THE MOJO INTERVIEW
From pin-up to pin-eyed in four decades of ground-breaking moody electronica. Now Depeche Mode’s clarion has given up running away. “I get lost in songs,” says Dave Gahan. “Reality I struggle with.”
Interview by MARTIN ASTON • Portrait by ANTON CORBIJN

THE MAN WHOM LOS ANGELES PARAMEDICS christened “The Cat” for the number of lives he burned through in the mid-’90s appears to have reclaimed at least a couple. Fifty-one years old in May, Dave Gahan is hardly the teenager whose impish grin said, “Look, ma, Top Of The Pops!”, when Depeche Mode became bona fide pop stars in 1981 , but it’s hard to even find darkish rings under his eyes. In fact, the only ring of note is the imposing silver skull on his middle finger - a gift from his wife Jennifer - encrusted with tiny black diamonds and rubies, always worn with the death’s head facing back toward him. “That way, the owner of the shop said, you’re reminded of life,” he says. Then that grin breaks out. “I wear it all the time.”
Squalid heroin addiction; wretched suicide attempts; flatlining for six minutes; a cancerous tumour overcome  in 2009 - Gahan has survived it all. He’s also endured 33 years, alongside Martin Gore and Alan ‘Fletch’ Fletcher, in the planet’s most successful electronic band. Depeche Mode were born in Essex Man’s Basildon lair, introduced Futurism to Smash Hits and TOTP and still get the brush-off from rock snobs. It annoys them - the sensitive Gahan especially - but their best revenge is 13th album Delta Machine: lustrous, bruising, nuanced and yet tailor-made to reach the top tiers of the enormodomes they’ve entertained for the past two decades.
Currently between an apartment in downtown Tribeca and a house in moneyed Montauk on the tip of Long Island, Gahan, a New York resident for 15 years, receives MOJO in a plush-but-bland Soho hotel suite. In a sharp-cut, dark pinstripe suit jacket and smart jeans, his accent vacillating, sometimes alarmingly, between Estuarine and American, he nevertheless appears at ease. A pot of coffee ordered from room service remains untouched for two hours as he willingly dissects his life’s lows as well as highs. Gahan’s peaceful pact with his past has been assisted by songwriting; after 22 years as a ‘mere’ frontman, he has credits on the last three Depeche Mode albums, previously Gore’s domain after the departure of original songwriter Vince Clarke forced the remaining trio to regroup. Yet Gahan’s contributions to Delta Machine - notably the epic, almost Walker Brothersesque Should Be Higher - still sound like he’s addressing Mr Death - heroin as lover as well as destroyer. Just as that clean-cut early-’80s mien disguised an upbringing marked by drugs, joyriding and theft - even a year of weekend custody at a sub-borstal ‘attendance clinic’ - looks can be deceiving.

We’re not WORTHY
Mark Lanegan lauds a fellow doomy baritone.
 “Depeche have so many great songs - they speak to me. Dave has a really cool voice, and he’s a great singer, which are two different things, but combined it’s compelling. The Soulsavers’ The Light The Dead See was my favourite album of last year. I’d not heard Dave in that consistently bare-boned setting, and it makes what he does all the more powerful.”

The new album is called Delta Machine: a marriage of Depeche’s electronic and rock‘n’roll roots?
We had a few permutations of the title, like “something” Machine and Delta “something” before Martin said, “Delta Machine?” But I wouldn’t dare say this is a blues record as Fletch has said a couple of times. That’s insulting, to blues musicians, on so many levels.

But if the blues is about suffering, isn’t that where Depeche Mode come from too?
Well, OK, we have influences coming from the blues. And Depeche Mode is fundamentally us whining, searching for something, moaning our way through life (laughs).

What do you have to moan about?
Myself! My inability to function like a normal human being, as I’m constantly reminded. Someone will say, “The way you’re talking to me is really...“ Like what? (clenches face). I get over-aggressive or over-enthusiastic and other people aren’t necessarily on the same page. I get into trouble with my wife. She’s the first to say, “You can’t talk to me like that. I’m not one of your bandmates or cronies that hang around you.”

