Alternative Universe: Vince Clarke

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He doesn't leave Depeche Mode after Speak & Spell. So there's no Yazoo, Assembly, or Erasure and possibly no transformation of Depeche Mode from cheerful pop to something more sombre.

― MarkH, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No Yazoo and Erasure is probably bad, couldn't give a sh@t about the Assembly. However, Vince-era DM is the ONLY DM that I can bear to listen to. Post DM seem to be made up of all the bad bits of lots of different ingredients - bad goth (no, I retract that. All goth is bad. Sorry, forgot), bad electro-disco-techno-summat or other.

Oh I don't know - look, Dreaming of Me, New Life etc - TOTAL CLASSIC. Later DM - DUD.

(Ducks for cover whilst Ned rains blows down upon my head)

― Dr. C, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes Ok the Vince-less DM swapped their catchy pop for bad goth with attendant changes to Gahan's appearance and lifestyle, but we would do well to remember that it didn't happen overnight. It wasn't really until Music for the Masses in 1987 that a darker side was hinted at. 1982-6 was largely a substandard rehash of the Speak & Spell material, the lyrics and tunes deteriorating as they went along. 1990's Violator was the real sea change, with the panelists on "Singled Out" or "Round Table" (whichever the Radio 1 review show was called at the time) wondering whether the guitar on "Personal Jesus" was sampled or not. But if Vince had stayed, would his creative input had ensured that quality would be maintained without a significant change of direction as happened to, say, New Order?

― MarkH, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It wasn't really until Music for the Masses in 1987 that a darker side was hinted at.

This statement baffles me. Are we talking about the same group that put out _Black Celebration, not to mention the songs "Shame", "Lie To Me", "Blasphmous Rumours", "Shake The Disease", "The Sun And The Rainfall", and "Shouldn't Have Done That"?

― Dan Perry, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

ok, I agree about Balsphemous Rumours. But not the others.

― MarkH, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

There's nothing dark about "Fly On The Windscreen", "A Question Of Time", "Black Celebration", "It Doesn't Matter", "Dressed In Black", "But Not Tonight", or "Stripped"? Or "Shame", which turns the act of a doctor stiching up hate-inflicted wounds into a refrain? Or "Lie To Me"'s destructive self-delusional graspings for a non-existent relationship? Or "Stories Of Old"'s staunch repudiation of love as a valid emotion? The creeping fascism of "Shouldn't Have Done That"?

Depeche Mode made their entire career out of making synth-pop tinged with darkness and decay.

― Dan Perry, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'd say they changed their tone pretty quickly after VC left. Maybe they didn't go for the full on goth misery of Violator straight away but Leave in Silence/Broken Frame (82) was uniformly downbeat and Construction time again (83)was full of cynicism for the world (and esp the music industry). All the more surprising as they were still Smash hits poster boys at the time.

― Billy Dods, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What Dan said. Dr. C mentioned something in this thread earlier, but I will charitably ignore it as the ravings of a deluded personality. ;-)

Based on Vince's career since _Speak and Spell_, he would still have The Pop Knack up to a point, but start repeating himself terribly towards the end of the nineties.

― Ned Raggett, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

But I thought we were supposed to like POP, more than arty-farty miserable stuff, around here. Must've misunderstood, like.

― Dr. C, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The thing is, though, that no matter how hard they tried, Depeche Mode were unable to produce anything that wasn't pop. It's pop wrapped around a very cynical, bitter center, but pop nonetheless. I defy anyone to tell me that "Somebody" isn't a pop song.

― Dan Perry, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Dan leaves out the fact that you're talking about him and Ned - they walk around together with matching t-shirts saying "I like The Cure more than he does".

― Tim, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

And we hold hands and stare into each other's eyes goofily and sweetly. This annoys Joei and Jane for some strange reason.

― Ned Raggett, Thursday, 6 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Possibly because we only take breaks to flip over _Construction Time Again_ on vinyl, or swap it out with _Disintegration_.

― Dan Perry, Friday, 7 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

eleven months pass...

vince leaving depeche is the best thing that happened to depeche if he had not left there would be no depeche today due to excesive repeated formulas by vince just the same shit year after year same old weak synth pop.

― viggo, Sunday, 25 August 2002 17:01 (twenty-three years ago)

Talk about a way to revive the memory of Dan's and my affair. HMPH.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 25 August 2002 18:03 (twenty-three years ago)

viggo's on the money.

― Siegbran Hetteson (eofor), Sunday, 25 August 2002 18:05 (twenty-three years ago)

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