Track-by-Track: From Please to Nonetheless

[VRIDD]

Am I wrong, or How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously is the ONLY Parlophone single never published on CD, or released in full quality for digital download?

[TwizzleUK]

Am I wrong, or How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously is the ONLY Parlophone single never published on CD, or released in full quality for digital download?

Correct - for the UK 7" version. The US 'Perfect Attitude 7"' was released on CD single there.

The only way to get the UK 7" digitally is to rip the audio from the PopArt DVD - but not SMASH, as that version is mono, for some strange reason.

Really strange after all these years, that the double A side of 'Where the streets have no name (I can't take my eyes off you)' has never come out digitally.

[Drico One]

When I was obsessed with Behaviour in 1990, How can you expect to be taken seriously? always stuck out for three reasons. Firstly, it was the spikiest track on the album that wasn't So hard. Secondly, it burnished my sense that Pet Shop Boys were the good guys, the band whose identity I could absorb into my own as they sardonically barbequed the Live Aid generation's sacred cows, Phil Collins, Sting, Bono... This was the aural equivalent of going on Smash Hits and slagging off the competition. And it was irrefutable. This song became the latest chapter of their manifesto: the things we stand against. At 18, that was a powerful "message for your fans." They were different, and difference was precious in a world of Rattle and Hum being shoved down my throat in the late 1980s.

Finally, the idea of "longevity" which Neil refers to in his lyric, struck me back then as some kind of unattainable rock ideal - something that would be beyond my heroes, especially as the commerical performance of Behaviour and its singles suggested a slow slide down the dumper. I never dreamt that 34 years later I would be watching the same duo in a packed arena of 16,000 people. Then again, is it the same duo?

I'm not sure it ever could be. But I am still very fond of this analogue version, because this is my kind of music, they play it all night long and, just as it was when I was 18, everything I'd want to say out loud will be sung.

[TallThinMan]

I wonder if there’s a demo version of ‘How can you expect…?’ where the targets are actually named. I’m sure the discussion in Literally at the time mentioned this.

[Pinhead44]

Track 49 : Only the Wind

Behaviour Further Listening Disc 1 - Track 5

My Mum's favourite PSB song.

When the boys marry a thought provoking lyric, with a simple, but stunningly beautiful melody like this, there is rarely anyone who can touch them.

Neil's fragile singing of 'my nerves are all jangled, but I’m pulling through, I hope I can handle what I have to do' still gives me goose bumps everytime I listen to it.

If they ever did that rarerities tour, this would be at the top of my list to hear them play live !

(9/10)

[Too Many Shadows]

Is this one of the great songs, and PSB's greatest song, about denial and the half-truths we tell ourselves and others? In a different time, it’s a song to which Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, or Nina Simone could easily lend a cool, measured tone. Luscious!

[Sandy Shaw]

Is this one of the great songs, and PSB's greatest song, about denial and the half-truths we tell ourselves and others? In a different time, it’s a song to which Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, or Nina Simone could easily lend a cool, measured tone. Luscious!

Well maybe a more contemporary jazz vocalist. Some issues getting hold of the ones you mention...

[Too Many Shadows]

Track 50 : My October Symphony

Behaviour Further Listening Disc 1 - Track 6

Stalinism meets Isaac Hayes and asks, "How do we respond when revolutions lead to discontentment?" This is my favourite PSB song. I’m a sucker for the chamber strings curling around the art pop. For me, it’s plush stuff that belongs in the topmost of top drawers.

[petshopgrrl]

It's the ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-oohs and aah-aah-aah-aahs for me. Hooky as heck. Love the strings at the end too.

Writing from the perspective of a Communist-era composer having a creative crisis... seriously, who else does this? And makes it work??

[telys]

Track 50 : My October Symphony

Behaviour Further Listening Disc 1 - Track 6

Stalinism meets Isaac Hayes and asks, "How do we respond when revolutions lead to discontentment?" This is my favourite PSB song. I’m a sucker for the chamber strings curling around the art pop. For me, it’s plush stuff that belongs in the topmost of top drawers.

Yep, it got to me immediately the first time I put the record on (autumn of 1990). Still on my top 5-10 list of PSB songs (which song is the best depends on my mood).
I'd like to add that the lyrics are sort of a nod to 1984 and the rewriting of history to fit the political regime of the present... and that the past changes so quickly that it's hard to catch up with it. I'd say Neil's lyrics are sort of Orwellian but not written during the time of a hard regime but during an interregnum which the 1990's truly was, most notable example of course in Russia.
"There Are Bad Times Just Around the Corner".

[Pinhead44]

My October Symphony

Almost 34 years since Behaviour was released, and this song still transports back to the autumn of '90 every time I listen to it.

The final minute of the track, with Johnny Marr's guitar, and the string quartet, is my favourite music part they have done in any song.

Can there be any album that has a better start to each side as Being Boring and My October Symphony !?

It's just a shame that all their songs sound the same !

Stunningly beautiful (10/10)

[Too Many Shadows]

My October Symphony

Can there be any album that has a better start to each side as Being Boring and My October Symphony !?

Sickeningly strong run of songs so far. We’re six tracks into Behaviour (should that be written as ‘Behaviour.’ ?) and they haven’t stumbled even once.

[Too Many Shadows]

My October Symphony

It's just a shame that all their songs sound the same !

I’m certain you jest. It’s sometimes so difficult to tell online.

I don’t think having a signature sound implies being repetitive. We’ll all have listened to every album multiple times. Sometimes that’s needed; otherwise, it’s easy to think little has changed and the art is created in a limiting space.

Look at Monet. 250 painting of water lilies. Noboby is saying they are all the same.