Learning with Depeche Mode

Depeche Mode plays from my computer as I write. I’m listening, peering back into my youth, and at the same time, realizing my present. Depeche Mode is a band of musical continuum. The simple, almost childish lyrics featuring rhythmic melody in the beginning has grown into a full-fledged ensemble of emotion and purpose, keeping and strengthening its melodic enticement. Everything has its start, and persistence has its place as we and our favorite bands grow. Such is the story of Depeche Mode.

I’ve listened to Depeche Mode for over 20 years now. I love the music of that time, the machine of alternative thought. Some saw them as an open expression of an alternative world of choice and revelation. They have been crowned the grandfathers of Techno, and I can appreciate this, but I think of them as Alternative. You might not like Disco, but it had its place in the 70s much to the chagrin of Tom Petty, Led Zeppelin and Aerosmith. You might not like Techno or Alternative but historians will mark the 80s as the coming of ages for these bands that reached the masses with pulsating beats and dark and troubled themes.

Depeche Mode started out for me as a glimpse into a world I wanted so desperately to mix with. I looked for causes, trying to find meaning in my existence. The new wave, alternative/Techno revolution had grown from the early obscure machinations of bands like Joy Division, The Cure, Yaz, and the punk sound of a little band called U2. I looked for meaning in this wave of melody and found it. However, I always felt like someone else had turned me on to it. It wasn’t quite my own. I could identify with it but I was an outsider looking in, trying to fit. I didn’t know the depths of the music, the meaning of this wave, but I was hooked. The melodic temperament filled me with a tune that beat in my mind. It was the start of something new for me. Depeche Mode stood out because while they found me, I found them and I turned others on to them.

What I realized later was that the music, the melody, was the form I most identified with irrespective of the thoughts and ideas contained within. When I started to read and hear the words, I realized that I had found a voice that I could identify with, not to just merely fit it. Most of the music, transparent at a time in its synthesized sound captured a moment or thought. The thoughts were shallow and deep, lost in synthesized beats but identifiable in all of our lives that listened. “Black Celebration” was a dark, thought-provoking album that, to me, ushered in the new Depeche Mode. It dealt with death, “Fly on The Windscreen”, soul-searching, “Stripped”, all the while mesmerizing with beats and feeling. It was my first Depeche Mode album. It reminded me of The Smith’s “Meat is Murder”, a form of expression with a message, an evolution of consciousness.

Depeche Mode was all-English to me. The wave of justification and purpose, reaching out to others that felt the same way was intriguing to me. We all wore black, changed or continued with our alternative lifestyles and felt as if someone was saying what we all agreed with. As our voices became louder these bands took on a new dimension in music. The depression of the world going to shit was replaced by masses uniting across the pond and drifting into the U.S., a swelling change would take place. U.S. Grunge would be the anthem of the 90s, as we all grew older, still forming ideas all the while.

“Violator” and “Songs of Faith and Devotion” would continue the theme that I would later understand as the creator of Depeche Mode’s songs and my identification with it- the learning process of life. As I read in an article once, the makers of this fine music feel that the marathon is far more important than the sprint. Well put I might ad. Depeche Mode offers a discography that grows and evolves and needs to do that, just like life. As a life-long learner who knows he has not stopped growing and learning, Depeche Mode will always offer solace in knowing that what you heard has its importance but its effect on change is infinitely more important. A growing music, an evolving sense of it all – that’s what I love about Depeche Mode and identify most with it.

Now, I’m entering another phase of existence and the transforming melodies and lyrics ring old truths home as they did at a time when I was looking for my voice. That love I mentioned earlier has solidified into my memory and now is transforming into a love for this time in my life. Depeche Mode plays in the background securing its place in my life. Music and life evolve hand in hand in my life. Depeche Mode still conjures thoughts of what I wanted to be, what I became and what is yet in front of me. Many people laugh at the notion of Depeche Mode; The music too simple, the beats too melodic. But, a few of us know the truth - Depeche Mode is music for life, evolution, life-long learning and discovery. I pace myself in the marathon that is my life as Depeche Mode marks intervals along the raceway. I cannot see the complete work of art but Depeche Mode assures me one is there.


Writer's note: This blog was written as a HE said She said exercise. My dear friend Alex Suhkoy shared in this experience and in the intimate pleasures of the past concerning Depeche Mode. I would invite all of you to enjoy her tremendous article at:

http://www.alexsukhoytake1.blogspot.com/

Thank you Alex for all your inspiration.