Delta Machine begins with Welcome To My World and ends with Goodbye. Is there a theme running in between the two?
To Martin and me, it’s the beginning and the end of the performance. It’s ironic and fun for us, but that’s just our sense of humour. Neither of us are all doom and gloom, but when it comes to making music, we do go down a darker path. Down there, you have to find your way out, and that’s the exciting part.

What are your roles in Depeche Mode? We’re not a band band. We’re not The Rolling Stones, jamming together in the studio. Things are very constructed between Martin and me. Fletch has ideas and input; he’s the one who’ll say, “What are you doing? You’ve been working on this for three days, it’s rubbish!” But he’s not conceptual. He’s the mediator. He’s the luke-warm water between fire and ice (laughs). He’ll do his crossword, and as long as he gets to lunch by one o’clock, he’s fine.

“Basildon Man” became shorthand for aspiring working-class Tories; what was your take on your home town?
My brother Phil recently sent me a documentary, a 45-minute special about Basildon, and seeing images like the town centre really brought back some… dull memories (laughs). My family moved out of East London when I was two, for this new town, the new world, where it’s greener and there are better schools. But it was miserable. My only good memories are of hanging with friends in the street. We lived on this little square, so everyone was next door to each other.

Was the anger always there? Your dad left home when you were a baby; your stepfather died when you were 10, and only then did you discover he wasn’t your ‘real’ dad...
Yeah, and I had two younger brothers, so I was always in that mindset of “I’ll take care of this, I know what to do”. But, really, I was drowning. My mother says that I was very stubborn and hard-headed. I liked to think I wasn’t following the norm. That’s probably why I latched on to punk. My mum would say I started to run with the wrong crowd. But I liked the reaction of doing bad things, teenage stuff. It was a good way to get a reaction. But music saved me.

Wasn’t The Clash your musical epiphany?
It was The Damned before The Clash, but really it started with glam and Top Of The Pops. Slade, T.Rex, Bowie, Roxy, buying singles. John Peel and punk came later. But my epiphany was Ziggy Stardust - this guy from somewhere else. Not from Basildon! Wherever he was, I wanted to be. “Freak out in a moonage daydream,” what the fuck does that mean? I often play the David Live version of Moonage Daydream before I go on stage. My fondest memory from school - which I hated - was the teacher saying, “Gahan, what is so interesting out of the window?” It was just a field, but if I was feeling courageous, I’d say, A lot more than what’s going on here, and off to the headmaster’s office I’d go. I was out of my mind already. I should probably have gone on some kind of drug to keep me focused. I was a dreamer.

Vince Clarke, Martin Gore and Fletch were anything but bad boys; they were Christian youth camp attendees. First impressions?
Martin said he liked church for the singing. They were really nice people. A little odd. I was suspicious but I was suspicious of everyone and I stuck with my kind. I was hanging out with a gang from Basildon and Chelmsford, going to punk gigs at Chelmsford Chancellor Hall, or up to the Music Machine in London, maybe a squat in King’s Cross after a show, back on the morning train, have a bath and go back in again. It was the first time I’d been part of a gang and it felt very comfortable.

But why settle for Clarke and company if they were so different?
Honestly? I had no other option. I was at art college because I didn’t want to work, and I’d been asked to leave. I felt I’d learned all I could. I just wanted to be in a band. Vince heard me singing Bowie’s “Heroes” in the next rehearsal room to them, and asked me to join. I wasn’t even in the band next door, who were called French Look; I was just a mate of Paul Redmond, this massive punk guy in Basildon with bright orange hair who everyone was scared of. I clung on to Paul because no one would touch me then. One thing I’m pretty good at is jumping in if an opportunity presents itself, good or bad, so I jumped ship. It didn’t particularly matter if I liked what they were doing, though I did enjoy it. And Vince was great at creating songs. At the end of every rehearsal, we had a new one.

