2021 Dave Gahan and Soulsavers "Imposter"

Audacy Check In: Dave Gahan

Dave Gahan joined us to chat about his new song with Soulsavers and their upcoming album, ‘Imposter’!

Start The Week With… Dave Gahan

Next month, Dave Gahan releases his latest collaborative album with Soulsavers. Titled Imposter, it’s a collection of covers, interpretations of songs that mean a lot to the Depeche Mode frontman and includes versions of Neil Young’s A Man Needs A Maid, Cat Power’s Metal Heart, Mark Lanegan’s Strange Religion, James Carr’s The Dark End Of The Street and more. It’s a very good record, there’s something dark and soothing about it at the same time.

It has its roots, Dave explains below, in the huge tour Depeche Mode did to support their Spirit album in 2017. I went on the road with them for a Q feature at the time (this is Niall, hello). I interviewed Dave in New York first whilst they were on a short break and he was lovely and chatty and charming but there was also a bit of a nervous edge to him, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. When I joined the band on tour in Canada, taking in two dates in Toronto and Montreal, I didn’t see Dave at all (apart from onstage anyhow), despite spending lots of time backstage, speaking to his bandmates and loitering in corridors waiting for photoshoots to happen. This was Dave’s way on tour, apparently. He goes deep. He recalls the period below, saying that he went a little too method with his stage persona, a character he liked to call The Imposter. But a period of self-examination has led to some wonderful new music. I spoke to Dave about it over Zoom a few weeks ago. Here’s a playlist I’ve made of some of his best stuff away from Depeche, too…

Hi Dave, how’s it going?
I'm well. It's going alright, yeah. I’m in New York and things are relatively in a sort of place back to... I was gonna say back to normal, but it's not. It's not. People are out and about, still with the masks and stuff, which is a good thing. Everyone's getting vaccinated and trying to get on with their life a bit somehow.

I’m in your old stomping ground, Southend.
Are you really? Are you living in Southend?

Yeah, I live in Westcliff.
Oh, Westcliff is nice, yeah. I remember I used to go to a pub there called The Cliff. It used to be a gay pub and I guess it was ’79, 1980, something like that, they would let a bunch of us and our friends at the time have this space above the pub that we would use for a club where we could play music on a Friday night. We’d play Bowie and Kraftwerk and Roxy Music, sort of post-punk stuff. It was a cool pub, I remember getting on the train to go there.

How important was that phase for you?
Very important. Because at that time, finding somewhere that was a little bit different and somewhere… like now it's nothing to think about anything like that but even going to listen to the kind of music that you wanted to listen to in certain places, there wasn't places you'd go to hear music like that. So I think I was just lucky to be in the right place at the right time, especially post-punk and coming out of that and that being sort of my early teen years. Having that to hang on to and latch on to like, like The Damned and The Clash and the Banshees and having those couple of years of actually being able to be part of something felt very, very cool at that time. As a teenager, you need something like that.

The new record is great.
Thanks. Have you had a chance to listen to it a bit?

Yeah, I’ve been blasting it in the house whilst the kids are at school. Your voice is in very good nick on it.
Thank you. The songs definitely tell a story. When I listen to the record, I have to listen to it as a collection of songs. I can hear myself in there, singing them as part of it, you know, the imposter, kind of playing out the role, but then I hear how close to home lyrically and mood and feel-wise, they just kick up stuff for me. I don't know why… I mean, maybe because of the voices that originally sang them that have, throughout the course of the years that I've been listening to music and being a music fan, those songs spoke to me, whether it was Metal Heart from Cat Power, or A Man Needs A Maid by Neil Young, at different times of my life songs in general have carried me through.

It’s called Imposter. Did you feel like an imposter when Depeche Mode became huge or did it come naturally to you being a famous frontman?
I had imposter syndrome for a long time in Depeche. I mean, honestly, that's where the title for this record actually came from, the sort of final character, if you like, that I was using for myself to do that whole Spirit tour. You know, he was the ultimate imposter, kind of on the edge of being maybe too old to be doing this.

