Pet Shop Boys - New Album "Hotspot" Jan 24 2020

The album is doing well in the UK:

Pet Shop Boys vs J Hus for this week's Number 1 album

later
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I received an email as well, better late than never.

 

For me SUPER was the best PSB album since YES (2009).
Hotspot is also good - 8/10 tracks!
Monkey B. and Berlin Wedding are corporal punishment. Terrible!

 

One thing I find impressive is that while you can tell Neil has aged and is now a 65 year old man in the Monkey Business video, his voice has been frozen in time and sounds very much like he did 30 years ago to where you can listen to these songs and picture them coming out of the 30-ish guy with the mop of curly hair because he still sounds so similar

 

They process the voice a ton though in a lot of them.
So his voice might be different, it hasn't changed much to me though.

later
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I agree with you 100%. 'Yes' is a great album with a lot of energy and with strong melodies. I think Price really did some serious damage for the 3 albums he produced. Also I agree as the songs do sound like demo's and not full fleshed songs. Like I said he has dumb downed all the tracks. They really should have had Price work on just one album then we might have got 2 great albums. The production on Hotspot is terrible. Something that anyone with a keyboard and a drum machine could do in there basement. Hotspot is so badly compressed I can't listen to the CD. If this were any other group I would have literally tossed the CD in the garbage. However since I'm a huge fan I'm keeping it for the collection but I can't play the CD on my stereo for more then 2 minutes as my ears really hurt from the massive compression.

 

I don't hate Price at all, he's created some of my favorite albums this century (Madonna, Scissor Sisters, The Killers, etc..).

The only issue I have is that PSB have been infamous for collaborating with a producer for one album then moving on to someone else... yet after Electric they decided they wanted a trilogy with him, and I don't quite understand why. Electric felt more like a collaboration with PSB and Price and that's probably why I love it (and why others might not), Super and Hotspot felt like he was just a hired hand.

 

Hey!

 

It's so weird to see some people these days talking up Elysium, and then saying they hate Electric, when the consensus is (was?) mostly the other way around. Also, I see Release getting some love, when it was pretty much seen as a real downturn at one time. Some people absolutely love Yes, while some others view it as more of a Xenomania album than PSB. It seems that everyone you talk to has a different view on what is good or bad, and I guess that is a good sign, that there is much to like on all their albums. They did say that the Price albums were going to be more simple and direct sounding that some of their previous stuff, and while that may have turned off some people that didn't like that idea, the results have been good for them and stabilized their career after the dreadful sales of Elysium.

It is time for a change however, and I can't wait to see which way things will turn.

 

I'm very ready for a new producer. Whilst there are some good tracks over the last three lp's, Price can't compete with a Trevor Horn or even Andrew Dawson.

 

Well we have Disco 5 coming later this year...

 

I think that was a joke in that article, although it may not have played that way. I wouldn't mind a Disco 5 of remixed version of songs from the latest 3 albums.

 

Good point. I remember the consensus amongst my friends who like PSB and myself was that Elysium was one of their weakest albums and we were happy that they followed it up with a banger so quickly afterwards (only 10 months between albums).

 

Hahaha. I saw your name right up there on the page and had to go for it!

 

One thing that bugs me about "Will-O-The-Wisp" is that Neil got the route of the U1.... well not wrong. Because he says it "emerges past Nollendorf Platz". And it does. But before it actually does get back into the light of day (for Gleisdreieck) it passes another station: Kurfürstenstraße. Which has a slightly seedy Bowie connection via Christiane F. ("Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo") since this is the place where the famous/ notorious Berlin 70's disco Sound was and Christiane gained her Heroin addiction. The station is also notorious for drug connected street prostitution.

So.... yeah. The U1 emerges "past Nollendorf Platz". But not until Kurfürstenstraße.

Sorry but I had to post this.

 

Randomly. Tuxedo (Mayer Hawthorne's side duo project with Jake One) actually pays homage to the Actually album cover in the "Toast 2 Us" video, cute tribute

 

The Dreamland 7”

 

Put mine into the album!

 

I agree and wish they just did the one CD with Price and then moved on to another producer.

 

We used to have a chow chow. She would occasionally get skin irritations under her thick fur and bite the fur off. We applied some kind of astringent to soothe the skin and stop her from biting. We called this condition: hotspots! PSB are probably embarrassed to admit that this is the meaning of the title.

I often think how he's managed to keep his high tenor range. Most pop singers lose the high notes as they age. Neil probably hasn't because he doesn't scream like rock-n-rollers. Does he smoke?

 

I was wondering what with the upcoming greatest hits tour if they might be getting ready to call it a day.
I can’t really imagine a 70 year old Pet Shop Boy...

 

if it is a farewell tour I would love to see them play more dates in the US, they never come closer to me than Chicago. Granted, America turned their back on PSB fairly early (they stopped having hits here around 1988-1989 and have been solely a cult band with hits on the dance chart) but they are one of the few bands I still want to see that I haven't yet and would travel to a degree for them.

 

I would definitely try to see them, they are playing with a live band again (as they did with the Super tour) and that adds so much to the shows. Even though the Electric tour was nice with all the lasers, I think it suffered not having anyone else on stage.

 

The problem with traveling too far is I have no real Pethead friends. My husband likes the eighties hits but doesn't go later than Introspective and to me they were only getting started then

 

Well, just drag him along. That's what I do with my friends, they aren't big fans but go with me cause they know I love them (Of course, me paying for their tickets helps too).