Monday 27 July 2009

Depeche Mode 'Enjoy The Silence'

Chart Peak: 6

YouTube

Some song titles are just asking for trouble, aren't they?

One of Britain's most consistently successful singles acts of the 1980s and 1990s, Depeche Mode have a 24-year span of Top 10 singles, yet have only appeared on three Now albums. I can only presume that when Mute was an independent record company, they were reluctant to licence Depeche tracks, although they evidently didn't feel the same way about Erasure.

It's not something that troubles me vastly, I must admit, because I don't really like them, and yet sometimes lack the courage of my convictions in not liking them. I can sometimes understand why people respect them as pioneers. But generally there's a lot that I just find too off-putting about them; their music just feels cold (no doubt intentionally) and self-important. 'Enjoy The Silence' has both these problems in spades, and also showcases Dave Gahan's vocal at its most one-dimensional, but it does also have a decent enough melody for me to appreciate it on some level. I'm still not sure whether it's possible to be "very unnecessary" though.

Also appearing on: Now 24, 62
Available on: Singles 81>98

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