Well…Depeche Mode having an amusing conversation with Ricky Gervais about David Bowie is up there for me. Here it is for your enjoyment – the Life on Mars? anecdote is very funny.
And the klaxon I refer to is not the intro to A Pain that I am Used To* – but the news that there’s a whole evening of Depecheness on BBC 4 (sic) on Friday – featuring a special concert “At the BBC” – I am thinking that this might be the one hour set they did recently to headline the 6 Music festival at Glasgow Barrowlands. A show that online reviewers universally have deemed to be ruddy brilliant. A real grower of a new album and a long tour coming up too – exciting times!
*fans will love that joke, honestly.
That really was quite a coup for Skavlan. Excellent TV. He does get some good bands: the XX were on a few weeks ago.
The show is broadcast in Norway and Sweden (he’s Norwegian but lives in Stockholm) and interviews are in Swedish, Norwegian,(a mixture of the two) or English.
In this case the show was done in London and he has also relocated to New York. SVT and NRK must be spending a few bob!
Yes, he does say “here in London” at one point.
I have seen the odd European interview where the questioner speaks in two languages. It’s quite strange – it’s like the satellite delay on the news when someone’s reporting from Norfolk.
Thanks for the BBC4 heads up BC. Sky box set to record. Your continued enthusiasm leads me to search beyond the singles and “Songs Of Faith and Devotion”. I’m off to Amazon with my voucher to buy the album with “Master and Servant” on it and I’ll go on from there. “Its a lot like life….”
Hope you enjoy it! I have fond memories of Some Great Reward. It has Lie to Me on it which is one of their best songs. Always liked Master and Servant – and I am back on board with People are People again. Alan Wilder’s If You Want is also a highlight.
I went for “Some Great Reward” and “Construction Time Again” because I adore “Everything Counts”. Looking forward to it……. I was driving a van for a living the year “People Are People” and “Master and Servant” came out, fond memories of whizzing round London listening to Radio 1 dj’s wetting themselves about the “change of direction”…
More Mode news here…
http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/articles/7661e1aa-a1cb-4074-bbe2-a0f61125847e
…though “wild” is stretching it a bit.
I’ve never really paid that much attention to Depeche Mode before and assumed they were just another of those tiresome ‘plinky-plonky drum machine’ bands but that interview was interesting and they came across as really decent men. I will take my prejudice out back, shoot it in the head and investigate their music. Where should I start? What’s their best album?
Best first bet would be a singles album or two – their chronological sets “81-85” and “86-98” are exemplary Greatest Hits collections, but if you insist on a one-disk-only digest, “The Best Of” is decent enough.
The safest ‘best album’ choice is Violator – the one with Enjoy The Silence and Personal Jesus – which is probably the fan favourite, and came in the middle of their great hat-trick bookended by Music For The Masses (with Never Let Me Down & Strangelove) and Songs Of Faith & Devotion (I Feel You & Walking In My Shoes).
And for my money, the key reason they’ve lasted so much longer than their contemporaries, without resorting to reformations or 80s nostalgia tours, is that they’ve always been such a great live band. Dave Gahan is a superb frontman (“Mick Jagger fronting Kraftwerk” as I’ve seen him described), and “101” (on BBC4 tonight) will give you a good flavour of that, too… enjoy!
Great, thanks for that.
Agree with @metalMickey – the mid-2000s best of (with a flower on the front) is a good place to start. For the albums,, Violator and then working outwards from there is a good plan.
But another way to do it is via the two excellent Remixes released in 2004 and 2011, especially if dance is more your thing. Part of the thrill in following them were the 12″ remixes that were often very different to the “host” song. For the 12″ version most other bands simply extended the intro and/or outro or repeated a verse. Depeche Mode always make an effort with the remixes and are very open to letting a producer fill their boots and bash out their own bizarre interpretation and then release it as Depeche Mode. Remixes 81:04 and Remixes 81:11 collect up all the best of those.
I rather like the fact that Andy Fletcher doesn’t look like a glamorous rock star.
I also like the fact that he isn’t a musician – his parts for the live shows are very straightforward. Yet he has just as much of a say in the band as Gore and Gahan. The band could go on quite easily without Fletch but I don’t think they would.
Nice work if you can get it. Linda McCartney without having to shag the boss.
He is the lukewarm water between the Fire and Ice isn’t he? I’m fascinated by the whole issue of what Fletch’s role in the band. I know he doesn’t play on the records, but he also doesn’t seem to be doing anything of great consequence on stage – I’ve read that he supposedly triggers the odd sample and on the last tour they had him play the bassline to ‘Just Can’t Get Enough’ and made a thing of it- but ultimately he’s basically Bez, but without the Maracas.
