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PSB in NYC I can never seem to leave the office and get myself organised as quickly as I intend to when I go to New York for evening events. I never manage to catch the train I want or to arrive as early as I�d like to do. Yesterday was no exception. I arrived at the Manhattan Center around 7 for the 9 p.m. Pet Shop Boys concert of 22 May 2002. Doors were opened sometime around 7.30, and I moved through the line until I reached a security guard, who informed me I had to go stand in a different line (which did not exist when I arrived) to pick up my tickets, then come back to the line in which I�d been waiting. Disorganisation on the part of venues annoys me. Nevertheless, I was likely among the first hundred or so people into the venue, so I was in about the second row of the crowd directly at center, waiting rather boredly, as I�d come alone to the show, on my feet for the next hour and a half or so. It was ample time to examine my surroundings, count lighting instruments, consider all the equipment on the stage, and admire the pretty faces in the crowd, which slowly trickled in. There was a constant supply of fog on the stage, with bright white spots slicing through the swirling smoke; an army of smoke machines must have been employed for this. The Manhattan Center�s Hammerstein Ballroom is a gorgeous venue, restored to something resembling its original glory with gilt and frescoed ceilings and remarkably good acoustics, a combination which almost rendered the disorganisation at the door forgivable. After what seemed an eternity, the harsh white lights suddenly shifted to blue, house lights dimmed, a drum loop began, and the audience howled. Band members entered first, the programmer surrounded by a truly phenomenal array of LCD screens, modules, controllers, mixing boards, and synthesizers, two guitarists, and a blonde woman behind a battery of percussion instruments. Chris Lowe followed and began weaving textures and loops from his wall of synthesizers, three or four in front with a Rhodes piano off to his right. Out of the dancefloor rhythm slowly emerged bits of the keyboard line on which �Home and Dry� is built. Neil Tennant entered, donned an acoustic guitar, approached the microphone and began relating the deeply affecting tale of someone whose love is far away, traveling on business. As the first chorus faded, so did the dance beats, and the synth ostinato of the original version of the song began to predominate, shifting the tempo down to �medium ballad.� I was enrapt to finally be seeing two of my long-time heroes and musical influences, whose songs have served as a soundtrack to large memorable portions of my life, in the flesh. With little space for warning after the closing bars of the first tune, the thunderous beats resumed, and the Pet Shop Boys flung themselves into their medley of �Where the Streets Have No Name / I Can�t Take My Eyes Off of You� and the sing-along began in earnest. Neil, I�ve read, will turn 48 this summer (Chris is five years and some months younger), and I found myself marveling throughout not only at the continued relevancy of their music, but also at the clarity of Neil�s voice. Some may find it nasal or grating, but I�m always amazed at his high ranges, which soar just as they did in the band�s earliest material. As if to explain the surprising twist which followed, Neil introduced �The New Pet Shop Boys�, and a slow, almost stately, certainly quite sensitive and more acoustically-instrumented rendition of �A Red Letter Day� followed. �I Get Along� (and we sing along) continued the acoustic vibe, recalling an earlier group of musical innovators, as this song sounds more like the Beatles than PSB. The refrain never fails to make me smile: �I get along, get along without you, very well, get along very well.� �Love Comes Quickly� was only slowly recognisable to most as it began. It seemed deeper and a bit slower, and there was no real clue to the song�s identity, apart from the rhythmic, pulsating treble �B� Chris was playing, until Neil spoke the ambivalent opening lines, �Sooner or later, this happens to everyone.� The crowd cheered, some perhaps hoping it might happen to them (yeah, me too). Throughout the show, between certain of the songs, Neil would say, �And this next song�� before teasing the audience with hints as to what was coming. In the case of �London,� he spoke of Russian soldiers trying to survive in London. I think it was here I first became amused watching him fight with his microphone cord, as it several times became entangled in equipment on the stage; perhaps the wireless units from former shows would still be better suited to the Boys� setup. Somehow, this song about immigrant criminals always pulls at my heartstrings around the chorus; I don�t know if it�s the melody or the memory of living there myself (albeit under much happier circumstances than those of the song�s characters). �You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You�re Drunk� followed, in a version somewhere between the electronic ballad of its original version and the acoustic guitar-driven version they�ve performed live in the past (see the MONTAGE video). Neil then shared another story, this one of a boy who gets to go backstage to meet his favourite rap artist (I don�t believe he actually NAMED Eminem), and ends up having a secret tryst with the star. While some may find �The Night I Fell in Love� controversial, I can�t understand how anyone could see it as anything other than a very sweet not-quite-love-song. The plaintive and dreamy repetition of the phrase �secret lovers,� sung in harmony by Neil and the guitarists at the end, enhanced this effect, though the sweetness was decidedly diluted by Neil�s grabbing his crotch in a thoroughly hip-hop-worthy fashion on the line, �You can have a private performance.