"Always on My Mind" was written by Johnny Christopher, Mark James and Wayne Carson Thompson originally recorded by Brenda Lee.
Allmusic lists over 300 recorded releases of the song in versions by dozens of performers. The most successful US version was performed by Willie Nelson. Successful covers in Europe were performed by Elvis Presley, and later Pet Shop Boys. At the 25th Grammy Awards held in 1983, the songwriters won Grammy Awards for Song of the Year and Best Country Song; in addition, Willie Nelson's recording won for Best Male Country Vocal Performance.
The song featured in the stage musical Priscilla Queen of the Desert -- the Musical
A cover appeared in the 2009 survival horror video game Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, featuring the series's prominent vocalist Mary Elizabeth McGlynn.
In 1987, Pet Shop Boys performed a synthpop version of "Always on My Mind" on Love Me Tender, an ITV network television special commemorating the tenth anniversary of Presley's death, in which various popular contemporary acts performed cover versions of his hits. Their performance was so well-received that the duo decided to record the song and release it as a single. This version became the UK's Christmas number one single that year, beating "Fairytale of New York" by The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl, and topping the charts for four weeks in total. It is their best selling single in the official UK Singles Chart.
In November 2004, The Daily Telegraph newspaper placed the version at number two in a list of the fifty greatest cover versions of all time.
In the video for Pet Shop Boys' version of "Always on My Mind" (an excerpt from their surreal music film It Couldn't Happen Here) , Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe are seated in the front of a taxi cab, when an odd passenger gets in, played by notable British actor Joss Ackland. At the end of the song, he gets out of the car, which drives away. Standing alone, he mutters: "You went away. It should make me feel better. But I don't know how I'm going to get through", which is part of the lyrics for another Pet Shop Boys track, "What Have I Done to Deserve This?".
In 1988, the duo re-recorded the song for their third studio LP, Introspective, combining it with a track called "In My House".
