clare Uchima from the backing band sang the Dusty Springfield part with considerable soul, while Heart was a full-bore dancefloor monster. “That one worked out quite well,” Tennant said with a smile. Even better was It’s a Sin, retooled as a build-and-release rave epic and blasted out under red lights.

The encore was perfect. An atmospheric electronic build-up teased West End Girls, which worked out so well that even Lowe smiled. He wore a “Boy” cap that nodded to their early days; Tennant did the same in a black overcoat.

They ended on a connoisseur’s favourite, the exquisitely rueful Being Boring, written about a friend who had died of Aids and dedicated to “everyone we’ve lost” in recent years and beyond. What a way to blow off the Covid cobwebs.

Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff, May 24; Bournemouth International Centre, May 25; Utilita Arena, Newcastle, May 27 and touring to May 31

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pet- ... -kl3rvddbw

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Re: Dreamworld - The Greatest Hits tour - reviews

#29 Post by Dog »

Woof.


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