[Introspective] Review: Pet Shop Boys deliver after a decade away - Daily Herald

[Derek BD]

Thanks so much for sharing this, Don. It was a great read.

I'm getting very excited now, despite having been so distracted by many
other things the last month or so: Doctor Who related 50th anniversary;
Robbie's new singles; and his forthcoming album Heavy Entertainment Show
releases Friday, the day before I see the Boys in Chicago! Super!

Enjoy your concerts, everyone!
And be well!
Derek

The best time to plant a tree is a hundred years ago. The second best time
is today. - Chinese proverb

On 29 Oct 2016 12:06, "Don Ackerman" <the.ackermans at juno.com> wrote:

Review: Pet Shop Boys deliver after a decade away
Scott Tittrington Daily Herald  Updated Oct 24, 2016

http://www.heraldextra.com/entertainment/music/reviews/
review-pet-shop-boys-deliver-after-a-decade-away/article_
ecf6a2b3-0d0d-598e-bbfc-f3efaf7adfa3.html

When my wife and I moved from suburban Los Angeles to Utah in 2014, one of
the things we most looked forward to was the opportunity to see live
musical acts without having to take out a second mortgage.

The greater Salt Lake area, complete with numerous top-notch live music
venues, has become a hot tour stop for bands and performers, and Heidi and
I have taken advantage to the tune of some 15 shows in the past 30 months.

I provide that context to offer the following -- I can't speak for her, but
Saturday night's performance by the Pet Shop Boys at The Complex in
downtown Salt Lake City is the best concert I've seen during our time in
the Beehive State.

Yes, you read that correctly. The show by a group that hasn't been exactly
musically relevant since I was in high school (I'm now 42), by a band
visiting Salt Lake City for the first time in more than a decade, trumped
several big-name popular acts performing in big-time venues that I've had
the chance to see in the past 2 1/2 years.

This wasn't the case of a nostalgia act looking to simply capitalize on its
popularity of years gone by more than a quarter decade later. Live-music
fans have had several opportunities to see such concerts this past summer
-- good in their own right, but centered almost completely on
radio-friendly hits from the past and offering up nothing new to
reinvigorate the passion.

Instead, the Pet Shop Boys -- vocalist Neil Tennant and keyboardist Chris
Lowe -- released a new studio album titled "Super" in April and have
literally been touring the world in support of it.

Backed by three additional musicians -- two percussionists and an
additional keyboardist/violinist who all dabbled in background vocals --
Tennant and Lowe played for just shy of two hours Saturday, delivering a
high-energy, visually stunning performance inside Rockwell, the largest of
The Complex's four separate venues that holds 2,500 patrons.

Several new tracks off "Super" featured in the first half of their set
compare quite favorably with the band's historic catalog, and the boys
weren't shy in pulling tracks from across their discography rather than
focusing solely on the hits that made them famous when they first burst on
the American music scene in the late '80s.

The variety was such that three of the Pet Shop Boys' biggest commercial
hits -- "Opportunities (Let's Make Lots of Money)," "Suburbia," and "What
Have I Done to Deserve This" -- didn't even make the cut for Saturday's
show, and so strong was the effort that no one really seemed to mind.

Tennant's vocals were on point the entire evening, and the energy offered
up by the now 62-year-old was inspiring and impressive. Lowe's keyboard
work was as strong as ever, the backing musicians more than proved their
mettle, and the accompanying light show, as well as the right-sized venue,
rounded out the memorable performance.

Several times throughout the evening, Tennant referenced that the Pet Shop
Boys had not taken the stage in Salt Lake City for more than a decade,
lamenting that fact and saying it had been far too long.

He's right. On Saturday night, he and his bandmates witnessed first hand a
rabid fan base still enthralled by not just the synth pop hits of decades
gone by, but the ones fresh out of the studio.

With that in mind, it's a safe bet it won't be another decade before local
fans have the chance to see the Pet Shop Boys again.

...
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