Pet Shop Boys

Oh dear. Britain’s best pop duo turned in a pretty dismal set last night at the Brighton Centre. Not that you would have known, as the hard core fans lapped it up. Great songs, a well balanced set of old and new too, but served up so poorly. The sound was atrocious – not, I think, the fault of the venue. NT’s voice, so often plaintive, sounded reedy and kazoo-like and was lost against the hefty backing tracks, which were loud to the point of distortion and pain. The visuals were so packed with cliched imagery that I laughed. Tunnels, boys? Stop it! No amount of laser wizardy was going to detract from that. And the dancers… simply rotten. Costume wise it was okay, I guess, but KLF and Grace Jones might want to have their people talk to PSB’s people.

Brighton Centre, 29 May 2014

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