� Naturally, I had to giggle. Next, Neil announced, �This is for you all,� and the crowd pulsed to the rhythm of the best song the Village People never wrote, �New York City Boy�. The ensuing declaration of, �This is another country-western tune,� was bewildering for all of two seconds until the band kicked things up several notches for the anthemic �Always on My Mind�, which was followed (with a pause for an explanation for those not from England, that football is soccer and fags are cigarettes, at least for the most part, there) by the newer, but equally danceable �Sexy Northerner.� (The song�s refrain is a defiant exclamation: �It�s not all football and fags!�) IF there was a weak moment in the concert (and that is a large if), it was probably �Birthday Boy,� which followed. While it is an affecting song when one considers its inspiration (persecution at the hands of people who neither know nor understand their victims�Neil has cited Jesus and Matthew Shepard as examples), its lyrics are a bit cryptic, and the melody is set so low in Neil�s range I wondered if he could hear himself clearly. �West End Girls� picked up the pace again with its tongue-in-cheek destructive swagger. The mood did not last, though, as the stage went black, and in the most effective lighting in a night filled with very nice effects, a backdrop of stars began to glow as Neil sat at the intersection of two white beams to sing �Love Is a Catastrophe,� possibly the most despairing song ever written. I cannot have been the only one to wipe a pained tear away by the end of that song. Without really breaking the mood, Chris began a tinkly piano introduction to a slow rendering of the first verse of �Go West,� and then the song began in earnest, with Neil trading vocal duties on the chorus with a choir of a thousand or so fans. The Boys and their band left the stage amid rapturous applause (at some point, Neil stepped down onto the subwoofers in front of the stage to shake hands with a few lucky crowd members), and someone standing next to me asked what I thought the encores would be. Apart from having heard they closed the show with �You Choose�, I had no idea and guessed perhaps �Closer to Heaven� and �Being Boring.� I was half-right. On returning to the stage, a rhythmic groove settled in which I recognised, particularly after the �guitar-scrubbing� began, as the latter of those two. (I think Neil had some difficulties finding a pitch in from the sparse and super-low bass line during the first verse, but by the chorus, he was definitely on.) As much as everyone is always overjoyed to hear that song, I find myself unable to escape its emphasis on our loneliness as individuals, particularly in the third verse, as I stand alone in the crowd, thinking of friends lost, and hear, �But I thought, in spite of dreams, you�d be sitting somewhere here with me�� �That was being boring, and this is a sin!� shouted Tennant. Talk about sing-alongs! �It�s a Sin� must still be as much the anthem of socio-religious disenfranchisement as it was when it was written, for it was difficult to hear Neil�s amplified vocals above everyone in the audience (myself included) singing. Finally, Neil introduced the band, beginning with the guitarist to his right, who appeared to be young enough to have just graduated high-school, and finishing with Chris Lowe, who looked surprised at the massive adoration from the audience, then, �And I�m Neil Tennant.� If his introductions of Chris and himself brought cheers, his declaration that the next song would be the last of the night brought equally enthusiastic groans from the audience. Though the set clocked in at 18 songs and just under two hours, we always want more. �You Choose� has been called the antithesis of �Love Comes Quickly� with its declaration, �You don�t fall in love by chance; you choose� (which prompted me to say to the people next to me, with whom I�d occasionally exchanged comments, �That�s SO not true!�). It was, nonetheless, a soothing way to end the evening, a descent to earth with a soft landing. After thanking the audience and assuring us they�d return soon, the �new� Pet Shop Boys were gone, and the house lights up, with Peggy Lee�s �Is That All There Is� on the P.A. For some reason, I didn�t think to stick around to see if I might meet these men, who have had such a tremendous effect on me, and whose music is so entwined with various moments in my life, but wandered out and through the New York City streets. In retrospect, it�s a bit disconcerting. �I never dreamt that I would get to be the creature that I always meant to be�� When I left for college in the northeast, seeking the varied experience of city life, never intending to return to the rural South for any extended period, I followed through on the first part of a dream which has always seemed the over-arching purpose of my life�How can I have failed so miserably to carry through with the rest of my intentions?
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