Sony Music Depeche Mode - Construction Time Again

1983 ( remaster 2016 )

Alan Wilder, Andrew Fletcher,  Dave Gahan,  Martin Gore

Remastered By – Simon Heyworth
Lacquer Cut By – Mike Marsh

[ sputnik ] : When Depeche Mode released their 3rd album (Construction Time Again, 1983) it proved to be a crucial point in the bands history. Right from the first track, 'Love, In Itself' the groups sound is immediately more dense with countless bleeping sound effects and samples exploding away in the background, accompanied by the richest, catchiest synth the boys had yet deployed (as opposed to the melancholic, almost minimalist tunes found on 'A Broken Frame').

Also, Alan Wilder became a full-time member of the band (previously he had only joined them on their 1982 tours), which seemed to propel Depeche's creativity far beyond anything they had done so far as a trio (after Vince Clark left in 1981). Being the only trained musician in the band, his skill can be heard everywhere on the album - his sharp arrangement skills and heavy use of samples enabled the band to create a rich, thick synthetic sound that they would later develop into their trademark dark boom, in just a couple of albums time.

[ AllMusic ] : The full addition of Alan Wilder to Depeche Mode's lineup created a perfect troika that would last another 11 years, as the combination of Martin Gore's songwriting, Wilder's arranging, and David Gahan's singing and live star power resulted in an ever more compelling series of albums and singles. Construction Time Again, the new lineup's first full effort, is a bit hit and miss nonetheless, but when it does hit, it does so perfectly. Right from the album's first song, "Love, In Itself," something is clearly up; Depeche never sounded quite so thick with its sound before, with synths arranged into a mini-orchestra/horn section and real piano and acoustic guitar spliced in at strategic points. Two tracks later, "Pipeline" offers the first clear hint of an increasing industrial influence (the bandmembers were early fans of Einstürzende Neubauten), with clattering metal samples and oddly chain gang-like lyrics and vocals. The album's clear highlight has to be "Everything Counts," a live staple for years, combining a deceptively simple, ironic lyric about the music business with a perfectly catchy but unusually arranged blending of more metallic scraping samples and melodica amid even more forceful funk/hip-hop beats. Elsewhere, on "Shame" and "Told You So," Gore's lyrics start taking on more of the obsessive personal relationship studies that would soon dominate his writing. Wilder's own songwriting contributions are fine musically, but lyrically, "preachy" puts it mildly, especially the environment-friendly "The Landscape Is Changing."