On August 19th, Neil and Chris meet by chance in an electronics shop on the Kings Road. Realizing they have a common interest in dance music, they begin to write together. Initially they call themselves West End; later they come up with the name Pet Shop Boys, a name derived from some friends who work in a pet shop in Ealing. “We thought it sounded like an English rap group”.
Zelda Fitzgerald dies in a fire in an Asheville, North Carolina mental hospital. She’s important in PSB history for having written the lines that inspired the song ‘Being Boring.’
The issue with today’s date of the U.K. magazine Record Mirror has a cover story on Liza Minnelli, referring to her as ‘Pet Shop Girl,’ which harkens back to the previous year’s album Results, produced and largely composed by the Pet Shop Boys.
Continuing work on ‘Indefinite Leave to Remain,’ Neil finishes the lyrics and records vocals.
Although this afternoon’s scheduled matinee performance of The Most Incredible Thing by the Charlotte Ballet had, just as the previous evening’s show, been canceled on account of technical problems, this evening’s performance goes off without a hitch, becoming, in effect, the work’s ‘opening night’ in America.