>Interview NME-26-3-1983 Depeche Mode are out to prove they are more than the abandoned puppets of Yazooâs Vince Clarke. Have they got the new balance right?
âDEPECHEÂ MODEÂ are the fast way forward to the future,â concluded Lynn Hanna a year ago.
The tape has wound on 12 months and finds the band with their fourth consecutive hit single since Vince Clarke left, a second successful LP under their belts, and growing appreciation in Europe and America.
But in 1982 Vince Clarkeâs new project, Yazoo, had the higher profile, leading many people to dismiss Depeche Mode as the abandoned puppets of an eccentric electro-pop genius.
âOur success last year was overshadowed by Yazooâs success,â admits Andy Fletcher. âA lot of people really think we resent Yazoo. A lot of people in the general public still think he was the brains behind the group.â
Andy is sipping milk in the restaurant of Frankfurtâs curiously named Hotel Splendid. Depeche Mode have just played a one-off concert at the Kongresshalle, neatly tying in with the musical instrument fair being held at Frankfurtâs massive exhibition centre that week. Songsmith Martin Gore and Daniel Miller, supremo of their record label Mute, have been sampling the wares.
In appearance Andy is part Shed boot-boy, part Okie farm-hand. Taller than the rest of the group, he is their semi-official voice. Martin, clad in Russian tank-driver black leather cap and jerkin, is notoriously shy and self-effacing, his air of fragile vulnerability enhanced by a halo of infantâs curls. By contrast singer Dave Gahan is a bit of a lad. Pushy, extrovert and exuberantly witty, Dave is Depeche Modeâs master of ceremonies, both on and off stage.
At 23 the oldest in the band, Alan Wilder has only recently become a permanent member. A veteran of various North London combos, Al joined when Vince left.
âThey advertised in Melody Maker and I answered the advert,â he explains. âIt said, Name band, synthesiser, must be under 21. So I lied, I was actually 22.â
Al is still slightly aloof from the rest of the group, debarred from joining in wholeheartedly by his different background. But with all the zeal of the converted, he is their most trenchant champion.
âSomebody in their position doesnât get somebody new in the first week who might turn out to be a complete arsehole. So I was touring and doing TV but wasnât actually recording with them until this new single now.â
âGET THEÂ Balance Rightâ is the toughest 45 Depeche Mode have so far released. It deviates even further than its predecessor, âLeave In Silenceâ, from the sunny, sparkling Mode singles of public expectations. But, as stylistic innovators from the beginning, Depeche Mode are not about to cease challenging their audience now.
Al elaborates: âLuckily weâre in the position where we know weâre going to get a certain amount of radio play just on the strength of reputation, which means that you can take slightly more of a risk than maybe a band putting out their first single.â
âWhen we released âLeave In Silenceâ it was a gamble,â Dave recalls. âIt didnât get nearly as much airplay as our past records had got. It didnât go as well, but the fact was it wasnât played as much. The radio didnât see it as a single; they saw it as more of an album track.â
How concerned are Depeche Mode with commercial success?
Says Al: âWe obviously want to become established enough, if we want, to go out on a limb and vary our approach.â
âWith the music industry being so fickle, youâve got to keep up there all the time,â Andy stresses. âOr if not, youâre forgotten in a moment.â
âWeâve done all right, â comments Dave. ââJust Canât Get Enoughâ was very big in the discos and clubs over there.â
âYou can have a fluke hit in America,â expounds Dave. âOur new single may become a hit in America but only through a fluke. All the English bands that are in the charts at the moment, none of them have followed it up with a second single. And thatâs because none of them have gone over and toured for six months apart from A Flock Of Seagulls.â
Andy: âTo be honest though, America isnât the end, isnât our aim at all. I trust I speak for the whole band. Germany for us is definitely more important at the moment. Germany is the market to break.â
âItâs an exciting market as well,â chimes in Dave. âWe enjoy it over here, actually doing gigs over here. You can see somethingâs happening, that weâre building. We can see ourselves getting bigger every time we come over here and play.â
THE SUCCESSÂ of tonightâs gig justifies their confidence. Despite the unpromising atmosphere of the vast, overlit, functional Kongresshalle itself, a large audience of post-pubescents are drawn into delighted communion with Depeche Modeâs symphonies for kids (of any age).
Their show is a careful mixture of spectacle and intimacy. Al and Martin appear first onstage, being gradually enveloped in smoke as they brew up a swirling instrumental overture. Then Andy walks on, as amiable and unstuffy as they come. Belying his backstage nerves, he casually switches on the backing tape-machines sitting centre-stage as he strolls over to his synthesisers.
