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Music for Boys

Writers - Tennant/Lowe
First released - 1991
Original album - Alternative
Producer - Pet Shop Boys
Subsequent albums - Behaviour 2001 reissue Further Listening 1990-1991 bonus disc
Other releases - b-side of single "DJ Culture"

This Chris Lowe virtual instrumental was inspired by an observation he made one evening while listening to similar high-energy music at a dance club. It occurred to him that the aggressive, boisterous music he was listening to was music written and designed implicitly for "boys" as opposed to "girls." So he simply made explicit what had previously been implicit.

This is one of the very few PSB tracks with no indisputably discernable trace of Neil in it. (For all we know, some of the distorted or sped-up vocals may indeed be Neil's, and he may be playing some keyboards as well and have contributed in other ways, but we wouldn't know for sure unless we're told so.) Although the b-side to the "DJ Culture" single, "Music for Boys" actually proved to be equally popular in the States, where as a double-sided 12" single they reached #13 on the Billboard dance sales chart. And it wouldn't be hard to guess which song got more play in gay dance clubs.

Annotations

"Music for Boys" apparently includes a sped-up, higher-pitched sample of piano and female vocal ("Oh, yeah!") borrowed from the track "Sanctuary of Love" by Zhana’ (full name Zhana Saunders), released only shortly before that same year, 1991. Some fans, however, have speculated that it's actually lifted from the Haçienda Version of "Violence," in which case that is the track that seems to have taken a non-sped-up sample from "Sanctuary of Love," and then they "borrowed their own borrowing," so to speak, for "Music for Boys." But, if this is true, it raises a perplexing question. "Music for Boys" was released in 1991, whereas the Boys have stated that they first created the Haçienda Version of "Violence" in 1992, and it wasn't released until the following year as a bonus track with the "I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind of Thing" single. So how could a 1991 track include a sample from a track that wasn't created until 1992? There are several possibilities:
- The sample in question was first used in "Music for Boys" and sped up for use in that track. The Boys subsequently decided to repurpose it at its original speed in the Haçienda Version of "Violence."
- Neil and/or Chris were mistaken when they said that they created Haçienda Version of "Violence" in 1992. They must have actually created it earlier than that, and then used a sample from the track, unreleased at that time, in "Music for Boys."
- Both tracks use the same sample (one of them sped up) from "Sanctuary of Love."
- "Music for Boys" does not include a sped-up sample from "Sanctuary of Love" and/or the Haçienda Version of "Violence" after all. They may sound very much alike, but they're not the same.
What's the actual case? I suppose only the Pet Shop Boys themselves could say.
Like their much later song "Here," the "Ambient Mix" of this track (see the list of mixes below) features a recurring synth riff reminiscent of a similar synth-hook from the 1982 post-disco classic "Passion," performed by the Flirts, written and produced by Bobby O—an important name in the Boys' history. "Passion" has been cited by Chris and Neil as a strong influence on them, especially their very early recordings.

Mixes/Versions

Officially released

Mixer: Pet Shop Boys
- 7" mix (3:36)
  - Available on Alternative
- "Part 2" aka Ambient Mix (6:11)
  - Available on the Further Listening bonus disc with the Behaviour reissue, among other places; its timing varies by several seconds, however, in its various appearances
Mixer: Chris Lowe
- Chris Lowe Mix (6:42)
Mixer: Altern 8
- "Part 3" (5:40)

List cross-references

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