Pet Shop Boys talk to OUT!

It’s supposed to be a wide-ranging interview with both Pet Shop Boys members Neil Tennent and Chris Lowe.

But the OUT cover story by writer and journalist Andrew Sullivan for Out magazine. But it’s really mostly Tennant who does the talking which is fine because he’s a terrific interview. Here are some excerpts:

TENNANT ON COMING OUT: “My mother once apparently asked my sister, ‘Is Neil one of them?’ And of course, they’d read I was gay in The Sunday Times (of London). In our family we never talked about sex, let alone being gay, but they went on this amazing journey where they quite liked the fact I was gay by the end.”

TENNANT ON AIDS: “[We’ve made] a lot of songs about the AIDS epidemic. My best friend was diagnosed with AIDS in 1986, and the song ‘It Couldn’t Happen Here,’ is a description of a conversation we had. I remembered him saying in the very early days that AIDS was not going to happen in Britain for various reasons. We were being a bit complacent about it. It’s the same guy in ‘Being Boring;’ and ‘Your Funny Uncle’ is about his funeral.”

TENNANT ON BARACK OBAMA: “We’re crazy about Obama in Europe. Everyone thinks he’s sexy. Lovely teeth, as my mother would say. He’s brought back dignity, which is an amazing thing to put back on the cultural agenda.”

TENNANT ON AMERICA: “We’ve maintained that the Pet Shop Boys are always an alternative to what’s going on. Its 1992, it’s all about Nirvana, but there’s still the Pet Shop Boys. It’s 2009, it’s all about the Pussycat Dolls or something, but there’s still the Pet Shop Boys. It’s why I’m not really bothered about success in America, because we do things our own way, and generally speaking, it’s been the hard way.”

Go to OUT.com to read the entire interview.