Just Can’t Get Enough: My 23 Year Relationship with Depeche Mode

Many of us musicaholics have one artist we depend on to put us in a certain state. For example, if I crave upbeat dance tracks to inspire me to clean, there’s New Order’s greatest hits double cd Substance. If I want psychological self-reflection to remind me that someone else’s emotional struggle is more painful then mine, then anything by Blue October does the trick. And if I desire creative motivation which reminds me of how much more growth needs to happen to realize full artistic potential, then I turn on I’m Your Fan, an album of covers by bands such as James and REM all humbly and respectfully performing Leonard Cohen lyrics. Finally, if I ever need “mood” music, then neither Barry White nor Patricia Kass can compete with the one band whose songs for the past two and a half decades have inspired numerous make-out sessions across the globe: Depeche Mode.

My first encounter with DM occurred in Dena Aksel’s house in (yes, of course) Skokie, Illinois. Dena lived in an area called Devonshire and back in 1984 she had MTV. At the time MTV still played music videos and one summer afternoon at Dena’s house we were watching Mark Goodman do his thing as innovative songs such as “Black Stations, White Stations” penetrated young minds. Then, a video came on by this new British band called Depeche Mode. The song was “People are People.” The beat was catchy and the lyrics demonstrated an almost too profound guitar-less, keyboard sound. (sing along with me now):

[:People are people, so why should it be
You & I should get along so awfully:] 2x

(tun, tun, tun)

So we’re different colors and we’re different breeds
And different people have different needs
It’s obvious you hate me though I’ve done nothing wrong
I’ve never even met you so what could I have done?

[:I can’t understand what makes a man hate another man, help me understand….:] 10x

Deep stuff for a decade of excess.

Another early memory of the band took place during a cold winter night in Chicago. My friends and I went to one of those now extinct Russian restaurants – this one on Lincoln and Peterson – to ring in 1987. I had lost my apartment keys and my sister had to leave her New Year festivities and pick me up so I could get home. She was not happy. (Sis, I am so sorry I spoiled that party for you & any others where you had to be the responsible one). However, that night her friend (I think Vadim) gave Masha the Black Celebration album. Dark, intimate and brilliant, listening to the title song as I type this I can tell you it planted a seed in a very young mind many winters ago. A few years later, during senior year of high school, for my advertising class I created a radio commercial. Using a dusty tape player, I selected “Just Can’t Get Enough” for my background music. I have no recollection as to what product I created the ad for, but who cares? As a future marketer I knew that an insatiable craving for anything resulted in more sales.

In 1990 I graduated high school and Depeche Mode grew up. Or, perhaps, I finally began to understand what this music was communicating. That year DM released what, in this writer’s opinion, is one of the greatest musical albums of that decade: Violator – a concise, seductive, perverse and dark title, perfectly reflective of its contents. The first song released off that album was played at my high school prom and, a few months later, at the cool clubs in DeKalb, Illinois. Debbie, my NIU roommate, brought a small tv for our tiny shared dorm room and watching the “Enjoy the Silence” video gave me chills. The addictive electronic dance beat tapped into my then very lost and confused soul like a heroin needle in the hands of a misguided celebrity. The second major hit off the Violator cd was “Personal Jesus.” Written in 6/8 time it had all the Jewish kids singing every lyric – never mind the irony. While the entire cd contained only nine songs total, with titles such as “Sweetest Perfection,” “Waiting for the Night to Fall” and “Clean” Violator instantly became the make-out album of choice.

In 1993, now a student at DePaul, as I took another step towards independence with my first Lakeview apartment, Depeche Mode released the even more mature Songs of Faith and Devotion. The following summer, Jen, my cousin Alex and big group of us drove to Poplar Creek to see Depeche Mode in concert. We had grass seating, it rained like a monsoon and yet we remained for the entire performance. We did not care. We watched the band do its thing – realizing then that perhaps some bands are best left to the studio. Which is ok. Depeche Mode was the first keyboard-focused non-guitar band to sell out the giant outdoor stadium in L.A. And the live two-cd set DepecheMode 101 is a brilliant compilation of all their pre–Violator hits. But on that particular stormy afternoon, technology and weather did not cooperate. However, one particular song on the new album struck a major chord: “In Your Room.” The song is an invitation, much like many of Depeche Mode’s songs, even the ones on their more current albums like 2001’s Exciter and the most recent Playing the Angel. The music is still relevant, still powerful.

Most recently, I’ve been listening to my DM library from the early days of “Stripped” to “Master and Servant” to “I Feel Loved.” And I picked up on the undercurrent of the theme, the constant idea that connects all Depeche Mode songs: it’s the hunger one person feels for another. Basic, primal and poetic all at once.

Every Depeche Mode song is a seduction – of the heart, the mind, the body and the soul.

I don’t think any other artist has articulated what that hunger feels like. (Only exception is “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails.) Sometimes we’ve hungered for someone so much it hurt – as the longing was a one-way street. Perhaps, we were craved by someone but lusted after someone else. And in that rare moment of mutual attraction, that age-old instinct that has sustained the perpetual conception of mankind, that split-second gaze between two people in hunger for each other, that instant is what defines every piece of music ever created by Depeche Mode.

So next time you want to seduce, or be seduced, surrender to someone new or someone whom you think you know, put on Violator and enjoy your own sweet perfection.

Note: Depeche Mode photo, Google.