DEPECHE MODE – PLAYING THE ANGEL 2x VINYL LP – NEW SEALED – RAR - NEU GAHAN

	€		76
	$		88

DEPECHE MODE – PLAYING THE ANGEL – 2005 – VINYL LP – NEW SEALED – RAR

Long out of print. Limited Vinyl Edition.

Gatefold Cover.

Printed in EU.

Stumm 260.

0094634020114

Tracklisting:

1. A Pain That I'm Used To
2. John The Revelator
3. Suffer Well
4. The Sinner In Me
5. Precious
6. Macro
7. I Want It All
8. Nothing's Impossible
9. Introspectre
10. Damaged People
11. Lilian
12. The Darkest Star

Review/1:

First things first: You can count me among that class of people who haven't paid the closest attention to Depeche Mode over the past, umm, decade. I don't imagine this is all that unusual. Sure, the music they've released seems fine enough. But laying claim to our brainspace takes more than that, and each album these guys produced seemed to be slotting them further and further into that place where groups just naturally wind up after a couple decades as a going concern-- the band version of adulthood. Band adulthood is where you've settled into enough of a groove that your core fans know who they are, and everyone else happily ignores your continued existence. Band adulthood is where you make perfectly fine and increasingly subtle and sophisticated new albums, and your members embark on highly touted Significant Solo Projects-- neither of which anyone can really work up any enthusiasm about.

Band adulthood means reviews that are a big swirl of stock phrases like "return to form" and "just may be their best since [insert classic here]"; it's a world of die-hard fans politely trying to convince everyone that actually, this new album, it's interesting, you should give it a listen. Band adulthood is a city where R.E.M. and Elvis Costello have offices downtown, and the Cure and New Order keep stopping by open houses in the suburbs. No mistake: people of all sorts still love their Depeche Mode; last year I even got to watch a 19-year-old metalhead dig back and convert. But people want their prime-era DM, not a paler adulthood. Even the titles of the band's last couple releases seemed to know it: after Ultra (!) and Exciter (!), I'm half-surprised they didn't manage to call one No Really, We're Still Worth It.

If you've caught any advance word on Playing the Angel, you'll probably have heard the same rumors that swirl around all band-adulthood records: That this is the one, the "return to form." That this isn't just the "best since Violator," but maybe even just as good. That they're about to pull off the same trick Morrissey did-- following the same path as always, and yet somehow getting everyone to sit up again and take notice. (Publicists help.) And while I wish I could take some bold, controversial true/false stance on that one, this album just won't let me. If you really are the sort of person who's been waiting with bated breath for a new Depeche Mode release, then don't worry: You'll love this. Dear everyone else: It's pretty okay.

It certainly sounds as good as anything they've done in a while-- and isn't that always the key with these things? Band-adulthood records leave everyone in fear of limp retreads, embarrassingly bombastic attempts to capturing former glory, ill-advised experiments, laughable bandwagon-jumping, or that ultimate horror of classic acts trying to ape the bands they're meant to have influenced. Depeche Mode have long managed to avoid those traps (say, "showing Linkin Park how it's really done"), and on this record they've done even better, hitting on something that feels solid and relevant and natural: a dense, buzzy web of sound that folds in the old arena anthems, the camp noir-gospel of the early 90s, and the polished micro-production of Exciter.

The whole problem of the "new" DM has always been the gap between the clean-lined synth clang of their prime era and the lush, fussy computer-assisted electronics of today; the most surprising tracks here shoot past that issue entirely. "Precious", the first single, works some slow-rolling "Enjoy the Silence" beauty-- but the whole thing's riding on burbling acid-synth lines, retro-classic and up-to-the-minute at the same time. "John the Revelator" does up-tempo "Master and Servant" pulse and "Condemnation" choir calls over ultra-modern bleep and click, "A Pain That I'm Used To" does slow industrialist grind, and some other tracks pull off something like Depeche Mode torch songs. Yes, they've got their style working, their production mostly down, and Dave Gahan's singing gets richer and better with each passing record.

