Pet Shop Boys: Pop Art: The Hits-Music Book

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Customer Review: Same old suspects but some welcome rarities !
For those of us who are trying to obtain the hits they enjoyed from the 70s on CD by purchasing most of the collections in order to obtain a few previously unobtainable tracks, this 3 CD set will satisfy you ! “Mandy”; “I Only Have Eyes For You” and “Annie’s Song” are most welcome big hits from the era not usually included on thse sets. Of course the usual suspects are there – “Blockbuster”; “Tiger Feet”; “All The Young Dudes”, “School’s Out”, but, amazingly for a 70s compliation, no “Make Me Smile” !! Also, tellingly, no Gary Glitter tracks appear on these sets anymore, so we are left with the ubiquitous “Angel Face” (face of an angel!!). The collection will also suffice as a first time buy for anyone looking to hold a 70s party ! Nice to see “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” taking its rightful place for once. Ludicrous although it may be, it has “70s” written all the way through it for me and I’m sure for many others. Also, check out its superb bass line ! Chicago’s “If You Leave Me Now” is a welcome inclusion, as is The Osmonds’ “Love Me For A Reason”. Overall, a worthy effort. However, why is “Daydream Believer” included ? Everyone knows it is a 60s song ! Bizarre !!
Customer Review: Fifty UK pop hits of the seventies
The seventies were a decade of contrasts when it came to pop music. There is plenty of variety here with soul, disco, reggae, easy listening, country and hard rock together with plenty of lightweight pop music. Now, I have very eclectic tastes in music but even I won’t pretend to like everything here. However I’ve seen plenty of compilations of seventies pop music and I’ve yet to see one that I like all the way through. I suspect that you feel the same, though your pet hates may be different from mine. Of the fifty tracks here, about thirty made number one in the UK charts and most of the others made the UK top ten, so on that basis alone each track justifies is selection except Daydream believer. The compiler made a mistake by including a Monkees track – they didn’t have a UK hit in the seventies at all. Daydream believer was a UK hit for them in 1967 (and for Anne Murray in 1980) but doesn’t belong here. Other than that, the biggest surprise to me (and very nice to see it) is the inclusion of Annie’s song, because it is rare for a John Denver track to appear on a various artists compilation. Many big names are here including Abba, Elton John, Dawn, Cliff Richard, Hot Chocolate, 10cc, Mud, ELO, Dr Hook, Barry Manilow, Leo Sayer, Showaddywaddy, Tammy Wynette, Art Garfunkel, the Bay City Rollers, Chicago, Sweet, David Essex, the New Seekers, Bread, Carly Simon, the Osmonds, the Three Degrees and Elvis Presley, but their greatest hits are available individually and they aren’t all represented by the most obvious hit here. This is good – it means that if you already have other various artists compilations, there will be less duplication. A compilation like this allows you to get big hits by artists that only had a few hits (perhaps only one), some of which are hard to find or unavailable outside compilations of this type. Among these songs, my favorites are January (Pilot), Barbados (Typically Tropical), Seasons in the sun (Terry Jacks), Rock the boat (Hues Corporation), Love grows (Edison Lighthouse), In the summertime (Mungo Jerry), Band of gold (Freda Payne) and Yellow River (Christie). If you are looking for a representative collection of big UK hits of the seventies, this is certainly one of the strongest I’ve seen. It’s not perfect but it’s as near perfect as I expect of such a compilation.
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Pet Shop Boys: Pop Art: The Hits-Music Book
Customer Review: All the best…
This is the ‘greatest hits’ of the Pet Shop Boys. There are several versions of this collection with minor variations and extra tracks, so be advised to check the listings carefully for the song-selections and tracks. Some include a book (most of the PSB Japanese offerings) with lyrics and such, but sometimes that is the only difference.

The first of the discs of this ‘Greatest Hits’ for the Pet Shop Boys contains 17 tracks (Pop), and the second 18 tracks (Art). For those who are die-hard fans of the Pet Shop Boys, this is a must have, but, for the most part, those fans will find it is in many ways an already-have. The tracks are remastered, but given the high production qualities of most PSB discs generally, there isn’t a great deal to be gained from this. There are two new songs, Miracles and Flamboyant (one on each disc), which are both wonderful (and, interestingly, the addition of two songs to the ‘greatest hits’ compilation matches their performance with Discography, which also had a ‘best of’ with two new tracks added).

There are the major songs and single releases from all previous albums, so this serves both as a retrospective but also as a handy all-in-one collection spanning the history of the Pet Shop Boys; from that perspective, if you were to have just one CD from them, this would the one. The songs are not in chronological release order (as Discography was), but rather seem almost randomly arranged; all songs but one from Discography are here, with an additional collection of tracks from the later album releases that reached the UK top 20. The division between ‘Pop’ and ‘Art’ is subtle, and any lifelong fan will have his or her own impressions as to which songs should fit into which category. The ‘Pop’ side is more disco/dance music, whereas the ‘Art’ side is a little more sombre, and the lyrics a little more complex. On the other hand, some songs, such as ‘Love comes quickly’ would easily qualify for either designation.

This collection represents more than 20 years work on the part of Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe. For the first several years of that career, they were famous world-wide, and quite a staple in the dance clubs and video programming in America and elsewhere. The first singles collection ‘Discography’ represented the beginning of the decline of 80s style dance music in America, but the music descended from this type remained strongly popular throughout the rest of the world, as the sold-out concert tours of the Pet Shop Boys everywhere except North America attests to. Many of the songs on this ‘Pop-Art’ collection will therefore be new to audiences whose interest in the Pet Shop Boys ended the hits from the ‘Behaviour’ era.

The bonus disc offers remixes of songs from the other discs, and tracks from B-sides and other tracks from the ‘major’ albums.

Pop-Art is a must-have for anyone who likes dance music, disco, electronic music, 80s music, the Pet Shop Boys, or who wants to have a complete music collection, but only one version is likely necessary.