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It’s the 10th anniversary of Letters Live, where stars read funny, moving and sometimes surprising letters of note on stage. Miranda Sawyer reports from the green room ....
Baffled: the Pet Shop Boys Credit: Shutterstock It’s A Sin, Channel 4’s drama about a group of gay friends in the Eighties as the spectre of Aids appears on the horizon, has been receiving rave reviews for its humanity, heart and humour. But the Pet Shop Boys song after which the hit show is named can lay claim to its own dramatic story, albeit one that is more bonkers than poignant. It’s a Sin was the second UK number one single for the deadpan synth-pop duo, often dubbed the Gilbert and George of pop. The song topped the charts for three weeks in July 1987. A gloriously over-the-top track that featured a NASA countdown, claps of thunder, choral chanting and quotes from the Latin Mass, It’s a Sin marked the peak of what Pet Shop Boys’ singer Neil Tennant would memorably call the band’s “imperial phase”. It also had one of the most catchy synth hooks of the decade. ....