You didn’t want to write yourself?
No, I just wanted to be Bowie, to stand on-stage, which I found terrifying at first but I later discovered it was the easy part, without the hard graft that people like Vince and Martin had to put in. But all I wanted was the adulation that comes with performing, and to be part of something. I started playing around with words in the mid-’80s, but I couldn’t take it to Martin, out of fear that it would be rejected, laughed at. That’s how I operated.

A Life in PICTURES
Broken frames: Dave Gahan exposed
1 Essex boy, pre-school: “I was very stubborn and hard-headed.”
2 The original Depeche Mode line-up, 1980: (from left) Gahan, Martin Gore, Andrew Fletcher, Vince Clarke.
3 The road of excess leads to the MTV Awards, 1993: “By then I had a full-blown habit, Dave admits.
4 A Faust-like Gahan on the notorious Summer Tour ‘94: “This monster had overtaken the person.”
5 Dave meets Dame, after Bowie’s show at New York’s Roseland, 2002: “My epiphany was Ziggy Stardust.”
6 DM go S&M, 1987: with “new boy”, ex-Korgi Alan Wilder (far right). “We’re not a band band.”
7 Snooker loopy at Konk studio, 1987: “The path we took after Black Celebration was more appealing to me.”
8 A life at the pictures: Gahan, more content in his own skin, with second wife Jennifer at the New York premiere of Control, September, 2007. “Being the English lad, I made her laugh.”
You didn’t want to write yourself?
9 Like heroin wouldn’t melt..., 1981:”l’m quite happy in my own little soul.”

Depeche Mode honed its art at venues such as Croc’s in Rayleigh but also the Bridge House in Canning Town, the HQ of Oi! How were the band received there?
Not well! Vince and I had taken our tape in to see if we could get some gigs. Terry Murphy, who ran the Bridge House, liked it and took us under his wing. He said we’d have a rough time and people wouldn’t like us, except he did! A group of us started to hang out there, and we’d play the Top Alex and Rascals in Southend as well. Punk was dying and this electronic stuff has come in and suddenly I had the opportunity to be part of a band that was interested in the music I was listening to, like Kraftwerk and Bowie. People like Steve Strange and Rusty Egan were looking for music to play in their clubs. Brilliant days. We’d play and 50 of our mates would come along, a ready-made audience. That’s how we met Stevo, who put out the Some Bizzare compilation [Depeche Mode’s recorded debut]. Steve was a very clever guy, but nuts. [Mute label MD] Daniel Miller was much better for us. And of course, he was The Normal.

What did you make of the ‘Futurist’ label the electronic scene was tagged with?
Nah, it was just dressing up! It was fashion. So was punk. Moving into boys wearing make-up and getting flamboyant, playing with gender - that’s what Bowie did. But we didn’t fit alongside Spandau Ballet and Duran. They dressed up the same but they had big managers, big record deals, while we were taking the tube to Top Of The Pops with our synths wrapped in blankets inside a suitcase.

When Vince left the band even before your debut album [1981’s Speak And Spell] was released, did you fear it was already over?
I thought it was the most stupid thing. But Vince was very unhappy, even six months before he left. We’d not even finished Speak And Spell. We’d just announced our first tour, and Vince said, “I can’t answer questions about what colour socks I’m wearing, I can’t play the game.” But his reasons were shadier than that. We were sat in our publisher’s office, and he pointed to Vince and said, “This one will be driving around in a Roller and you three will be following on your tandem. Yeah, with three seats!” A little light went on in Vince’s head, that he could do it all himself, without compromising. All he needed was a singer and someone to perform on-stage with him. Daniel said, “Can any of you write?” Martin had written one song and one instrumental on Speak And Spell, and, he said (adopts Mr Bean voice), “I’ve got another, it’s called See You, I don’t know if it’s any good…“ He still does that! But we were so naïve that it never crossed our minds we’d break up.

