Techno Takeover 30

Bulwark Bazooka - Wumpscut 

Casual reminder this was written earlier in the month and I just had horrible writers block and didn't finish it until now...

I really wanted to review this a while ago but school kicked me in the butt and I was way too stressed to form any sort of opinion on this album other than my original fangirling response. It's been almost three weeks since Bulwark Bazooka was released and my general opinion has not changed much. I really enjoy this ten song album and the stuff I don't like isn't that bad.

"Bulwark Bazooka," is not for the faint of heart, which is why I've come up with alternative meanings for most of the songs on here. I have the lyric booklet, fought iTunes tooth and nail for it and all it did was make me question life. "Rubber Corpse," has two of the most horrifying choruses out of any song I have ever heard in my life. Yet if you listen to the the catchy beat, don't have the lyric booklet, and can't understand some of the words because (insert reason here) that fact wouldn't be known. Curious as to what the lyrics are well here are the verses:

"I got a deal for you, I got a clue. I got a dead one oh yes it's true.

I got a corpse down there with a bad smell.

I reserved human flesh oh I can tell."

"Downstairs at Eric's I put it in wax, upstairs at mommy's I erase the tracks.

Of my latest fancy of my latest joke.

To late to revive it to late for evoke." 
 

That is set to a catchy beat and chorus, but the chorus is addicting as all hell and it is why I decided "Rubber Corpse" is about taxidermy... clearly forgetting about "upstairs at mommy's I erase the tracks," and the fact that someone might have murdered someone as a joke and the person thinks it is funny.

In all seriousness, "Rubber Corpse" is on my list of Wumpscut songs new listeners should listen to. Lyrical content aside, it's not too crazy musically and it's catchy. If you're new to Wumpscut, it is definitely a song to check out. Also if you're new to Wumpscut, how the heck did you find this album first and how are you not scared out of your mind?

If the first song didn't scare you, then "Furunkel Lolita," will probably make you feel a little weird... Because most people know what the term Lolita means. But I don't know how Furunkel fits into the meaning of it. It means boil. Those two words can not mean the same thing thrown together in this song's context. It can not be a person who looks like an underage child, or is underage with boils being found sexually attractive. That's horrifying, the giggling children in the beginning don't help either. This is also my favorite song from "Bulwark". It grabbed my attention and kept hold of it with just a short piece of the last chorus all those weeks ago. It was this song that made me determined to review it.

Tress means a lock of a woman's hair.

"Hell is what awaits me if (when) I touch (all) your tress." Not hell is what awaits me if I touch your dress, hell is what happens if and when this persons touches someone's hair. Their hair is that tempting, not the dress, the piece of clothing that would be most tempting to touch or maybe their cheek, the tress. This isn't meant to fit a rhyme either.

"I can not resist your young charm, come to me to find my true warmth.

Heaven is what your young body flesh promises, Hell is what awaits me if I touch all your tress" or "Hell is what awaits me when I touch your tress."

The hair has been touched okay, and this is weird. I am not okay with the weird. But this will never stop being an awesome song. Nothing about these lyrics are okay. But it has to sound amazing, it has to have the amazing electronic horns happening, and the crazy nature of the chorus with a small throwback to "In The Night." "Furunkel Lolita" is creepy, intense, and it is my favorite song. The struggle is real.

Skipping Cross of Iron, Atrocity Dancer, and Heresy, because "Supergurl" "Vienna," and "Flesh Trench" need to be discussed. "Supergurl," is growing on me. This song (and "Rubber Corpse) features vocals by Aleta Welling (she's credited on a bunch of Wumpscut songs, one of them being "Death Panacea" from Woman and Satan First.) I had mixed feelings about this. I thought it was kind of annoying as well as "Flesh Trench" and "Vienna," but with time I changed my mind and now I like it. The lyrics aren't up on websites yet which is strange, and I am terrible with hearing lyrics and understanding them without the words in front of me. If I understand anything it's in pieces and I can't make sense of it, sometimes not all the time. This song was one of those cases, and the lyrics are sort of sad at first and then it gets dark, really dark. This is song almost reaches Furunkel Lolita levels of not okay, but it seems to be the most obvious song out of all the songs with actual lyrics. There is a woman, out of someone's league, and I'm guessing she's an independent woman who don't need no man, and she ends up killed. Or... it's one of the songs that is 'if I can't have you (no matter what the reason is' no one can have you,' and I am not okay with this fictional premeditated murder being thrown in my face.

