Pet Shop Boys - Story (25 Years Of Hits) (2009)

Pet Shop Boys formed in London in August 1981, when vocalist Neil Tennant (a former editor at Marvel Comics who later gained some recognition as a journalist for Smash Hits magazine) first met keyboardist Chris Lowe (a onetime architecture student) at an electronics shop. Discovering a shared passion for dance music and synthesizers, they immediately decided to start a band. After dubbing themselves Pet Shop Boys in honor of friends who worked in such an establishment -- while also obliquely nodding to the sort of names prevalent among the New York City hip-hop culture of the early '80s -- the duo's career first took flight in 1983, when Tennant met producer Bobby "O" Orlando while on a writing assignment. Orlando produced their first single, 1984's "West End Girls." The song was a minor hit in the U.S. but went nowhere in Britain, and its follow-up, "One More Chance," was also unsuccessful.