Only here's the thing: Surely a pop album lives or dies by its songs. And while the sounds here, apart from some sterile "modern" clicks and flourishes, climb their way past the pitfalls of the 25-year-old band, the songs here can't. Give any songwriter a couple decades, and the same things will happen-- the writing gets progressively more subtle, more sophisticated, until eventually it's curiously free of spark, always skirting the obvious old hooks in favor of something too professional to even notice. It's all here: the arch, wandering melodies; the methodically constructed key changes; the weirdly formless slow-and-quiet epics; the standard lyrical stew of religion and lust and fragile, innocent, faithful things in a dark, dark world. Yes, this group has spent the past 15 years trading in mood and atmosphere-- much more so than the relentlessly tight pop of their 1980s arena days. Yes, given enough time, they'll gather up into something passably engaging. No, no one's asking for karaoke classics. But none of the moods and atmospheres and slow-growers here stand much of a chance of reaching out and drawing you in-- or of making a believer out of anyone who didn't believe already.

The end product, then, is one of those signature artifacts of the Adult Band: an album we hardly even need to review. Depeche Mode's core fans will flip for it; it's the best thing they've released in a long while. Everyone else? It's pretty okay. And these days, over a decade since Songs of Faith and Devotion, well, you already know which of those two camps you fall into.

Review/2:

Close your eyes and you'd think we were back in the good old days of the concept album. From the title to the footnote on the back of the CD - "pain and suffering in various tempos" - Depeche Mode are in spiritual territory. Lest that footnote sounds awfully gloomy, I should add that much of the music soars, producer John Hillier (Doves, Blur) adding an appropriate otherworldly dimension.

Virtually every song has a religious dimension, whether or not the narrator is a believer. Not totally unfamiliar territory for a band that recorded a hit anthem called Personal Jesus, but even so there's more here than in the past that speaks of the search for - truth, wholeness, something...

The title comes from the lyrics of the closing song, The Darkest Star. "Oh you sad one / Playing the angel isn't so easy where you come from / Oh you wild one / Devil's companion..." This is perhaps the darkest track, starting with low-key electronica and some discordant keyboards, then developing into a slow and melancholy ballad. Damaged People shares some of those characteristics but adds a lovely melody, before returning to dissonance that perfectly fits the wistful lyrics of a warped love song.

Other songs are much more upbeat. John The Revelator is a standout track from the first hearing, Dave Gahan's powerful vocals establishing this as a worthy follow-up to previous anthems, but with more in the way of gnashing and whirring from the electronics department. "John the Revelator / he's a smooth operator / it's time we cut him down to size..." - we're talking the Biblical St John the Divine here, in case you hadn't twigged; you know, the one (possibly) responsible for the book of Revelations. Whatever, a great song.

This album is full of them, actually. After his solo album, Dave Gahan gets himself on the composition credits for the first time with three songs: Suffer Well, the dreamlike, swirling I Want It All and another standout, Nothing's Impossible. This kicks off with an insistent rising bass line, bleeps for a bit and then turns into a classic. The menacing opening lines - "Just give me a reason some kind of sign / I'll need a miracle to help me this time" - morph into a great love chorus. "Even the stars look brighter tonight / nothing's impossible / if you believe in love at first sight." Irresistible.

Macro takes us to another place altogether, starting with a (literally) pulsating beat as Gahan sings of hearing his own blood flow while contemplating the cosmos - rather a fascinating concept. Precious, already released as a single, is perhaps the airiest of all the tracks, a lovely, simple song in which Gahan's voice floats above a relatively simple treatment. There's a feeling of open space; perhaps I'm over-fantasising here but it really gives me the feeling of flying, swooping over the base earth below...

OK, enough. As you may have gathered, I like this album a lot. Some may say it doesn't move Depeche Mode forward a great deal; I say I don't give a damn, it's a real treat and I'll have some more, please.

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Jitomate77