iPod song of the week – new Depeche Mode
If you have liked a band for any length of time, never mind your favorite band of all time, there is always a moment of nervousness when you hear the new song. What if I hate it? What if it’s nothing like the old stuff? I don’t worry about that so much with Depeche Mode, because let’s face it, they’re not ever going to sound like, say, Nickelback. But I’m lucky in that I have never really been disappointed. Even the records that some people feel are stinkers, like Exciter, I liked. And it’s not like artists I adore can do no wrong… witness the last Interpol record.
But I’m going to digress a moment before talking about the song and mention the reason I own it. You see, I bought the “iTunes pass” for the new album, Sounds of the Universe, which comes out in April. (As a digression from my digression, I produce a schedule at work for competitive titles being released and every week that I check off DM, I salivate just a little). This pass is good for 15 weeks through and beyond the release of the album and little by little it gets released to you along with various other tracks. It cost $18.99 which is even pricier when you consider that I really want the physical CD and will inevitably buy that. But I’m a sucker and so I did this. I feel like even more of a chump working at a record label where we do this sort of thing all the time, that is, try some new method of eking $$ out of the truly committed and/or teasing them while simultaneously gathering information on them and observing their behavior.
We have a band which you may or may not have heard of, but they have a truly devoted fan base and over the course of the last couple of months, the marketing department put together a teaser website with all kinds of mysteries and slowly, slowly, leaked info and music. Out of curiosity, I went to this band’s extremely active forum and read the many “did you check out mystery website yet?” and “the website won’t work for me – omg my life is over” and “well what do you think this means?” and “is that the new track because it sounds AMAZING!” messages.
I couldn’t decide if these fans liked this sort of tease or not. They did lap it up and maybe for some it was a fun game, but to me, it seemed a sort of necessary evil to get to the band and new record which doesn’t come out till March. Which brings me back to DM. Of course I would want the whole thing at once sans excruciating trickle of little bits of new stuff. But if the choice is waiting till April with nothing beforehand or the new single and a remix now and then little pieces dribbled down to me week by week, well, please take my $18.99. The fool and his money may soon be parted but no one mentions what great music the fool is listening to. The worst part, though, is being aware my strings are being pulled. Dance, puppet, dance!
Anyway, I think this song is very DM in that it both sounds like everything else they’ve done and nothing they’ve ever done before. It has a dark menacing tone, is catchy, and has all the trademark DM notes you’d expect, but has the repetitious title word which somehow is just right, despite the title. The video is another thing in itself and, as I post it, I think of my Intro Psych professor’s words as he turned off the lights to show us the film of the Milgram experiments: “I’ve already seen this and it’s really too disturbing to watch repeatedly, so, see you later!”
You’ve been warned. Enjoy!
