After completing a degree in history at the Polytechnic of North London, Neil takes a job at Marvel Comics, anglicizing spellings and indicating where over-risque woman needed to be redrawn decently. While there he interviews comic fan Marc Bolan, who politely points out that his tape recorder wasn’t working. In 1977 he works at Macdonald Educational Publishing, later moving to ITV Books. In June 1982, he joins Smash Hits.
‘Jerusalem’ by Fat Les, featuring a mix by the Pet Shop Boys, debuts at #10 on the U.K. singles chart.
The Boys perform in Moscow on the second date of their Pandemonium Tour.
The official PSB website announces the title of their next studio album, Elysium, and confirms it will be released in September. As an advance ‘taster’ for the album, the track ‘Invisible’ appears online with its own new music video. Meanwhile, back in the studio, Neil casually mutes some equipment in order to answer the phone, but then gets distracted and forgets what he has done. Unknowingly, they believe their still-muted gear is malfunctioning. (After all, they’re only human. It’s two days before their sound engineer determines the cause of the problem and simply presses the button again to ‘un-mute’ the equipment.)
They bring their Electric Tour show to Paris.
They perform at Berlin’s Mercedes-Benz Arena.
The Boys bring their Dreamworld Tour to Belfast.