Depeche Mode
02 Arena, London, 22 January, 2024
★★★★
The black-and-white film playing across the “M”-shaped screen at the back of the stage shows Dave Gahan and Martin Gore in Grim Reaper hoods, playing a Seventh Seal-style chess game in the video for Ghosts Again, the first single from last year’s Memento Mori. The real-life figures beneath, however, are spinning quite a different story. Twirling around in hectic circles, arms outstretched in his turquoise-panelled waistcoat, Gahan suddenly comes to a figure-skater stop and holds the pose like he’s waiting for the judge’s perfect score, a moment of preposterous theatricality that highlights the ever-fascinating dichotomy at the heart of this band.
This is, inescapably, the Memento Mori tour, Gahan and Gore now operating without Andy “Fletch” Fletcher, who died in 2022 and whose face poignantly fills the stage during a monolithic World In My Eyes. They have always been (as artist Jeremy Deller’s 2008 film Our Hobby Is Depeche Mode underscored) a band who demanded to be taken very seriously indeed: “I give in to sin / because I like to practise what I preach,” sings Gore on tonight’s underground cabaret take on Strangelove, a perfect summation of their peak transgressive appeal.
Yet while their music might proudly bear the smuts and residues of Berlin dungeons and LA rock’n’roll corruption, the survivor of many dark scenes, tonight’s show also underlines their devotion to spectacle, to melody, to fun. They come onstage to the abrasive grind of Memento Mori scene-setter My Cosmos Is Mine – a harsh scruff-of-the-neck way to grab the audience’s attention, but an arch reminder that from now on, the O2 is their universe. Repeatedly tonight – from the robotic gasps of Policy Of Truth to the rock-Mephisto singalong of Black Celebration - it’s clear that there’s no real need to stuff so many hooks into even the heaviest songs, unless it’s just for the sheer profligate glee of it. They might be consummate stadium-rock professionals, but it’s interesting that the live video feeds are treated to make it look like some kind of Samizdat Iron Block Betamax from 1980. As the video skulls that rotate behind a glorious Enjoy The Silence have scrawled across their foreheads: “Enjoy!” It’s later than you think.
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Gahan embodies this brilliantly, occasionally venturing into the audience on the well-deployed runaway, veering between imperious toreador strut, graceful black-swan gesture, filthy bend-and-snap and - on the high biblical camp of John The Revelator - a Zoolander Nick Cave. Gore is a more delicate presence, his torch-song versions of Strangelove and Heaven (from 2013’s Delta Machine) a welcome gear change. “The beautiful angelic voice of Mr Martin L Gore” says Gahan, as he returns to the stage. There’s a lot of affection visible – a high five, hugs, a gathering round the drums after a formidable I Feel You, laughter during the encore as Gahan conducts the audience in a teasing coda to Just Can’t Get Enough (no slight synth caper but a joyous pop fractal).
The encore ("are you ready to have a little bit of fun, then?") also sees Gore and Gahan hitting the runaway again for an earnest Condemnation, before the singer conducts the crowd in the crab-like arm-waving choreography of Never Let Me Down. The final crescendo comes with Personal Jesus, the thundering drop into “reach out, touch faith” delayed but very gratifying, knowing nearly too far is just about right. “Things get damaged, things get broken,” sings Gahan on Precious (from 2005’s Playing The Angel) but tonight he and Gore show just how effectively they have held the corners of Depeche Mode together. Like that existential chess match, they have played one hell of a game.
Setlist:
Speak to Me (instrumental outro)
My Cosmos Is Mine
Wagging Tongue
Walking in My Shoes
It's No Good
Policy of Truth
In Your Room (Zephyr Mix)
Everything Counts
Precious
My Favourite Stranger
Strangelove (Acoustic, sung by Martin)
Heaven (Acoustic, sung by Martin)
Ghosts Again
I Feel You
A Pain That I'm Used To (Jacques Lu Cont Remix)
World in My Eyes (Dedicated to Andrew Fletcher)
Black Celebration
Stripped
John the Revelator
Enjoy the Silence
Encore:
Condemnation (Acoustic)
Just Can't Get Enough
Never Let Me Down Again
Personal Jesus
Pictures: Jim Dyson/Chiaki Nozu/Getty
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