#218
August 27 1984
Depeche Mode
Some Great Reward
3.75 out of 5
Why do I think of Depeche Mode’s music as ugly? This question presents itself to me with every passing Mode album. I have never felt compelled to give any of the previous three anything more than 3.5 stars and that was Speak and Spell and the rest scored much much lower.
It took me to “People Are People” to figure it out: I loathe Dave Gahane’s voice. I find him almost heavy metal aggressive and instead of working counter to the music of Martin Gore and the rest it makes it sound angrier. While this full throated pointed attack works for, say, Roland Orzibal, it grates on me with DM. It doesn’t really work for me until late in the album on “If You Want”.
The 80s are littered with children & cousins of Joy Division/Ultravox/Yaz/Kraftwerk/Numan, etc. I don’t know why Depeche Mode cut through as high as they did. But they do nothing for me, and then I just want to put Upstairs at Eric’s back on.
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