Just by that casual press of a button he sums up Depeche Modeâs appeal; the technology of their music-making is instantly demythologised. You donât have to be a genius or rich or good-looking to stand a chance. Just like that other quartet of boys-next-door twenty years ago, Depeche Mode bridge the gap between performer and audience by showing the potential for magic in the most familiar, accessible things.
BEFORE HEÂ goes onstage, Dave makes final adjustments to his appearance in the dressing-room mirror:
â âThereâs gonna be a borstal breakout, thereâs gonna be a borstal breakout!â âhe chants. "Those were the days of real music.â
Dave doesnât seem the milk and biscuit type.
âHe was quite a lively youngster, by all accounts,â insinuates Al.
âDave has a different background from us,â elaborates Andy. âDone everything before youâre 17. Like clubber, Studio 21⌠We never went nightclubbing.â
âWhen we were doing our homework,â laughs Martin.
âWhen Dave was going up to London and that, I was going to church,â continues Andy. âI went to church seven nights a week. So did Vince. Vince was really bad, if you think I was. Vince was a real Bible-basher⌠There was all this rumour going around about churchgoing choirboys. I was never in the choir.â
But the bandâs early image was so sweet and angelicâŚ
âThatâs the way we were though,â remonstrates Andy. âWe never tried to portray ourselves. We bought loads of jumpers out of Marks And Sparks. Thatâs the way we are. Weâre not wimps. The bands that said weâre wimps⌠Bow Wow Wow â Iâd take them on any day!â he guffaws.
WITH LITTLEÂ free time, not enough money and even less inclination to leave Basildon, Martin, Andy and Dave still live at home. How do their parents feel?
âTo tell you the truth, they remain totally unaffected,â confides Andy. âItâs as if you were going to the office every day. I think they donât really realise the extent. They see us coming home on a day weâve been recording. They see us on telly, but they just accept it as normal. I donât know why⌠everyoneâs doing it!â
âWe never had any trouble. Obviously some people jeer and this. Itâs maddening when they sing Yazoo songs at us. You just have to keep going, through the troubles, the trials.â
Andy heaves with mock sobbing, appropriately accompanied by the lachrymose strains of âMoon Riverâ on the hotelâs muzak system. âAll we wanted to do was make nice music!â
Vince and Yazoo are never far from the surface.
âA lot of the reasons we made it was because of Vince,â explains Andy. âHe was on the dole. He was pushing and pushing. Youâve got to give him credit â he was very ambitious. And without him we wouldnât have made it because weâre not ambitious people. Weâre lazy people.â
Vinceâs quitting in the midst of band commitments caused a crisis.
âHe didnât leave us totally in the lurch,â Martin explains. âHe actually told us that he was leaving around the end of October (1981), but he carried on playing with us right up until Christmas. After that, all we had scheduled was an American tour, and that was quite tight because we had to get Al in and rehearse in about a week.â
And Martin, who had hitherto penned only two numbers in the bandâs live and recorded repertoire â âBig Muffâ and âTora! Tora! Tora!â â found himself the principal songwriter.
âFour or five months before Vince announced to us he was leaving, we sensed it, so we tried to build up a few songs as a sort of cushion. At that time anyway I was a bit wary about putting songs forward because we did feel it would be better to save them.â
An admirer of Jonathan Richman and Ron Mael, Martin writes very different songs to Vinceâs fiction romances. âA Broken Frameâ is a beautifully crafted compendium of sighs for lost innocence and observations of the worm in the bud of human affairs. âGet The Balance Rightâ develops further in the same direction. Richly multilayered in texture and melody, its rhythm steamhammers home a bleak message of ironically intended realism. Whatâs up, Mart?
âItâs difficult to pinpoint what it is. You get older and you see more at the same time. Whether itâs just actually seeing more or seeing it through different eyes⌠I tend personally to get disillusioned by a lot of things. Things that used to seem great donât seem so great anymore. Perhaps Iâm just a very pessimistic person.â
WE ARRIVED back at Heathrow Airport on chart day, and everyoneâs anxiety about the fate of âBalanceâ with the fickle public was palpable. Whilst waiting for our baggage âUncleâ Dan Miller made a quick call to Mute HQ⌠Number 32, the highest position Mode have ever entered the British chart!
So, despite the predictions of downfall, Depeche Mode are still ahead of the game. Fast forward once more to the future and they wonât be just filling the dance floor but hearts and minds as well. See you there.
