In Brief

* * 1/2 Pet Shop Boys, “Very,” ERG. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe have made some great records featuring their wall of techno sound. Their melodic pop tales, brimming with quirks, ironies and black humor, can be effervescent or nightmarish. Like all their other albums, “Very” is listenable and danceable, but overall it sounds as if their creativity has petered out--they’re recycling these days rather than creating.

New albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent).