Introducing the Band:
Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are joined by guest Dave Weigel. Dave is a founding reporter at Semafor, where he covers the 2024 campaign and writes the Americana newsletter. Check his work out here and find him on Twitter at @daveweigel.
Dave’s Music Pick: Pet Shop Boys
Opportunities are knocking: I've got the brains, and you've got the looks, so let's make lots of money as we use the post–July 4 week to celebrate the United Kingdom's most famous '80s/'90s synthpop dance-music duo! Of course, Pet Shop Boys -- a two-man collaboration that began in 1981 when rock critic Neil Tennant ran into bedsit-room synths-and-sequencers muso Chris Lowe at a record shop -- are much more than that besides. They managed the trick of being one of the United Kingdom's most commercially dominant chart acts while also being one of its cleverest and most tasteful, the result being that their classic run of albums beginning with Please (1986) have not dated even as they helped create and define the sound of '80s and '90s pop, club, and dance music. Neil Tennant's knack for melody and endlessly clever lyrics relating stories of heartbreak, ennui, and urban adventure from a then still-hidden subculture (gay London of the '80s and '90s) matched perfectly with Lowe's preternatural ability to layer keyboards hooks and sequenced percussion into compulsive radio fodder: The Pet Shop Boys scored 22 top-ten singles in the U.K. and ten over here in the United States, and you'll be surprised how many of them you knew without realizing you did. So press play, get ready to dance, enjoy a real treat. By the end you may be asking yourself: "What have I done to deserve this?"
Episode 115: Jesse Walker / Willie Nelson [Part 1]
Episode 114: Steve Miller / Mott The Hoople
Episode 113: Andrew Heaton / 'Weird Al' Yankovic
Episode 112: Scott Immergut / Squeeze
Episode 111: Eli Lake / Prince [Part 3]
Episode 110: Eli Lake / Prince [Part 2]
Episode 109: Eli Lake / Prince [Part 1]
Episode 108: Mike Long / Robbie Fulks
Episode 107: Rory Cooper / Paul Simon
Episode 106: Andrew Prokop / Kate Bush
Episode 105: Bruce Edward Walker / Warren Zevon
Episode 104: Charles C. W. Cooke / Fleetwood Mac [Part 2]
Episode 103: Charles C. W. Cooke / Fleetwood Mac
Episode 102: Daniel Gullotta / Michael Jackson
Episode 101: Matt Lewis / John Mellencamp
Episode 100: Andrew Fink / The Allman Brothers Band
Episode 99: Randy Barnett / Traffic & Steve Winwood
Episode 98: Jeff Dufour / Neil Young [Part 3]
Episode 97: Jeff Dufour / Neil Young [Part 2]
Episode 96: Jeff Dufour / Neil Young [Part 1]
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