"Soon it is too much how you thrill me,

With a touch too much, you will kill me,

Soon a glancing touch, it will thrill you

With a lethal touch I will kill you."

With that out of the way, "Flesh Trench," is confusing as all hell and I decided it is about discovering a kink you didn't know you had before with a partner that enjoys said kink as well and they both think they are nothing and they want to share the nothing.

"You are nothing, I am nothing, you are nothing, let's share."

You can't share nothing, nothing is just... well nothing. It isn't a physical thing. You'll just be left with more nothing and how does this relate to having a strange kink?

"Come be a flesh trench only a sex mensh,

Come and submit to me."

That's the first chorus of the song. A mench is a person. Urban dictionary says so. The word is spelled wrong in the digital booklet?

Anyways, I thought this was annoying at first as mentioned before. I can't put my finger on what changed it for me, maybe the way it sounds like he's growling the verses, or singing into a fan that is silent. Also as strange as the chorus is, I love it, the music is perfect, and his accent kind of comes through in certain spots and it's kind of attractive...

"Vienna" is a song made entirely of samples from things I can't find because I don't speak whatever language it is in. It might be German, it isn't mentioned in the digital booklet where any of the samples come from. And to be honest this was a very boring song until it got stuck in my head. That is the only reason I can tolerate "Vienna," and the one sound effect that happens at 1:48 is pretty cool.

Pagan Crusade is the one song I was COMPLETELY wrong about originally. There are lyrics, and Rudy is singing said lyrics. It is not instrumental like it seemed to be. I feel silly for thinking it was completely instrumental. Other than that, the song is just kind of there. It doesn't really stand out it never grabbed my attention like "Furunkel Lolita," or "Rubber Corpse," did. I don't listen to it as much as those two songs either.

And then there are the songs I don't particularly like or feel like I want to like but can't seem to care for. "RTL Hariti" the song about is an Iranic ogress and Bactrian (Peshawari) mythological figure who eats your children or then feeds them to her own children, then one of her kids goes missing and she converts to Buddism when a monk shows her the error of her ways. And she vows to protect them as a result. There are not enough lyrics for this song to be nearly seven minutes long and have the same music looping once the lyrics end. Something has to change in order to keep me interested but nothing changes drastically and I quickly lose interest in "RTL Hariti."

Don't ask me what the RTL means, I'm still waiting for some sort of answer to all my annoying questions I ask Wumpscut in his facebook fan page.

"Atrocity Dancer" and "Heresy" are the other two songs I don't care for, but they are far from terrible. All I can say about Atrocity dancer is that it is the only song I found the source of one of the quotes. It is from the movie AI: Artificial Intelligence. Also why is the C-bomb dropped for the sake of a rhyme? For real though that word always makes me uncomfortable... but that's just me being weird. I feel bad for "Atrocity Dancer" because I really love Rudy's vocals on the verses, but I hate music and everything going on in the chorus.

Heresy has a great start but it gets boring halfway through. There are no set lyrics and Google has no idea what the quotes are from so I'm back to where I started. The sad part is the audio clips are in clear English for the most part. "Ejected from the communion of (something like a holy mother charged) as a disciple of Satan." Google has no idea what I'm talking about and I don't understand why, it's not hard to hear at all except for a few words. Anyways, The song feels too long and boring for how many times it loops without something different. The song goes until 2:47 before "What's the difference?" is repeated a few times and then it just kind of ends awkwardly after the quote from the beginning of the song shows up again.

If anyone is curious I just wasted four pages getting this silly review out. So here's a brief summary of what I actually thought of the album. Wumpscut's always been creepy but the creep meter was cranked up on this album and I like it. If you're already a Wumpscut fan you're well aware what is in store for you. If you're not, this is not an album to listen to as your first exposure because it probably will scare you away before you realize how awesome some of his previous stuff was, unless you like creepy, then this album is for you.