Given you were seeking approval from Martin, was he another de facto father figure?
Daniel was the father figure, to all of us. I just wanted a pat on the back from Martin, which he seemed to avoid. He’s like that with everyone, but I brooded on it for ages. I could see crowds having a great time, but I didn’t sense the band thought I was doing a good job. We were very English. That coolness isn’t a good thing but it fed this strangeness about the band that still excites me. I can’t put my finger on it, but I’m drawn to it, like a drug, like I’m supposed to be a part of it. And Martin treats me like an equal now. After Alan [Wilder, keyboards/arranging, 1982-95] left, it became about Martin and me.

The old singer-versus-songwriter tussle?
The kind of partnership Martin and I have, we feed each other. More so now than the last couple of albums. I could tell he was into working on and contributing to my songs, which excited me. Martin’s turned some corner in that his songs no longer come across as insular. He wants to be part of this universe, to have some peace, and I think he’s finally getting there. The fact he did a record with Vince [as VCMG, on 2012 techno album Ssss] shows that, because I thought it would be the last thing he’d have considered. Martin writes songs in search of himself, and that’s why we’re together, and have been for so long.

And because you’re writing for Depeche?
He definitely has more respect for me, which was vital to our survival. Over the last 10 years I’ve forced my way in, which was difficult at first. Martin won’t say, “Hey, you’re treading on my toes”; you might get a bit of tongue poking out and this look (makes Martin Gore-as-lizard face). When I did [2003 solo album] Paper Monsters and formed a band to tour it, that surprised him. He came to one of the LA shows, I hadn’t seen him for a while, and afterwards - he’ll probably hate me for this - he said, “I really feel like I’m following you around now,” which shocked me because I’d been following him for so long.

From the late ‘80s onwards, the darker Depeche Mode became the bigger you seemed to get...
The path we took through Black Celebration [1986] and Violator [1990] was much more appealing to me, because Martin was as lost as I was. You’re in your late twenties, in a pretty successful band, but taking our fair share of criticism at home, for having success as a pop band, for which we’ve never been forgiven. It took years before we felt we were considered a band worth considering, which hurt a lot. We had the chance to develop a following elsewhere, and when Alan joined we finally felt like we had something. We got serious.

Meanwhile, you took being “the frontman” of Depeche further and further. Too far?
After years of trying to do right by Martin, doing what was needed for his songs, I thought, “I’ll throw all that energy into performing.” So on-stage I became this guy that nobody could possibly deny, really going for it, and that developed over the years until I came to a crashing halt. This monster had overtaken the person, and when I tried to take that suit of clothes off, I couldn’t. I had nowhere to go.

You really did emulate Bowie and Ziggy.
At the time I’d have laughed that off, but, yes, it was that kind of role. The band was really pissed off as I’d drifted away by then. I’d moved to Los Angeles, where I could hide, to not be Dave, and no one knew anything about me. That was very comfortable, and I could hide behind these great songs that Martin was writing.

LA was the gateway to heroin. But you first indulged when you were 17?
Yeah, I snorted it, thinking, “This doesn’t look like speed.” I threw up all over myself and passed out in the corner, woke up and the gig was over. Well, that was rubbish, I’m never doing that again, and so I went back to amphetamines. But years later, it just fit. I smoked it, and I didn’t throw up. I’ve heard people say it since, but everything made sense. I didn’t care about Martin’s approval any more. But I was only an occasional user, after a show, never before, but everyone was doing it in LA, bands like Alice In Chains, Jane’s Addiction... I never thought it was scary, which again is complete naivety. One guy told me, “Don’t ever take it more than three days in a row.” I was like, “What? I can drink you under the table!” I just didn’t put it together, the history of all these bands I’d loved, Iggy and Lou Reed. But the shoe just fit.

