The dazzling skulls, the stage tinged with infernal red lights and the macabre ghosts that hover in the Memento Mori album, with Depeche Mode become an ode to life. After Andrew Fletcher’s passing, the intense frontman Dave Gahan (61) and the tormented poet-musician Martin Gore (he will be 62 on July 23) are left.
The tour that opened the Italian live performances of Basildon’s band from the Stadio Olimpico in Rome on Wednesday — it will also be in Milan (July 14) and Bologna (July 16) — is the first without the friend and co-founder Fletch. Two hours of music which, apart from a handful of songs from the last album, out of more than twenty songs in the lineup, drew from a good part of DM’s production.
The scenography is reduced to a minimum: an “M” (which recalls the writing on the cover of the new album) is superimposed on the gigantic screen at the back of the scene (two others are placed on the sides of the stage). From center stage a catwalk cuts the crowd in half for Dave’s — and sometimes Martin’s — forays into the audience. Everything else is done by the music and the charismatic Gahan: he twirls on stage, sways like Mick Jagger even if, with the glittery jacket, waistcoat and double-layered eyes, he looks more like a skilled Mephistophelean cabaret artist from Germany in the 20s.
Forty years ago they started in four, now Depeche Mode find themselves in two to face the power of their synth-pop that shakes stadiums. More united now than in the past, when it was Andy’s turn to be the balance point of the band. On stage, supporting the energetic wall of sound are drummer Christian Eigner and multi-instrumentalist Peter Gordeno, who have toured with the band since the late 1990s.
The start of the show is with new songs: the sinister percussive rhythms of My Cosmos Is Mine (No pain, no shroud/No final breath/No senseless death) and the Kraftwerkian Wagging Tongue. The rhythm intensifies, the jacket off, Gahan intones Walking In My Shoes and the first chants start. On It’s No Good the ecological issues dear to the band are raised.
The atmosphere heats up, 55,000 sing and dance to Everything Counts with Dave cheering on the crowd and waving the mic stand. The pressure of drums and guitar accompanies Precious.
The darkest part of the show opens with Speak to me accompanied by images of crosses silhouetted against a gray sky. Gore takes the stage, amid applause, to sing Question of Lust and Soul With Me, letting Gahan catch his breath, who when he comes back on stage says of his partner: «Glorious», sweeping away the tensions of the past. Guitar, drums and synthesizer weave the melody of Ghosts Again, while you see the video with Martin and David engaged in a game of chess, a reference to the 1957 film The Seventh Seal by Ingmar Bergman.
The scream of I Feel You blows away the black air descended on the show, the ending of the song is all for the impetuous drumming of Eigner. The rhythm rises again and veers towards techno rock with A Pain I’m Used To. The homage to Fletch arrives with World in My Eyes: the black and white image of a young Andy fills the screens, the photograph slowly changes to show the Nottingham musician bringing a hand to his face, in a famous portrait taken by Anton Corbijn. At the end a few words: “A round of applause for my friend Andy Fletcher”.
The granite Enjoy The Silence is embellished by Gore’s guitar while the screen lights up with colored skulls with the words: “Enjoy!”. The embrace between Martin and Dave takes place at the end of the poignant Waiting for the night, during the encores. But the desire for tenderness doesn’t last long: we dance to Just Can’t Get Enough and end with the enthralling techno-blues Personal Jesus.
Depeche Mode will also return to Italy in 2024: at the Palalpitour in Turin (March 23) and at the Mediolanum Forum in Milan (March 28 and 30).
2023-07-12 21:35:48
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