2013: Year End Review : Part 1

2013: Year End Review

 Part 1: Disappointments

I have started at least ten different reviews over the past month and I have finished none of them. I apologize for that. I'll finish them at some date I don't know when. I also have no idea what I'm going to review for my year end review. And then I remembered Pandora happened, well it's been around for a while to be fair, but it came into my life earlier this year...

Yes, Pandora radio might not be the greatest internet radio service and it's really only available in the USA from what it seems... which is highly irritating, but it works and I've discovered new music, rediscovered old music, and dove deeper into genres I already liked to find more awesome music. For instance folk music is amazing, I started with Corvus Corax and Hagalaz Runedance radio stations, then Blackmore's Night station and somewhere in the mix Medieval Babes popped up but I just added that group to another station and eventually Kate Rusby showed up. It took a few months but now I have a Kate Rusby station.

On the other end of musical things, I discovered a band called And One that only has one good song. I've heard most of Body Pop and I have no desire to listen to anything else other than Military Fashion Show. However, Beborn Beton a band I didn't particularly care for the first few songs I heard from them, have grown on me since June.

Some Major Disappointments...

Yup starting off the year end review with the negative. Last year if I was told VNV Nation and Wumpscut would make albums that I didn't like and were a step backwards in their musical progression, I'd have laughed at you. I'm glad nobody mentioned this to me because I'd have felt like an idiot for laughing.

VNV Nation and Wumpscut put out new albums, VNV nation is also touring Europe and show no signs of being anywhere near the Americas anytime soon destroying my hopes of attending their Transnational Tour. And riding that disappointment wave is Wumpscut's new album. I don't know if I've disliked something as much as this album. Woman and Satan First was very meh at best. Madman Szpital never stood a chance. I hated writing that. I really did, because Rudy has some really enjoyable songs. And it's not because his sound is completely different from his past albums it's because they're boring and annoying with nothing to redeem either qualities.

For example, "Loyal to my Hate" from the 2011 album Siamese. That song is way too long for one repetitive chorus mixed with some musical interludes. The reason I like it is because the music is extremely catchy and counteracts the repetitive chorus. Madman Szpital is just boring. It's almost as disappointing as Evoke but without a song like "Churist Churist" to save it. The only slightly redeeming quality is "Tod Essen Leben auf" I can tolerate listening to it again for the sake of reviewing than the rest of the album. However, there's a little voice I hate that happens randomly and echos a few words and it doesn't need to be there.

Can I just ask what in the world "Vegan Witch" is about? Because I have no idea if there's a deeper meaning than someone tried to be a vegan and went about it horribly wrong and decided to only eat grass. Of course she died if that's what she thought being a Vegan was all about!

In all seriousness Madman Szpatial does not work because it's a whole bunch of things thrown together. It is the audio equivalent of someone taking different puzzles of the same size and forcing different pieces together of the same color but from different puzzles. Like half of the edge pieces from one puzzle let's say a tree, and half from an outer space puzzle and having them somehow fit together. Then the inside pieces are from a fish puzzle and the other of an ocean, and one from a puzzle of a sky. It doesn't work at all and I hope his next album takes a better direction than this one did.

Now for VNV Nation. I was so happy with Automatic I still listen to just about every song. I still don't like "Radio." Figuring that Automatic was such a success I had high hopes for Transnational. I was wrong for having high hopes because it met them just barely halfway. Should I be bothered by an okay album? Yes if the previous one and even the one before that were pretty much amazing albums. Transnational was like hey I'm here, and I tried. It doesn't fail at life like Wumpscut's Madman Szpatial, it's all one happy puzzle with all the pieces in place from that one puzzle, but it is a boring picture. It was fun putting together but the pay off wasn't that great. In other words, it's okay to listen to but in the end they could have done better.

In January of this year, Three Days Grace suffered a low blow with their lead singer abandoning ship during their tour. One reason offered was a non-threatening health issue, other less favorable rumors were variations on he just didn't want to be in the band anymore. Whether it was a health issue or not, he has since reformed another band and has no plans at the current moment to rejoin Three Days Grace. I wasn't a huge fan to begin with and call me butthurt but I lost a little respect for him after that. No matter what his reasons were he abandoned his band during a tour and then formed a new one with very little if no warning to his departure. Last minute issues happen I get that and maybe he had a problem he had to deal with I don't know the guy so I can't ask him. And he doesn't owe me anything, but I can't help but think of the fans who were so excited to see Adam and the rest of the band on their Transit of Venus tour maybe even for their first time only to be told, Adam resigned and the My Darkest Days singer is filling in his place. The departure of Adam hasn't gotten the band down, supposedly they're releasing another album, good on them for pushing through this unfortunate event.

