Remembering The AIDS Crisis With The Pet Shop Boys
“There are no more lovers left alive, no one has survived.” There were certainly times during the late 80s and early 90s, at the height of the global AIDS crisis, when this statement from the song “Dreaming Of The Queen” seemed all too true. A disease that had been virtually unheard of before had suddenly struck at mankind. And, after the gay liberation movement of the 60s and 70s, it had most viciously struck at LGBTQ people.
It’s no surprise, then, that AIDS became a popular topic in pop culture texts. It was the subject of plays (Angels In America), movies (Philadelphia), and songs. In pop music, few other artists addressed the disease on global and personal levels as impressively as the Pet Shop Boys. Indeed, the discography of England’s most successful pop duo lends itself to a trip into a dark past.
On this journey, we will remember and retrace the AIDS crisis by examining four of Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe’s best tracks.
How A Virus Changed The World
Before we dive into the depths of the Pet Shop Boys’ discography, let’s take a moment to familiarise ourselves with AIDS. The acronym is short for ‘acquired immunodeficiancy syndrome’. This syndrome is caused by the HIV (‘human immunodeficiancy virus’), which mainly attacks and weakens immune cells.
Consequently, the body of a person with AIDS can no longer successfully combat other diseases that would under normal circumstances not be fatal. Therefore, people don’t actually die of AIDS, but rather of AIDS-related diseases. Known modes of infection include unprotected sex, blood transfusions, and shared injecting equipment.
The AIDS epidemic in the US began in the early 80s. By the end of 1982, 121 gay men had died after suffering from pneumonia or skin cancer. Their immune systems had been curiously weak, and the term GRID (‘gay-related immune disease’) was soon used to describe their condition.
Even though drug users and other groups of people contracted AIDS as well, it has always been considered a ‘gay illness’. It hit the LGBTQ subculture at the worst possible moment: shortly after the well-known gay liberation movement. The common narrative of the infected gay man negated most of the progress that had just been made. LGBTQ individuals were ostracised and in many cases blamed for their condition. Unprotected sex and promiscuity were, after all, clearly a ‘gay thing’.
The late 80s / early 90s were a dark and uncertain time in which you had to live like there was no tomorrow, because there quite possibly wouldn’t be one. On the search for rays of hope, artists began using all means available to them to address life in the gigantic shadow of AIDS. Among them were Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe, the two men better known as the Pet Shop Boys.
“It Couldn’t Happen Here” (1987)
Released on the Pet Shop Boys’ sophomore album Actually, the somber ballad “It Couldn’t Happen Here” perfectly describes the early days of the AIDS crisis. As the song’s title suggests, nobody had believed that anything like the AIDS epidemic could ever happen, neither in the US nor in Europe. But then it did, and people started dying.
Speaking about “It Couldn’t Happen Here”, singer and lyricist Neil Tennant said:
“The lyric is about this friend of mine who was diagnosed with AIDS. In the first verse we are all teenagers in Newcastle in the whole glam period, and the song describes the Newcastle scene. ‘Who do you think you are?’ refers to the idea that gay people were too public.”
Then the chorus kicks in. “Now it almost seems impossible,” Tennant sings, before wondering, “I may be wrong, but I thought we said it couldn’t happen here.” With these lines, the ballad captures the essence of a time when the improbability of a future made living for the moment the only option. It details the shift from the hedonistic, free 70s to an era of discrimination and death.
By 1986, when the song was written, there had been 31,741 AIDS cases in the US and 3,858 in Europe. Looking back, Tennant said: “It’s amazing to think that in Britain in 1986, it was quite shocking for someone to have AIDS. It was still pretty unusual then” (The Advocate, 17th Sep. 1996).
“Being Boring” (1990)
When “Being Boring” was written and released, AIDS cases were no longer unusual. Indeed, by 1990 no less than 307,000 cases had been reported worldwide. Friends had died and dreams had died with them. The beginning of the new decade marked the darkest years of the epidemic. The years in which too many people were left with nothing but memories of brighter days. Those very memories are the subject matter of “Being Boring”.
“It’s one of the best songs we’ve ever written,” Neil Tennant once said about the track. He then added, “I suppose it’s because it’s true” (The Advocate). Released as the second single from the Pet Shop Boys’ fourth studio album Behaviour, the midtempo ballad became their lowest charting song in the UK at the time. Chris Lowe commented that “it just shows that chart positions aren’t the be all and end all.”
What, then, is it about this song — which has by now become a fan favourite — that makes it so good? As Tennant said, it’s true. True and authentic. It’s also incredibly complex for a popsong.
