Review: Depeche Mode – Delta Machine

Depeche Mode

Delta Machine

Columbia

Street: 03.22

Depeche Mode = Duran Duran x U2

After 35-plus years of making sly and danceable new wave electronica, a band might be forgiven for letting it get a bit stale. Mixed by Flood (New Order, Nick Cave, U2), the album is a very solid, but not exactly inspired, collection of blippy dance numbers like “Welcome to my World” or “Soft Touch / Raw Nerve” that harken back to their earlier days, and tracks like “Angel” and “Goodbye” that fit into Dave Gahan and Martin Gore’s more recent forays into bluesy rock. There’s nothing wrong with a band that defined a genre to rest on its laurels, but sometimes it’s sad to realize that we will never again have that rush of the first time we heard Some Great Reward. Still, this album is better than some initial reviews suggested. –Madelyn Boudreaux