And now for the biggest musical disappointment of 2012/2013. I've mentioned before that I am a huge Breaking Benjamin fan. Well my musical world almost exploded and died when I found out they were going through legal issues and Ben was suing band members for putting songs on their greatest hits album without asking him. They shut down their fanclub site, their forums went down, and all was silent from them. All because of a stupid cover of "Blow Me Away" and maybe the few previously unreleased tracks that are on Shallow Bay. I loved "Better Days" and "Lie to Me," so if Ben was worried about those songs or convinced that they weren't good enough, I reassure him they are perfect. And I can put my love of a band aside to judge the quality of their music. Case in point, those massive paragraphs about Wumpscut's Madman Szpital.

After long months of silence and nothingness from Breaking Benjamin's website. People started saying oh they broke up. Even when there's a quote of Ben Burnley saying when this s all said and done he's going to return to making music. It didn't change some people's opinions, and months of hoping this stupid law suit would end soon and Ben would return and be awesome again it happened. 

 

I was convinced that the silence meant bad news for the band and for Ben. I prepared myself for the worst even though part of me knew Ben wouldn't just quit music forever. Not like this anyways. And then out of the blue one day the wait was over. The Breaking Benjamin twitter account posted something, good news...

Halloween Review: Ghost Adventures 100th episode

Ghost Adventures 100th Episode:

The Exorcist House

Ghost Adventures reached their 100th episode milestone. They've also been in their eighth season for a while now. It has been decent; not too bad not too excited but we're only eight episodes into said season. The place that happened to be investigating on their 100th episode was the house that inspired the popular movie The Exorcist.

A bit of history first, it's based off a book that is based off of events that took place in 1949. It started in Maryland and ended in St. Louis where the exorcism took place. A boy who has remained unnamed even after all these years, experienced demonic possession and as various sources feel the need to state, he was from a troubled home. Some details are sketchy and vary in places but cutting it down to size those facts remain the same.

The movie plot is different obviously, but it had plenty of rumors surrounding it like deaths before the film release and a fire that took place on set. It was probably not related to the fact that they were filming a movie about an actual event, but it's still fun to look at some of the facts found on the internet. She mentioned the whole 'the kid and his grandmother were playing with an Ouija board and that's how the demon possessed him' story. There may be variations on this throughout the internet but bottom line a demon showed up and possessed the boy and might have told them to go to St. Louis, or they had relatives in St. Louis and thought maybe a vacation might help their son's behavior, insert theory here. There was a different show, unrelated to Ghost Adventures that mentioned the boy having Louis carved into his body and for the life of me I don't remember what it was, when I watched it, and what channel it was on.

The Exorcist house episode was pretty interesting. It dealt with the possibility of demons again and with their history with demonic hauntings, and the great niece of the priest who did the exorcism stating she knows it was real (the 1949 exorcism) and refused to be interviewed anywhere near the home were pretty chilling starters to the whole episode. I feel the balance of interviews and pre-investigation theatrics to set up the whole tone of the episode leaned more towards the interviews and reminding you that, this is where one of the most famous exorcisms in history took place and there may be a demon still here but it could just be residual as well. It's not that the investigation lacked in evidence because they received some very compelling evidence, I just felt like I had to wait forever to get to the investigation, and then once the investigation happened it didn't hold up to the hype. I do like how this episode really shows how much they've grown as a team and how they've 'grown up' when it comes to this case. In the earlier seasons Zak was very full charge guns blazing when it came to demons and it was very reckless. However they were still trying to re-invite a demon into a house which is just a stupid and reckless as going in guns blazing.

I haven't given praise where praise is due. They did get good EVPs and had an intense spirit box session. Those were the two that stood out to me. I disagree with the use of the Ouija board but they weren't necessarily using it as indented. It was just sitting there as a trigger object to get the voices. However, the Ouija board might have had something attached to it because later on they interviewed the guy they got the board from and he said he saw a shadow figure in his house after previously using the board. So was it the residual energy or actually active energy of the house or was it something brought in with the board the whole time? Either way they got some pretty good evidence whether it was the spirits they were trying to initially contact or different ones.

