Pet Shop Boys honour Alan Turing with new album 'A man from the future'
"Our motive in creating this work was to make a musical memorial to Alan Turing"
Last updated 17 hours ago
Pet Shop Boys have announced a concept album about English mathematician, computer scientist and World War II codebreaker Alan Turning, ‘A man from the future’.
Released on Friday 9th October via Parlophone Records, Pet Shop Boys’ Neil Tennant Chris Lowe collaborated with acclaimed Alan Turing biographer Andrew Hodges on the 8-song record.
Produced by Pet Shop Boys and German composer Sven Helbig, each song on ‘A man from the future’ explores a significant chapter in the life and death of Alan Turning.
Alongside music and lyrics by Pet Shop Boys is a narration spoken by actress Juliet Stevenson, taken from Andrew Hodges’ book Alan Turing: the Enigma, which has been edited and extended by Neil Tennant and Andrew Hodges.
The music is a combination of electronics and strings with string arrangements by Sven Helbig performed by the Manchester Camerata Octet. Boys from Manchester Grammar School choir also sing on four tracks.
Pet Shop Boys say of ‘A man from the future’: “Our motive in creating this work was to make a musical memorial to Alan Turing who gave so much to his country and the world and was rewarded for it by being prosecuted for his sexuality.
“Alan made a massive contribution to the defeat of Germany in World War II and was a pioneer of computing, imagining a world with intelligent computers. He also looked forward to a time when being gay would be accepted as normal. In both his professional and private lives, he was ahead of his time.”
Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe originally wrote the work with Andrew Hodges in 2012-13 and performed it with the BBC Concert Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in July 2014.
Over a decade later they decided to revise the piece to give it more of an electronic emphasis and Sven Helbig suggested reworking his orchestrations in a more intimate arrangement for eight string players. It also features updates to the spoken text.
‘A man from the future’ is available to pre-order on vinyl, CD, Blu-ray audio and digital formats here ahead of its release on 9th October.
Pet Shop Boys’ ‘A man from the future’ track-listing:
Natural wonders every child should know
He dreamed of machines
The Enigma
Other ranks
The memory and the control
The trial
Only in his death
A man from the future