Depeche Mode – reside at Twickenham, 17 June

There are a number of issues to fret about when seeing an iconic band play reside lately, not least, after all, the price. We will argue about inflated ticket costs all night time (the final time I noticed Depeche Mode at Crystal Palace in ’93 it was, for then, an eye-watering £13 – this time it’s 10 occasions that).

But it surely’s additionally concerning the ‘extras’: the ‘official’ merchandisers tempting you with a hoodie for £80; the unofficial meals distributors parked up in a individuals’s entrance gardens on the best way to the stadium, promoting sizzling canine for a tenner; or the Marriott lodge charging you thrice the worth of the live performance ticket to remain the night time (

breakfast not included, TV not working).

However the actual fear now we have with Depeche Mode tonight at Twickenham, on the band’s solely UK date, is whether or not, at this stage of a prolonged world tour, they may simply be going via the motions.

And we all know what most of those motions are already, due to the earlier dates and YouTube: Dave’s going to spin and wiggle his bum, hug Martin, there might be a tearful second or two of Andy Fletcher reflection. Even the setlist’s just about a given because it’s not modified a lot for the reason that tour kicked off in March.

However whereas we all know the motions, we’ve underestimated the feelings.

Right here all of us are – an estimated 80,000 – to see The Mode play half of their (really nice) new album, Memento Mori, and fill the remainder of the gig up with songs that remind us why now we have the wallets out within the first place. And we needn’t have apprehensive.

Opener My Cosmos Is Mine is without doubt one of the most understated Depeche Mode tracks however, because it seems, the proper technique to begin a gig at 8.10pm on a sweaty night in larger London. Wagging Tongue is a fiercely energetic and Krafterkian approach of stepping up the tempo into favourites like Strolling In My Footwear and It’s No Good.

And earlier than we all know it, it’s In Your Room, the video screens kicking the track’s darkish facet into life and making you say – not for the one time this night – ‘that is Depeche Mode’s greatest tune’.

However issues actually kick off with Every part Counts. As soon as a Mode live performance nearer, that is now – given the massive vary and high quality of the band’s again catalogue – only a mid-session increase, however what an injection. It’s the beginning of the gig for a lot of and the gang temper round us is visibly raised.

Treasured and My Favorite Stranger simply profit from the uplift after which it’s ‘Martin’s bit’ the place Dave will get what have to be a welcome break on this significantly sweltering of nights.

A Query Of Lust is surprisingly nice, helped by the truth that Martin walks the ‘catwalk’ to the centre of the Gold Circle wherein we stand, and Soul With Me– one of many many highs of Memento Mori – is made that rather more memorable and (that phrase once more) emotional when Dave rejoins the get together early to indicate his appreciation.

Ghosts Once more is fantastic, the band enjoying alongside to the video, the track sounding, at one time contemporary, one other time, traditional Mode.

A few tunes later, World In My Eyes is genuinely shifting, too. It’s not simply Fletch looming giant on display that brings the grit to the eyes; it’s turning round and seeing the majority of the gang behind and surrounding us within the stands at Twickenham swaying their telephone torches alongside in time; a lesson to us all on correct cell phone use at live shows – and a lot safer than lighters.

There’s additionally one thing mesmerising about watching a band play because the solar goes down – from gentle to darkness, which Dave appears to faucet into. From right here on in, he switches to nighttime stalker mode and it’s time to tear via some favourites: Fallacious is the impeccably ‘proper’ technique to comply with World In My Eyes, and Stripped is every part you need it to be – searing strings reminding you why it’s, once more, ‘Depeche’s Mode’s greatest tune’.

Take pleasure in The Silence is a becoming ‘finish of half one’ and the best way the gang maintain the tune going is one more lump-in-the-throat second. As if the emotion can’t get any greater, Dave and Martin return to present a genuinely shifting rendition for Ready For The Evening about 20 ft away from the place we’re standing.

In my head it’s simply the three of us singing it in an empty stadium, however now we have besides that fantasy out as we change to the excessive camp and hip swinging of Dave (and us) belting out Simply Can’t Get Sufficient. He’s in full writhing snake mode now – how he can maintain these joints intact on a tour like that is past us.

Because the Rose Bowl gig on the legendary 101 tour, By no means Let Me Down Once more has taken on a reside lifetime of its personal; it’s that clip of Dave getting the gang to swing together with him on 18 June 1988 that makes you realise simply how enormous the Mode have been within the US again then.

That swinging has, after all, turn out to be a reside staple now and the gang right here throw themselves into it some 35 years on (nearly to the day), and as some welcome rain begins to fall, it’s one more emotional highpoint.

As Private Jesus correctly closes the present, it’s time to replicate, and whereas we’d have favored to have paid much less for the expertise – as unlikely in 2023 as Alan Wilder or Vince Clarke turning as much as play a couple of notes through the encores – Depeche Mode actually purchased the products house tonight.

We’ve had the songs, the facility, the laughter and tears, going via all of the feelings we may have wished for. We’d most likely do all of it once more tomorrow, to be truthful. And pay for it. Andy Jones

★★★★★

Setlist

My Cosmos Is Mine

Wagging Tongue

Strolling in My Footwear

It’s No Good

Sister Of Evening

In Your Room (Zephyr Combine)

Every part Counts

Treasured

My Favorite Stranger

A Query Of Lust

Soul With Me (Acoustic)

Ghosts Once more

I Really feel You

A Ache That I’m Used To (Jacques Lu Cont Remix)

World In My Eyes (Devoted to Andrew Fletcher)

Fallacious

Stripped

John The Revelator

Take pleasure in The Silence

Encore

Ready For The Evening

Simply Can’t Get Sufficient

By no means Let Me Down Once more

Private Jesus