I know they can't always get definite answers on investigations. Paranormal investigations don't work by walking in and demanding something to happen and it always happens once you tell it to do something. Also even if you did a live playback there's still no way to know if you have a definite yes or no as to the thing you want answered about the haunting. It's rather disappointing that they went in and got half of an answer but they did their best on their limited time schedule. This episode wasn't a complete failure, it was rather successful, but I couldn't felt but feel slightly disappointed. I can't put my finger on what disappointed me about the whole thing. Normally I know what disappoints me about an episode of anything, not this one. So I'll give it an okay approval. It wasn't mind blowing, while it did have some mind blowing evidence.

Shoutouts ... or something of that nature

A Quick Shout out (or something of that nature) too:

E Nomine

There are times when Pandora plays something awesome, there are times when Pandora plays something completely stupid or annoying, and then there are times when I don't know what to do with what it's playing.

Introducing a band from Germany called E Nomine. The band refers to their music as monumental dance is a strange combination of trance, techno, Gregorian chanting and singing. Their songs are mainly in German and Latin.

Enter the song "Vater Unser (Our Father)" which is the only song I've heard so far because sometimes Pandora has a horrible track record for consistency of artists/bands. I don't think I hate it because that's usually very easy to tell if you don't like a song. I can't say I love it either. I listen to it and I am confused. I've been like this for a month. It starts with  Christian Brückner speaking in this growl and it sounds like something you'd hear in a church. And then the singing happens and it still sounds like a church hymn but set to a really nice beat and it's all electronic. 

*Side note they often bring in people to perform certain parts of songs. Christian is a well known German voice actor and long time collaborator with the band.*

 

Have I looked up the translation? Nope, I have not looked for the lyrics in English. That usually leads to disappointment so I will stay unsure as to what the translation is until I can form an opinion of the song at face value. 

The band E Nomine

 

I don't have anything to accurately compare them to so saying if you like one band you might like these guys and I haven't heard much from them so there's no easing your way into this band like there is with Wumpscut as far as my advice goes. Pandora just threw this song at me while I was listening to my Assemblage 23 Radio. I guess if you're like me and enjoy Gregorian chants and Industrial music and wondered if there's a band who combines the two genres, this would be the band for you. 

** A quick thing as to where I've been**

Tumblr and Supernatural ate my life. I didn't stop reviewing I just get lost in the depths of tumblr and then by the time I think maybe I should get to reviewing something because I now have a backlog I could never hope to dig through it's like 11 PM. I shall try to leave tumblr when there's annoying downtime because everyone seems to have disappeared to review things.  

Techno Takeover 28

Iris: It Generates Review

Originally I planned on listening to the whole album of Wrath, but that took to long and I really want to talk about the best Iris song ever. That's exactly what I'm going to do. However, I must inform the world about the band, so band history time.

 

Andrew and Reagan

Reagan Jones and Andrew Sega the two people that make up the band Iris. Iris formed in my birth year, 1993, and have been trucking along ever since. Andrew replaced Mat Morris after he left because he didn't like the direction the band was going in after the first album. So then he was replaced by Andrew and he helped push their sound in an experimental direction and out popped Awakening. After that album (reached number 1 in Poland mainstream charts) came the follow up album Wrath.

I'm almost definite this was the first song I heard from Iris. "It Generates" is a synthpop track with a catchy bass and the most infectious chorus ever. When it comes on Pandora I seriously have to press pause after it ends just to listen to it at least ten more times on iTunes because I can't listen to it just once. The guitar and bass add a nice touch to it because it's not something commonly found in synth pop or any other genre heavily electronic based.

Reagan Jones has a beautiful voice. I fell in love with it almost instantly and I continue to love just about every other Iris song I've heard. I'll get to the not so great songs at a later date. Speaking of not so great things, I hate that last awkward minute of the song. I tried to tolerate it but I ended up cutting out in Audacity so instead of a 3 minute and change song it now only lasts for 2:44.

