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Album Review: Depeche Mode, "Playing the Angel" (Reprise)
The latest from Depeche Mode strays in places, but the trio generally hits the mark with its signature brand of dark-and-brooding electronic goth-rock.
As always, the focal point is singer David Gahan's lush, velvety vocals, which, 25 years into the band's career, sound unchanged by time. He again leverages this gift by pairing his angelic delivery with lyrics that, by and large, dwell on the decidedly non-angelic nature of man.
That dichotomy is best represented on tracks with characteristically gloomy titles such as "A Pain That I'm Used To," "Suffer Well" and "The Sinner in Me," which chief songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Martin Gore and keyboardist Andrew Fletcher fill with swelling arrangements of synthesized blips, bleeps and keyboard flourishes layered atop propulsive percussion and catchy riffs.
Less compelling are "John the Revelator," a brassy, abrasive number that finds Gahan doing an unwelcome amount of yelling; and "Macro," a contemplate-your-navel clunker featuring Gore on lead vocals, a role he's capable of filling, but he'll always be better suited for singing gorgeous harmonies--which, thankfully, he does frequently elsewhere on the album.
At the other end of the spectrum is the album's first single, "Precious," a track that would have been right at home on the band's 1990 masterpiece, "Violator." Think "Enjoy the Silence, Pt. 2."
As Gahan and Gore sing on the track "Lilian," "Pain and misery always hit the spot" ... at least, they do when delivered in the form of a solid Depeche Mode album.
