Pet Shop Boys drop surprise single Dreamland with Years & Years

While giving this its first spin this evening, a distinct feeling emerged: This sounds like one of those Pet Shop Boys B-sides in which they are aping a specific artist, song or genre, or some combination thereof, such as in "The Ghost of Myself" (Britney Spears' "…Baby One More Time") or "Betrayed" (jungle). In this case, the imitated object would be the popular synthpop recording artist known as Years & Years. My first impression is that this new A-side is pleasant enough but not destined to be a favorite.

While it was known they'd been working with Olly Alexander of Years & Years, bonus points are in order for dropping the lead single from out of nowhere on a non-standard release date, accompanying the news of a greatest hits tour and the January release date for the upcoming studio album (it's been a long wait), which will complete the Stuart Price-produced trilogy. Here's to a new era of PSB.