Now that the complaints are out of the way, time to brag about how awesome it is again. I think this might be the best track off of Wrath, I like one other song Land of Fire I believe is the name but it does not hold my attention the way "It Generates" does. "It Generates," is like a drug and I am completely addicted to it with no plans on going to rehab for my addiction. I can not describe my love for this song in any other way. It's such a happy and upbeat song there's part of me that refuses to believe anyone could hate it. I know some people will because Pandora says in their bio for the band that they were once described as disposable but I digress.

It sounds happy and upbeat until you really think about the chorus which is this:

"It generates your life

It generates your low

It found a way inside

It left a gaping hole

Let us sound the alarm let a warning rage.

Before it's gone and you leave another body"

Then it gets really dark in my opinion. Something got inside someone, left a hole (in their heart I'm guessing) and it has happened before to a point where a body was left. I doubt it's a physical meaning of someone murdered someone. Unless it is and that would be the ultimate twist. Sometimes I like to check songmeanings.com for other people's opinions on songs and this was one of those cases.

Everyone said it had something to do with religion and I was like shut up you're wrong. No I didn't literally type that as a comment, but I wanted to. No I don't think they're wrong for having an opinion I just disagree with it being about religion. I'm at a point where I'm not even sure what the song is about myself, but I do know I can relate to this song on some level because in honesty it reminds me of when someone has to show up, piss me off, and then run off like they're not going to pay for it in end. I'm not a physical person, but I will chew a person out if I feel they deserve it. So in a sense, the it would be anger, getting inside and leaving a hole. The people around them would be 'sounding the alarm' which would mean telling them they'd better go apologize for being a damn idiot, before I get the chance to verbally kick them in the face.

That's what I thought about earlier in the week... then again I have a tendency to think some really messed up things.

So to sum things up Iris is a pretty decent band, Reagan Jones' vocals are perfect in this song, and I recommend that everyone listens to it. Thank you Pandora for showing me another awesome band. I highly appreciate it.

"Watching Over You" Seabound mini review

"Watching Over You" (Haujobb Remix)

Seabound

I was planning on doing a double review with Seabound and Neuroticfish but that review has been taking forever because it just is... so in the intrum of trying to finish that I've decided to talk about (or fan-girl) over this amazing song. 

 

The original "Watching Over You" is on the 2004 album Beyond Flatline but I prefer the remixed version on the Poisonous Friend EP that came out in 2004 as well. Either way the chorus is what hooked me on both songs. I just felt really safe while listening to it, like all my problems and fears didn't matter anymore. I felt like I was wrapped in a blanket of safety and nothing could hurt me while this song was on. I realize how stupid that sounds, but that's how I felt.

(Chorus)

"To the crag that braves the tide

To the beacon in the night

I trust in you (and)

I'm watching over you

To the souls that crouch in fear

To the ghosts that disappear

I trust in you (and)

I'm watching over you"

In the remix there's a whole bunch of stuff added to it and I love how it gives the song a very atmospheric touch to it. Frank M Spinath's vocals are just beautiful with the music that seems to put the listener in a trance. It did that for me at least I can't speak for everyone though. I disagree with the vocal distortion on the lyric "... I'm still alive" it was kind of annoying and out of place but it's forgivable.

I highly recommend this song to anyone who is going through a tough time. It might not be your cup of tea, but if you ever feel lonely just listen to this song, it helped me feel like someone somewhere cared about me. I'm aware Frank doesn't know me or anything I've been through and has no reason to care about me, but for some reason I listen to this song and I feel like everything's gone.

Fun fact time: While on tour with Iris, Reagan Jones, the lead singer did a duet with Frank of this song and it's kind of awesome. Also I'm reviewing Iris as well... don't know when but it will happen.

I won't go into too much detail about my feelings towards this song, I still have the other review to do, so overall, love the song get familiar with the band because they're awesome and I'm going to finish that double review... at some point in time.

On an unrelated note, Happy first anniversary to Broken Infinite.

