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So Hard

Writers - Tennant/Lowe
First released - 1990
Original album - Behaviour
Producer - Harold Faltermeyer, Pet Shop Boys
Subsequent albums - Discography, Disco 2, PopArt, Smash
Other releases - single (UK #4, US #62, US Dance #4)

This funny-sad song about a couple's mutual infidelities and resulting distrust of each other was the first single from Behaviour and, in fact, came out in advance of the album (which is the Boys' general habit with their albums' first singles). You can't help but feel that the two characters described in the lyrics deserve each other. Best line: "We've both given up smoking 'cause it's fatal—so whose matches are those?"

Neil has confirmed in print the accuracy of the longstanding rumor that this track contains a brief sample lifted from a porno movie (although it may have been a "second-hand" sample; see the first bullet-point annotation below). Indeed, in many mixes (including the album and single versions, although you have to listen closely) you can at times hear what sounds like a man—though Neil stated it was a woman—essentially moaning the title. Largely because of this fact, the title is often cited as a double entendre, which the Boys have also freely acknowledged.

Annotations

Unfortunately (strictly for historical purposes, of course), it's anyone's guess as to which porno film served as the source of the moaned sample of the title described above. I'd be terribly surprised if the Boys themselves knew. But it's very likely that the exact same sample—the only difference being that its PSB usage sounds a bit "sped up" and therefore slightly raised in pitch—had previously appeared in the 1987 track "Deeper N Deeper" by the underground dance-club duo Modern Rocketry (where it can be heard at about the 5:59 mark of its 12-inch version). To be sure, it's quite possible, perhaps even likely, that the Boys "sampled the sample," so to speak, from the Modern Rocketry recording itself. In light of this, it's also well worth noting that this isn't the only PSB/Modern Rocketry connection. In April 2000, the Pet Shop Boys performed a live cover of another Modern Rocketry song, "Homosexuality," at an "Equality Rocks" concert in Washington, D.C.
"I'm indebted to a contact magazine" – It's easy to forget that the Pet Shop Boys were writing songs before the Internet became an everyday fact of life for most people. Before Craigslist, before Grindr, before any number of other online sites and applications that strangers use to hook up for their mutual gratification, there were the "Personals" columns and ads in select newspapers and magazines. A "contact magazine" is (was?) a publication devoted largely or even entirely to such ads, whereby people would establish—what else?—contact.
The January 1992 issue of Q Magazine featured a reproduction of the typewritten lyrics to this song, apparently Neil's own "working copy" with his handwritten adjustments. By far the most interesting change is an entire stanza near the end, crossed out and never used:

I will give you all my
love and trust you
if you'll do the same
Even though it's hard to
It's what we must do
before it's too late

But it doesn't seem to "fit" rhythmically with any portion of the released song, which may account for its excision.

Mixes/Versions

Officially released

Mixer: Julian Mendelsohn
- Album/single version (3:58)
  - Available on Behaviour
- Extended Dance Mix (6:38)
  - Available on the Further Listening bonus disc with the Behaviour reissue
- 9" Edit (4:59)
- Dub (7:37)
Mixer: David Morales
- Red Zone Mix (7:45)
  - An abbreviated (2:48) version of this mix appears on Disco 2; the full-length version is available on the bonus third disc ("Mix") with the "Special Edition" of PopArt
- Morales 12" Mix (6:26)
- Morales Radio Mix (3:37)
- Eclipse Mix (4:02)
Mixer: The KLF
- The KLF Versus Pet Shop Boys (5:30)
  - Available on the "The KLF vs. Pet Shop Boys" version of the "So Hard" single

List cross-references

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