What baffles me about Fletch is that given the amount of downtime there must be on a massive world tour, hanging around in hotels and airports – which he’s been doing four decades – you’d think in that time he could have had some lessons and figured out how to play a keyboard riff or two so he’d have more to do on stage.
I guess ultimately they like having him around, without him it’s an unlikely synth duo of Gahan and Gore – without Fletch they’re not a band.
I’d read that he does do the odd thing in the studio, but clearly not much. Apparently one of his key roles is to speak for Martin when Dave is getting a bit full of himself and Martin shuts down. He and MG are close apparently. Still funny tho. If i was Fletch I’d be mortified at the endless “what does he do” stuff, get some lessons and make an effort. But in night on 40 years, he never has – he makes Linda Mc and Bez look like amateurs in the freeloading stakes.
You’re totally wrong about Linda, she played live and she played on Wings and Macca records and contributed toward the songwriting.
I’m not saying she didn’t play live or on record Dr V. There’s an isolated track of her playing and singing somewhere on the net i think. My point is she didn’t get to do any of those things on merit and i don’t believe she contributed anything musically of note. I’ve watched all the various live tapes like One Hand Clapping and i cant see or hear anything being added myself.
I’m a fan of Cook of the House myself, but i suspect the ‘songwriting’ credits were a crafty way of holding onto a greater share of Macca’s publishing rights.
I’m told, by someone who would definitely know, that live, Linda’s contributions were routed to her monitor but not to the front of house PA.
Great interview.
I have never really got Depeche Mode after their early 1980s stuff but I will look again.
I came to them late – I picked up the two collections because I knew a few hits, and they are great, so got into some albums….personal favourite is Playing The Angel….and they are effing brilliant live!
Bless ’em. I do like Depeche a lot. They make the kind of records that certain bands of their vintage can’t help make – (and I’ll count my favourite band Wire in this) – good solid records that won’t exactly replace their classics in anyone’s hearts and minds but sound like they still give a shit and still want to put over new stuff rather than falling back on their considerable back catalogue. You’d never catch Depeche playing Violator in full for example, and you certainly couldn’t accuse them of wallowing in nostalgia on the Barrowlands set
I have to say I prefer the old two-finger synth, pipe-banging and tape machine style Depeche Mode and I could do without that hyperactive rock drummer guy clattering away – and I do wish they’d be a bit more imaginative with their choice of ‘old’ too- they still seem to be picking the obvious ones from the late 80s onwards (Personal Jesus, Walking in My Shoes, Enjoy the Silence) – be nice to hear them attack something like Get the Balance Right or some deep cuts off the earlier albums – let’s have Tora Tora Tora! Obviously the Barrowlands was a truncated version of the set they’ll be touring soon so we’ll see.
I think they gave Shake the Disease an airing during the last tour, which is a relatively obscure one, even though it was a top 20 single.
I hate that refrain, “We’re Entertainers”, from Artists whenever they enter the fray of explicit commentary. Bugs the shit out of me!
Recorded 101 last night, is it any good?
It’s a good film – you don’t have to be a fan to enjoy it. it’s not just the live footage of the show, it follows some young fans around the USA and has behind the scenes stuff. There is an excellent part where we see the lady behind the lighting desk operating the light show as if she is one of the musicians. She knows the song and is “playing along”. Here it is :
She actually seems to do more than Fletch !!
I saw them live once and it was quite interesting, I only knew most of the singles and it was an eye opener to see the devotion they received from their fans for not doing much at all on stage. I felt I was in the church of some obscure religion.
They have some nice tunes, but some of the poorest lyrics ever. They were on TOTP this week doing Everything Counts:
“The turning point,
of a career,
in Korea,
being sincere…”
Ouch.
Martin Gore is a fine, Ivor Novello award winning songwriter – but every now and then he delivers some terrible lyrics. The latest album has a song called The Worst Crime which has the rottenest lyrics this side of the Cranberries,
“For whatever reason
We now find ourselves in this
We are all charged with treason
There is no one left to hiss”
They usually get away with it don’t you think? There’s something about the production and DG’s doom laden voice of import that often adds weight to the headiest tosh.
You’re right. Despite that, The Worst Crime is actually quite lovely and Dave Gahan’s voice and the production saves the day.
If memory serves, there was a documentary a few years back about Mode fans that the band suppressed because they were all a bit too full on and culty. Did it ever surface on the net?
Possibly Jeremy Deller’s “The Posters Came From the Walls”. Quite severe cases in that film, mostly from Eastern Europe. Saddo that I am, I watched a screening from (seemingly) someone’s phone at the movies that was on YouTube for a while. At one point a Russian woman talks passioantely about how the English will never understand Depeche Mode because prophets are always without honour in their home land. Her speech provokes a round of applause from the audience.
That’s the one alright. Sounds fascinating. I like Jeremy Deller’s work a lot.