~Pugsly~

Depeche Mode: Black Celebration and Some Great Reward Review

Depeche Mode: 

Black Celebration

And Some Great Reward

Review

** Broken Infinite has reached it's 1 year anniversary, whenever something special happens I always plan a million reviews and usually accomplish a handful. This may or may not be my only review to celebrate the special occasion. Happy 1st Birthday Broken Infinite. **

I really wanted to start out by saying, If you don't know Depeche Mode by now you should feel bad about it. However, I don't like seriously shaming people for not knowing a certain band, genre, artist, or anything of the sort. So I'll start by saying, I'm finally reviewing Depeche Mode.

I can't speak for everyone, but look at the alternative side of the music spectrum and just about all of them state Depeche Mode as one of their musical inspirations. It almost seems like it's all hype from how many bands state this, but it's not. Depeche Mode did great things for the Electronic genre. 

 

Thanks to Pandora I have reconnected with my love for this British band from the 80's. Composed of Dave Gahan on lead vocals, Martin Gore (backing vocals, keyboards, some lead vocals, and guitars) and Andy Fletcher playing keyboards as well along with backing vocals and bass guitar in the 80s, they made the list of 50 Bands Who Changed The World (Q Magazine.) They've inspired generations of musicians, and they're still touring, making new albums, and being completely awesome.

Their name is French, it came from a French Magazine, but Gore commented that it means "Hurried fashion or fashion dispatch. I like the sound of that." However in the French language it means something along the lines of "Fashion News," or "Fashion Update," only relating to the magazine they took their name from.

Fun fact time: The first time member Martin Gore remembers playing under the name Depeche Mode was at a school gig in May of 1980. They'd previously used the name Composition of Sound and they had different members back then too. When the band first formed Vince Clarke was in the band, and when he left a guy named Alan Wilder. Alan left in 1995 and the band continued on as it's currently is, with Dave Martin and Andy.

They didn't start out with their songs containing dark subjects and melodies, Speak And Spell was written by Vince Clarke, when he left, Martin Gore took the song writing job duties and that's when Depeche Mode when dark.

"Just Can't Get Enough,' one of the singles from "Speak and Spell,' helped put the band in the spot light in Europe and some other countries. Some Great Reward helped them achieve international success. "People Are People," one of the singles from that album went to number 2 in Ireland, 4 in the UK and Switzerland, and number 1 in West Germany. The US was a little slow in catching on to the Depeche Mode craze and it only went to number 13. It did become an anthem for Gay Pride festivals and the LGBT community in the 80s and that's always a win.

"Blasphemous Rumors and Some Great Reward"

"People Are People," is the third song off the album. That song while not a chaotic mess, has a lot going on in the beginning and it's beautiful. This needs to be like the anthem to solving bullying and mistreatment of people for no reason. I don't know whether the song was intentionally written for that purpose but truer words have never been sung.

Despite the great things this song could do for the world, supposedly, Martin Gore hates it. It has not been played live since 1988 and he says he prefers his songs to have subtle metaphors to allow people to find their own meanings to his songs. He feels people are people does not fit that description. I think he likes to be a Debby Downer.

The other song I really wanted to talk about is Blasphemous Rumors. The six minute long song about "arbitrary divine justice." 

 

I had a slight idea they'd be saying something possibly shocking to religion. Context wise, it's not that shocking but to the overly religious person they might take offense to it. They're not trying to offend they're telling a story and a very relate-able one at that.

Some people find religion in dark times and other people start questioning it. A mother finds her 16 year old daughter tried to commit suicide, she didn't succeed, and I don't know if she's the same girl in the second half of the song. If she is, then two years later, she rediscovers religion and one day is hit by a car and dies. If she's not then the song is from the band's point of view adding maybe a personal outsider's element to it.

Then this line happens, "And when I die I expect to find him laughing."

That kind of threw me through a loop only because of the image it put in my head, however explaining the whole thing requires a very long drawn out discussion on religion I don't feel like getting into.

Taking a few steps back to the beginning of the chorus, it's so catchy. Hell it's so catchy I almost didn't recognize how dark it actually was until I listened to it for the fifth time and realized there were actual verses. When I write anything I've been letting Pandora play and I completely missed the first two verses but caught the choruses and then the last verse before the repeated choruses.

Master and Servant is about BDSM and it was banned from a few stations due to this. The world should have realized you can't keep Depeche Mode down, it made it to 87 on the billboard hot 100 chart for three weeks. It also tries to have a political element or something to it but it's about sex and we all know it. The song is great, I heard it on their Best Of... Volume 1 album, but that was during a time where I only cared for "Enjoy the Silence," and "Personal Jesus." 