I’ve read that Daniel Miller didn’t realise you had a habit, and the band tried to ignore it.
That’s not strictly true. Everyone tried, but they didn’t think it was as bad as it was. I didn’t know either. We were all out of control, Martin with his drinking, Fletch had terrible depression. We were like a mental institution. But we liked to party. We were known for it, including the road crew, it was like a gang. But in LA I found another gang, and it was another two years before we got together in Madrid to make [1993’s] Songs Of Faith And Devotion. By then, I had a full- blown habit, but I only realised once I’d landed and started clucking after a few days. Everyone scrabbled around to find what they thought I needed - booze, coke, hash, pills. But heroin wasn’t provided. I went looking in some subterranean club. I approached some guys who looked like they might be in that vein, but I got a severe beating outside instead. I remember rolling under this car, snow on the ground, and Martin trying to intervene and promptly getting punched. The next morning, I told everyone.

How guilty did you feel?
It was awful. It took years to earn back Martin’s trust, and there was my family, my brothers, my sister, my present wife. It’s such a selfish addiction. Even if you’d said my mother had died, I wouldn’t have cared less. While we were making Ultra [in 1997], Martin would say, “What about the band?”, which was absurd to me. In my mind, I was trying to save my life! Now he sees my side because of his drinking, which he stopped six years ago, but he drank like a fish, so for him to be pointing the finger at me... I was the obvious mess, but drinking is the British way. You can be as drunk as a skunk, under the table, naked, and get away with it.

The band had a therapist on the Faith And Devotion... tour.
A psychiatrist! We weren’t communicating. We were a band on-stage but off-stage everyone went their own way, Martin to clubs, Fletch would drink in some bar, and I’m with some local cronies taking me to places to get high. Alan was doing the work. The psychiatrist sat with us maybe twice, with our manager too, and said we all had really bad problems. He left the next day, saying he couldn’t help. But no one wanted the party to end and the machine helped keep it going. But when I got home after that tour, I really was broken. I had no entourage to take care of my needs so finding heroin became my life for the next couple of years. I ended up in some of the seediest low-life places. That Hollywood underground is dark, man.

Any sex deviances or addictions? Interesting piercings?
Heroin and sex don’t go together. It was more waking up in bed with two, three people there, different genders… The drugs were the sex for me. I was happy hanging out on my own. I had my guiche [perineum] pierced. My [second]
wife and I did that together, ceremonially! My son in New York, when he was six, said to me, when I got out of the shower, “Why do you have an earring in your butt?” I don’t know! So it came out. It was all about shock. And then it wasn’t shocking. Then it was survival.

What finally pulled you out of the hole?
Addiction is a sad, boring existence. Years go by. You’re still sitting on the couch, seeing the same dealer, talking the same bullshit. My wife had walked out on me, and rightly so. She was dabbling but I was dragging her down. I went into rehab, where I met my current wife, Jennifer, who was there for a different reason. Being the English lad, I made her laugh, and laughing is the same kind of euphoria, you know? I left there with all the right intentions, but I kept relapsing, and then trying to get clean to visit Jen in New York. She’d heard of the band but didn’t care. She was younger than me, more into stuff like Billie Holiday, which influenced me later on. I didn’t know anyone in LA who wasn’t using so I had to get out, and I officially moved to New York in 1998. I’d meet Jen’s friends, just people living their lives, painters and photographers. My best friend Dennis is a fireman. It was so refreshing.

When a tumour was discovered in your bladder in 2009, did you think someone - God or otherwise - had it in for you?
I was so lucky they found it in the early stages, and the chemo didn’t affect the rest of my body. It now feels like a brick wall I was relieved to run into, because it made me look around again at my wife and my kids, and all I have, and I have plenty of love and support. I feel really good, health-wise.

Do you ever have a drink?
I choose not to. I was out Christmas Eve, a nice restaurant, everyone drinking. I thought, “Why can’t I just have a glass of wine?” But I don’t any more, because even one glass opens a whole Pandora’s box. My mind immediately thinks, I can go much higher. That’s what [the new album’s] Should Be Higher is about - that line, “The lies are more attractive than the truth.” I still draw on that stuff when I’m singing and performing, to dig my way out of trouble.