When I did the Q feature on that tour, you said it took you all day to get in the zone for a show.
A whole day, and then it got to the point where I just sort of stayed in it. And that often happens with performance, especially if you're on a tour. Over the years, I've found that doing these really large tours with my band, I have to be fully in. You do step out every now and then because you do certain legs of the tour and you might have, like, a month in between certain legs and it's always very difficult to make that transition to come back home for a month, see your mates, see your wife and your kids and kind of be like, ‘oh, what's happening?’ At some point, you kind of switch and you end up like, ‘I've just got to stay in this until it's over’. You know, it's a long time, you're doing it for on and off for the best part of a year and a half, two years, so you invest a lot of yourself in it. After this last big tour Depeche did, it took me a good while when I got back home. It was kind of pretty obvious to myself and to all those around me, including my wife, like, 'you've gotta reel it in, you're way out there, come back to Earth now Dave'. And it took me a while this time to be comfortable around my mates and life and stuff. So the idea for the title sort of popped in my head around that time.

You recorded Imposter at Shangri-La Studios in Malibu. How was that?
Every day was beautiful. Each day when we were going into record, we would do one track after the other and we recorded almost a track a day. I think we ended up with maybe 15 songs and throughout it, I suddenly realised that in a recording session, this was the most honest I'd felt in a weird way. It was odd, I felt really at home, really comfortable, I'd done a lot of prep before we went in, I really studied these songs and listened to the versions of the songs from various different artists that had covered them or whatever. And so I knew it was a tall order with some of the songs to be like, 'Okay, I'm going to have to somehow really make this be mine, like it's coming from me and it's not just a bunch of covers'. We've all heard those records, and some of them are good, and some are not so good and some work and some don't work.

What was the trick?
It had to be a complete piece of work that you could put a record on in the old sense of it and listen to a side of a record and go 'Okay, that's the end of the first side. I'm going to listen to the other side.'

I was surprised at how much the album feels like a Dave Gahan record and not just a playlist of cover versions.
Before I started recording the album and I was still at home, in my little studio I have a PA set up and I'd sing live over that. Rich from Soulsavers would work up a track with some sort of keyboard stuff or a bit of guitar and maybe a loose kind of drum idea or something and we were working out keys, tempos, arrangements, doing things before we went to Shangri-La, so there was a lot of preparation. Then I would get this loose idea of what the song could be in the studio and I would start to work up my voice. At some point during that, before we went out to Shangri-La, I hit this spot where I realized, ‘I'm not interpreting the songs as I've heard them before anymore, I'm singing them in my own voice and my own style and I feel comfortable and I'm moving around to it like I want to’. At that point, I even started to form what was loosely the sequencing, which became really important to the way you hear and I hear the songs and the album.

It was the 40th anniversary earlier this year of the first Depeche Mode release. Did you guys do anything to mark the occasion?
We had a massive party! No, we didn't. I mean, we got inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the most unlikely thing to happen to Depeche Mode and any music journalist who would have thought would have happened… that 40 years later we would not only still be making music, but actually be inducted into some so-called important thing. I can't think of a better way to celebrate the bizarre world of what Depeche Mode is and what it has been, and that we're still here and we’re still somehow together, managing to have fun and we laugh a lot together. We joke a lot together, we get deadly serious about shit sometimes, we fight together over things quietly and very passive aggressively. But, you know, I realise now after all this time, it's a very special thing. It's 40 years, I'm in my third marriage!

I was 40 this year too.
There you go!

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Dave Gahan announcement

Лидер Depeche Mode выпустил новую песню и рассказал о планах группы на 2022 год

8 октября 2021 вокалист группы Depeche Mode Дейв Гаан (которому, кстати, в мае 2022 стукнет 60 лет – поверить в это сложно!) обнародовал песню «Metal Heart»: она появится на новом альбоме музыканта, который он записал с британскими альтернативщиками Soulsavers. КП-Афиша решила не только рассказать об этой работе, но и найти ответ на важный вопрос: «Когда же группа, отметившая в прошлом году свое 40-летие, наконец-то вернется в студию?»

Композиция «Metal Heart» является кавером на песню американского проекта Cat Power 1998 года. Ее можно будет найти на новом альбоме фронтмена Depeche Mode и Soulsavers– «Imposter». Он, целиком состоящий из кавер-версий на произведения известных рок-музыкантов (среди них – «A Man Needs a Maid» Нила Янга и «Not Dark Yet» Боба Дилана), был записан в Малибу – в легендарной студии «Shangri-La». «Imposter», выйдет 12 ноября, а в интервью NME Гаан заметил: «После последнего турне Depeche Mode я пришел к выводу: «С тебя хватит, чувак». Я говорил это не один раз – да и не только себе. Но, признаюсь, работа над «Imposter» что-то открыла во мне. Я даже подумал: «Надо же, я все еще получаю от этого удовольствие. Я могу делать что-то со своим голосом и это позволяет мне ощущать какую-то гармонию».

