Spirit
Depeche Mode
(Columbia)
Four stars
Spirit finds Depeche Mode gripped by a new revolutionary fervour in middle age, looking beyond their usual introverted musings on pain and pleasure to rage against a world in political and financial turmoil.
Making his debut with the group is producer James Ford, half of the British dance-rock duo Simian Mobile Disco and regular studio foil for the likes of Arctic Monkeys and Foals.
Ford does nothing radical with the group’s signature sound, but finds a healthy balance between their electronic heartbeat and their stadium-rock muscle, creating plenty of space for strong vocal performances from both Dave Gahan and Martin Gore.
Gahan flexes his full operatic range on anthems like Where's The Revolution?, a rousing call to arms flanked by battalions of fizzing synthesisers.
Cloaked in dissonant shards of post-punk guitar, So Much Love is another defiant statement of positivity against the forces of oppression. Gahan's languid bluesman croon also serves him well in The Worst Crime, a potent doom-dirge awash with ominous imagery of lynch mobs and latent violence.
Long overshadowed by Gore's dominant songwriting role, Gahan increasingly asserted himself in recent years, scoring two or three composer credits on latter-day albums. While his songs have typically been inferior to Gore's, the singer excels himself this time with Cover Me, a luxurious electronic confection that morphs midway into a shudderingly percussive floor-stomper.
Ironically, Gore is responsible for arguably the weakest track here. Poorman, a protest ballad about poverty and corporate greed, is marred by clunky rhymes and grindingly earnest lyrics. In long established tradition, Gore also sings lead vocal on a couple of numbers, his dramatic high-pitched vibrato provides a welcome textural counterpoint to Gahan's boomy baritone. While both Eternal and Fail are typically impassioned romantic torch songs, the latter is also shot through with jarring metallic noise and angry fatalism about the state of the world.
It further reinforces that Spirit is the band's most politically and socially engaged album in decades.
artslife@thenational.ae