The title was inspired by a stranger accusing the Pet Shop Boys of “being boring”. The song, however, isn’t about them and their image. Instead, it sees Tennant remembering the very friend who had inspired “It Couldn’t Happen Here”; a friend who had in the meantime passed away after a tough battle against AIDS. In fact, the Pet Shop Boys b-side “Your Funny Uncle” details his funeral.
“Being Boring” tells the story of Tennant and his friend growing up in Newcastle and dreaming of fame and fortune. It also describes how their lives took completely different turns. The introductory text to the official music video summarises “Being Boring” as follows: “The song is about growing up — the ideals that you have when you’re young and how they turn out.” Tennant elaborated further:
“When we were teenagers we would always discuss that we weren’t going to settle for boring lives, we were always going to do something different. And then when it came down to it, I did become a pop star and at exactly that time he became very ill.”
The first verse of “Being Boring” focuses on the Newcastle party scene. The second verse is about Tennant moving to London, guided by hopes and dreams. The third verse, then, introduces the reality of the AIDS crisis: “But I thought, in spite of dreams, you’d be sitting somewhere here with me.” Add the prominent disco elements and the almost spoken vocals and you end up with an outstanding meditation on a gay man’s life in the latter half of the 20th century.
“Dreaming Of The Queen” (1993)
“Dreaming Of The Queen” is a twisted midtempo commentary on some of the reactions to the AIDS crisis. The standout track of the Pet Shop Boys’ most successful album, Very, was described as an “anxiety dream” by Tennant. It’s based on one of the most common dreams in England: that of the Queen visiting for tea. In the song, though, she doesn’t come alone. Princess Diana is with her.
The two members of the royal family stand for two different political approaches to the AIDS crisis. The Queen, much like Ronald Reagan’s US government, seems rather reluctant to address the issue. AIDS was, at least initially, considered a ‘gay illness’. Thus, it was a problem that the LGBTQ community had to solve, not the government.
Diana, on the other hand, openly tells the Queen that “there are no more lovers left alive.” This refers to the staggering number of 2.5 million AIDS cases that had been reported globally by 1993. Lady Di was the most active member of the royal family when it came to the fight against AIDS. She organised charity concerts. She opened the first HIV ward in a UK hospital. And she was even photographed holding the hand of an AIDS patient at a time when most other politicans were keen on keeping a physical distance between infected people and themselves.
By 1993, several treatments for AIDS had been developed. The drug AZT had first been approved in the 80s. Later, various combinations of different drugs had proven to be even more efficient at keeping the virus from replicating itself at a fast rate.
As “Dreaming Of The Queen” makes clear, however, the treatments came too late for too many people. Besides, AIDS was still around and still lethal. Therefore, the protagonist of the song wakes up from his dream “in a sweat, desolate.” This line hints at the possibility of him actually having AIDS; or at least thinking that he might be HIV-positive.
“The Survivors” (1996)
This ballad from the world music influenced 1996 album Bilingual is only indirectly about the AIDS crisis. It’s still included for two reasons. Firstly, it’s not only about growing old, but also about survivor’s guilt. Secondly, it was released at a time when the darkest years of the AIDS crisis were already over. The (LGBTQ) people who were still around in 1996 were quite literally “the survivors”.
In the middle of the 90s, new drug combinations, non-blood HIV tests, and HAART (‘highly active antiretroviral therapy’) had been introduced. Because of these advances in medicine, having AIDS didn’t necessarily lead to certain death anymore. Moreover, the number of newly diagnosed AIDS cases in the US declined for the first time in 1996.
In this new environment, the pop culture narratives about AIDS changed as well. “The Survivors” is an apt example of this. The song combines memories of the past (“our heads bowed at memorials for other faces in the crowd”) with musings about the future (“face the future, find the will”). For the first time since the beginning of the AIDS crisis, a future existed again.
Speaking about the song in a 1996 interview (The Advocate), Neil Tennant said:
“If you’re 40, whether you’re straight or gay, you can look around at the people you used to know, and they’re just simply not all there anymore. And when you know a lot of people who have died, particularly of AIDS, you have this sort of guilt feeling that you’re still there. That’s what the song is about, really.”
The AIDS crisis hit the world — and especially the LGBTQ community — hard. In addition to the deaths it directly caused, it contributed to the discrimination against and the ostracism of LGBTQ people. From the first reported cases to new treatment methods, from “It Couldn’t Happen Here” to “The Survivors”, AIDS changed the face of the Earth. Even today, the HIV remains a constant threat, so that it’s sensible for everyone to get tested frequently.
As Neil Tennant sings on “The Survivors”, “many words may make it sound contrived, but somehow we’re alive.” Let’s make the most it.
Buy the new Pet Shop Boys album Super wherever music is sold. Check out the entire lyrics of the four songs from this article on their website.
