Keyboard Magazine Interviews Martin
( July issue 1997)
Depeche Mode RESURRECTED!
The departure of keyboardist Alan Wilder in 1995, coupled with
frontman David Gahan's near-death antics a year later, almost drove a
stake through the heart of Depeche Mode. But to many a Modehead's
amazement, the remaining members (Gore, Fletcher, and Gahan) managed to
pick up the pieces and carry on. With Tim "Bomb the Bass" Simenon
and his
production team in tow, the band locked themselves into the studio and
emerged 15 months later with a remarkable record.
Ultra (Mute Records) is Depeche Mode's 12th full-length release,
and while down-tempo is the name of the game this time around (the
swiftest track tops out a turtile like 100 bpm), the CD is an ear magnet.
"Barrel of a Gun," the first track out of the gate, is one of the
most
riveting Mode singles yet -- replete with throbbing synths, liquid bass,
slappy percussion, sci-fi bleeps, and tortured vocals. And there's plenty
more where that came from. Stay tuned for a slew of Mode singles, videos,
and remixes in the cue.
We rolled tape with songwriter Martin Gore recently, and were
able to fire of a dozen questions in the allotted time, appropriate,
perhaps, since Ultra is the band's 12th album.
Q:When Alan left the band, did it feel like the end?
A: As bad as things were, I don't think any of us felt that we wanted to
split the band up and finish. I think the low point of the band was when
Dave had his (personal) problems. At that time, for me, it seemed like
there wasn't really any point in continuing. But fortunately Dave decided
to make a change in his life, and since then, everything has been quite
easy.
Q: How did the new balance affect the making of Ultra?
A: This time around it was much more a team effort. I had an idea to work
with Tim Simenon 'cause we'd known him for years, and he'd done a couple
of remixes of us in the past. But we were totally unaware of the way he
worked: He always works with the same team, which includes a programmer, a
musician, and an engineer. In a way, Tim and his team helped to fill
Alan's shoes. Alan was always the so-called musician in the band; the one
who was classically trained. But it went far better (with Tim) than we
ever could have imagined. We went into the studio to try out a couple of
tracks just to see how things were, how we were getting on, how it would
work with Tim as producer, and to test his team out. We didn't set
ourselves any large goals. It was a question of trying out a few tracks,
and maybe getting a single out of it, and if things were going really
well, then we could carry on and maybe make an album. So after the first
recording session, about six weeks, it became very apparent that things
were going well, and we decided to carry on with the whole project and
make it into an album.
Q: How did you write this batch of songs?
A: I think I still write pretty much the same way as before. I always
start on guitar or piano, and get the basis of a song together before I
move on to computers, keyboards, samplers, or whatever. I feel it's
important to know that the song is strong before you get carried away with
technology, because sometimes you fool yourself. You might think you've
got a great song going, but in actual fact, what you're really liking is a
synth sound or bass line. We've always been about songs -- marrying songs
with technology -- and I think sometimes that point gets lost. We often
get cited as an influence by a lot of bands and producers, but it's more
because we were an early electronic band, and more because of the way we
created music as opposed to the actual songs.
Q: Is melody usually the first element you focus on
when writing?
A: Yeah, I think it is about melody, but it's also about emotion. If at
that moment I sit down and write something and it moves me, I realize that
there's a fairly good chance I might be able to move somebody else.
Q: So after the initial piano/guitar writing phase,
you sequence your song
ideas.
A: Yeah. At home I've got a basic setup of demos. I've got (Hybrid Arts)
ADAM machines for the recording, and I program on (Steinberg) Cubase. I
use an Akai CD3000, a (Roland) JD-800, and c (Clavia) Nord Lead. The Nord
is a very interesting synthesizer -- the fact that you can record all your
movements real time into computer, wave sweeps and everything. I like it.
I've also got three ARP 2600's and two Minimoogs. But I tend to keep
things very basic at that stage.
Q: How do your home versions translate to the studio
sessions?
A: I made tapes and sent them out to Tim and the rest of the band, and
then we went into the studio. It was a very different process for us this
time. Sometimes there were three or four different things going on at once
in the studio. There was a programmer, a musician, Tim, me, Dave
practicing his vocals, I might be doing something with Tim, the programmer
might be working on a rhythm track, and the musician might be off working
on a totally different track.
Q: Did any of your demo tracks end up on the record,
or were they all
re-recorded?
A: Its really different from song to song. Sometimes the essence of what
actually came out, what was released, was actually on the demo. But
sometimes we totally pulled a song apart. If we felt that the basic song
was good, but the direction of the demo wasn't quite right, we'd pull it
apart and maybe reconstruct it three or four times before we were happy
with it.
Q: Taking a song like "Barrel of a Gun," for
example, how similar was the
final mix compared to the demo?
A: "BoaG" was one that remained very similar to the original demo.
All the
parts were basically there, so it was just a question of bettering the
sounds and making it a bit harder. But that was probably one of the most
similar demos to the finished version.
Q: The opening drum sequence is a real attention-getter.
Is that a loop?
A: I think we originally started off with loops, and then tried to
recreate them. It's very hard sometimes because a loop has an immediate
atmosphere, but you don't always want to use a loop. So in this case it
was a matter of recreating it by cutting up various loop to get snares and
bass drum sounds.
Q: Ultra is a down-tempo record. Any particular reason
you kept everything
under 100 bpm?
A: It's the area that interests me the most at the moment. I find it
emotional and moving at that tempo: 80 to 100 bpm. When I try writing
anything faster than that, it just loses emotion for. Maybe it's just a
phase I'm going through {laughs}.
Q: Will the band be touring?
A: No, this is the first time ever that we've actually decided not to tour
after finishing an album. We've toured on the back of every single album,
and the last one was so long...we go to the end of it and were totally
exhausted, mentally and physically. We had total communication breakdown
problems within the band. We all hated each other. You know, that was the
main reason Alan left. And so we don't want to repeat that again. We've
just been in and out of the studio for 15 months, and the thought of going
out on tour for a year is just too much to handle. We're considering,
possibly playing some live TV, but were really trying to keep this year
very stress-free. It's all questionable at the moment.
Q: What's your take on the current resurgence of electronic
music in the
States?
A: We've been through quite a few electronic trends during our career, and
one of the things we laugh about is the fact that it has absolutely no
relevance to our record sales. Whether electronic music is in or not has
no relevance to us. And I think it's because we created our own niche at a
very early stage.