 

"If You Want To" was one of the songs I hadn't heard until listening to the whole album for this review. It gives off unnecessarily creepy vibes, and I say unnecessarily because the song doesn't need to be anywhere near as creepy as it comes off. It's rather vague in context, is it about a party, is it about doing drugs, or could it be about hooking up with someone?

Black Celebration

 Black Celebration Album

Depeche Mode's musical genre shifted slightly when the world heard their album Black Celebration in 1986. They gained a reputation in the Gothic subculture of Eurpe and became teen idols as well. Black Celebration according to Wikipedia, 'moved away from their industrial - pop sound that characterized their previous LPs," I didn't know Industrial pop was a thing... The album did bring in the dark and ominous as well as atmospheric sound.

"Here Is The House," the second song to motivate me to review Depeche Mode. This was also the second song Pandora introduced me to. I firmly believe this song is about someone having sex as well. I tried searching Google, and Google had no idea what I was talking about it. I also heard somewhere that there's a period of songs from a certain time that are just all about sex. I have no idea where I was when that information entered my brain, but I don't think I'll ever find it again. The only thing I can confidently say is that I was hooked the minute it started. Then the first verse ended and that riff starts the brief instrumental part between twenty seven seconds and forty-two seconds, I was completely sold by then.

As I was listening to this the other day I realized as much as I don't care for religion, it could be spun to be a religious song if not religious then very spiritual song. I think even if it's not meant to be a cute song, the original context was that it's a sexual song. I also wonder if it's about cheating. Why else would someone randomly be calling on the phone and no one answer it, well I don't think anyone answered it. That makes it even more mysterious, this song makes me think and I like it.

I didn't care for "Black Celebration" or "Fly on the windscreen". Question of Lust was the big song from that album and it deserved to be. "Sometimes" is the song Martin Gore took the lead vocals on and I couldn't understand what was happening. The echo was a good idea but make it clear enough that a call and response vocal works. It doesn't work when it's one second early and then the rest are all thrown off. It sounded like it was all piled into one mess of a song. "It Doesn't Matter Two," has to be the most annoying song I've ever heard from Depeche Mode. I could hardly hear Dave over the instrumentals and only halfway through does it stop and I can hear him sing. 

 Stripped

 (Question of Time)

Other than a few songs on side two the 'dark' tone Depeche Mode tried to establish for themselves, doesn't really hold up. The sounds might sound heavy and dark, but unless I'm missing something, the actual product is just a major flatline. "Stripped", "Dressed in Black," and "New Dress" kept the 'dark' themes up very well. "Question of Time" is pretty tolerable though, I liked that one but it doesn't hold up to "Stripped" and "Here is the House."

"Dressed In Black" I thought I was listening to Dead Can Dance. I don't know how or why Dave managed to remind me of Dead Can Dance but I don't like it at all. Now I don't completely hate Dead Can Dance, but those two bands are on two different levels of the music spectrum I can't even begin to compare the two.

"New Dress" I am guessing this has all to do with politics and how the media sucks at covering things. People suffering and dying all over the world and all anyone cared about was Princess Dianna's new dress she might have wore. I didn't expect this song, it hit me like a ton of bricks. Did everyone just forget this song exists, I feel like it deserves to be relevant again. It might not be the greatest Depeche Mode song but the world needs this song back in their faces again.

I think I should state this now, these albums came out over twenty years ago and Dave Gahan's voice hasn't changed a bit. Through the drug addiction, through all the singing and stress he put on himself from being in the music business, the vocals he recorded on a CD so many years ago sound the same now. I find that awesome.

Overall this was a really disappointing review. I thought I would have a lot more fun with this. I hardly made it through some of the songs but I did so I could form some opinion on it. I don't expect every song to be a smash hit because that's insanity but even for the songs that wouldn't normally be a hit song they should still be generally good. Some of these were terrible. I think this album is telling a story, but I don't know what about, some songs seem to be about some relationship and others are about politics and then there are some I have no idea what the lyrics are about.

I hope my reviews of Seabound, Iris, and Neuroticfish aren't as disappointing.

~Pugsly~