Pet Shop Boys’ debut hit West End Girls has been named the greatest UK number one single by The Guardian.
The classic track topped the run-down of 100 classic hits, beating out Dead or Alive’s You Spin Me Round (Like a Record), Donna Summer’s I Feel Love, The Beatles’ She Loves You, and The Specials’ Ghost Town, which 5 to 1, respectively.
Reflecting on the win, Neil Tennant confessed he never would have predicted the end result.
“I would have chosen (The Beach Boys’) Good Vibrations,” he quipped, adding, “It’s obviously intensely subjective.
“I can see that West End Girls is quite a lot of records in one record,” he explained. “It’s a dance record. It was actually written to be a rap record, back in the day. It’s a moody soundscape. It’s about the city at night. It’s about boys and girls meeting to have fun and presumably to bond.”
The Love Etc. singer continued: “It’s about sex. It’s paranoid. At the same time, its message is sort of like Dancing in the Streets – it’s about escape into the city at night, which is emblematic of pleasure.”
Check out the full top 100 here.