What’s wrong with an upbeat pop song? Depeche’s remain so serious and downbeat.
Nothing’s wrong with them! Broken is uptempo, but lyrically it’s dark. All I can say is that Delta Machine is a truthful record. This is who we are, and this is what Martin and I can conjure up together. If I had my way, and it might not be the right way, we’d probably do things a lot looser. Martin is a great guitar player, but he likes to work with electronics, and I have to support that.

Since 2003, you’ve written songs for two solo albums, three band albums and last year’s Soulsavers album The Light The Dead Can See. Sorted?
I made some demands on [2005 Depeche album] Playing The Angel. I wanted half the songs. Martin said he’d give me a couple. I wrote six for this one, got three. But if I hadn’t made the Soulsavers album, I don’t think I’d have made Delta Machine. Because the offer from [Soulsavers linchpin] Rich Machin was so unexpected and I was so unprepared, I learned about the freedom of just showing up and something musical moving me.

It’s some accolade, given Soulsavers’ previous frontman had been Mark Lanegan.
They’re big shoes to fill. Not that I was trying to follow in his footsteps. What I do is in the same ballpark but it’s a different part of the field. Mark gave me great props for that album. He texted me, saying how great and inspiring my Soulsavers record was, and that’s just the greatest, after all these years, to have respect from your peers and other singers. There’s nothing else I want for.

How has Depeche’s core trio lasted this long? Are you scared of what might come after?
I’m scared of not being able to do the things I love doing - songwriting and collaborating, to start with something and you don’t know why you get to where you get. The thing is, I’m just beginning to feel that with Martin. For some reason, we have this thing together and a great deal of people get something out of it, more than just following a band.

Describe a typical day when you’re not making a Depeche album or touring.
I meet friends for coffee, but I’m at my studio every day, working on something, if only for a couple of hours. I wake up very early, 5am is normal, because I’ve always had trouble sleeping since I was a kid. I used to sleep walk, or have sleep paralysis. That’s why I liked heroin because I’d go out for days. I love walking around New York. It feeds me.

What’s it like hanging out with Dave Gahan?
I think it’s all right now. I’m a little over-sensitive to criticism, from the missus normally, which can be the simplest thing, like, “You’re gonna wear that shirt?” Needy? No, the opposite. I’m quite happy in my own little soul. I’m dreaming again. It’s taken years and years for me but it’s back. It’s what keeps me here. I get lost in songs, on-stage, making music, and others’ music too if I’m lucky. It’s the reality of life that I struggle with.

Real Real GAHAN
In Depeche and beyond, picked by Martin Aston.
SYNTH-ROCK IN EXCELSIS
Depeche Mode
Violator (MUTE,1990)
*****
My, how they’ve grown! The Basildon boys’ still-unequalled summit, which eschewed their habitual pre-production fussiness for reflexive studio growth. Digging deep, Martin Gore rediscovered his anthemic gene in Personal Jesus and Enjoy The Silence, while Blue Dress and Clean - as if! - suggested ominous subterranean vibes unearthed in Berlin nightclubs. Gahan sounded stentorian, as if he was finally ready for his close-up.
INDEPENDENCE DAVE PARADE
Dave Gahan
Hourglass (MUTE, 2007)
***
2003 solo debut Paper Monsters tried to stand apart, yet its eclectic reach was bitty and inconclusive. The follow-up mined one overarching, deep-purple mood, and so what if it sounded more Depeche-like? Blame the renewed man- machine confederacy on Gahan’s new collaborators: the Mode’s oft-used session drummer Christian Eigner plus producer/remixer Andrew Phillpott. Shivery, imperial single Kingdom showed the way.
THE HOLY COMMUNION
Soulsavers
The LightThe Dead See (V2, 2012)
****
Of all the singers who’ve fronted Rich Machin and Ian Glover’s gothic cinemascapes, Mark Lanegan had been the snuggest fit, so for Gahan to rival him for spine-tingling profundity and devotional beauty was, frankly, astonishing. Riding a killer wave of slo-mo strings, Presence Of God’s soulsearching spaghetti western is one of Gahan’s greatest-ever performances: heartbreaking and life-affirming in equal measure.