Thursday's Victim

I liked Pet Shop Boys' music in the 1980s - I'm not sure that I knew anybody that didn't - but I never felt compelled to buy any of their albums or 12" singles, the latter even more surprising given my love of the the format as a teen going into adulthood.

 

Although I partly redressed the balance going into the 1990s and 2000s, I was still by and large lagging a decade behind with the Pet Shop Boys' catalogue. All of which preamble means that it was not until 2023 that I first heard their 2013 single Thursday, lifted from the album Electric.

 

My introduction to and education in the 21st Century Pet Shop Boys came courtesy of JC's epic series on PSB singles over at The Vinyl Villain which ran weekly from January to October last year. You don't have to be a Pet Shop Boys fan to appreciate the quality of the writing, the in-depth research and a very personal take on the songs that Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe have produced in their career. I looked forward to each installment, no less when it moved into albums and singles that I was completely unfamiliar with.

 

Thursday is a great pop song with an at-the-time astute choice of guest star Example, though then and now I can quite happily give his rapping-cum-singing a miss, if I'm honest. The single comes with a couple of, er, examples of Tennant and Lowe's ability to place some musical gems as B-sides. JC covered the Thursday single and B-sides, No More Ballads and Odd Man Out, in part 24 of the series in July 2023.

 

The links in the original post are now gone, but you can hear the songs on the Pet Shop Boys site on You Tube.

Odd Man Out was originally written and demoed in October 2011, with the version accompanying the Thursday single appearing in November 2013. As JC notes, the song is directly inspired by the 1961 film Victim, starring Dirk Bogarde and acknowledged as the first British film to explicitly name homosexuality and approach the subject matter with sensitivity and compassion.

 

I think I've only seen Victim once before but a high quality copy of film in its entirety is available on (where else?) You Tube. I'm going to watch it again at the weekend.

Neil Tennant's lyrics to Odd Man Out adapt lines from the film and the last 30 seconds directly samples from Victim, editing the character Henry's conversation into a closing monologue. Fact fans may like to know that Henry was played by esteemed actor Charles Lloyd-Pack, father of Roger Lloyd-Pack (Only Fools And Horses, The Vicar Of Dibley) and grandfather of Emily Lloyd (Wish You Were Here).

A rather more tenuous connection via lead actor Dirk Bogarde is Adrian Morley aka Dirt Bogarde, who has collected 8 previously released songs in one bargain price EP,  Blowback Vol.1. Listening to the music in the filter of the above songs, can I detect some PSB vibes in his music? Possibly. Either way, highly recommended if you're not familiar with his work.