С конца 1990-х Гаан живет в Нью-Йорке: его жена – американская актриса и продюсер Дженнифер Склиас Гаан. Поборов наркотическую зависимость, а также онкологию (в 2009 году музыкант перенес операцию по удалению злокачественной опухоли мочевого пузыря), сегодня вокалист Depeche Mode ведет исключительно здоровый образ жизни. Но планирует ли он возвращаться к концертной деятельности?

«Выступления – огромная часть меня. Я надеюсь, что будут какие-то необычные концерты с новым материалом – точно в Лондоне», – признался Гаан NME.

Информации о сайд-проектах Энди Флетчера нет: известно, правда, что он любит разъезжать по свету с диджейскими сетами.

Что же касается Мартина Гора, который тоже с семьей живет в США (но не в Нью-Йорке, а на Западном побережье – в Санта-Барбаре: он и его жена, актриса Керили Каски, воспитывают двух дочерей – Джонни Ли и Мэйзи Ли), то в январе 2021-го он выпустил электронный мини-альбом «The Third Chimpanzee». Эта работа не только понравилась критикам, но и фанатам: в Германии, например, она попала на 13-е место в хит-параде.

Планы есть! Вот, что сказал Гаан NMЕ: «Мартин в прошлом году записал альбом, который мне очень понравился. Я, кстати, пластинку купил – потому что иначе было бы просто неправильно. И я знаю, что он возится в своей студии – так что, думаю, в какой-то момент мы соберемся в следующем году. Надеюсь, по крайней мере, чтобы хотя бы поговорить о том, что мы оба чувствуем, чтобы двигаться дальше».

Очень хочется надеяться, что эта встреча произойдет уже в начале 2022-го – и тогда (давайте помечтаем!), возможно, ближе к осени Depeche Mode осчастливят нас если не новым альбомом, то хотя бы синглом. Напомним, что последний лонгплей легендарной группы, «Spirit», вышел в марте 2017 года.

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Dave Gahan and Soulsavers song ′′ The Dark End of the Street ′′ will be released next week.

Dave Gahan cover of “The Dark End Of The Street' will be released this Friday, October 22

Official Audio

Jill Riley talks to Dave Gahan about his latest collaborative covers album with Soulsavers, "Imposter". Gahan discusses sequencing deliberation, his longtime musical partnership with Soulsavers, and how they approached the recording process.

Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode: ‘Regret is a weird word. I don’t look back on my life like that’

The Depeche Mode frontman answers your questions, on his new covers album, taking early dance lessons from Mick Jagger and the right way to load a dishwasher.

Did you accomplish everything you set out to on [forthcoming album] Impostor? MrBeelzebub

I was really burned out after the last Depeche Mode tour, then Rich [Machin, long-time musical partner in Soulsavers] and I started talking about songs and artists who had influenced us. Before we knew it, we were making a Soulsavers record with me as frontman that paid homage to those songs, but was almost a new piece of work. I realised that the choices were songs that put me where I am, suggested where I have been and where I might be. They are songs [such as Dan Penn/James Carr’s Dark End of the Street or Bob Dylan’s Not Dark Yet] that reflect on lives lived. I would not have known how to sing these songs when I was 18.

Did you avoid David Bowie or Roxy Music songs as you have covered them previously? RobRohm

As a teenager I didn’t realise that Bowie’s Pin-Ups and Bryan Ferry’s These Foolish Things were covers albums. They sounded like their albums! Bowie was on the original longlist for Imposter, but I wanted to mix Elvis [Always On My Mind], Neil Young [A Man Needs a Maid] and so on with more contemporary artists. Mark Lanegan’s Strange Religion came up immediately. We’ve done Cat Power’s Metal Heart, and PJ Harvey’s usually intimate The Desperate Kingdom Of Love with a 10-piece band. Rowland S Howard [Shut Me Down] was a unique guitar player in the Birthday Party but his songwriting, melody and lyrical content have been overlooked and I wanted to pay homage to the post-punk, DIY thing which was so important to us when we started. Punk taught us that if we had an idea, there were ways to get it done.

I’ve been singing Martin [Gore]’s songs [in Depeche Mode] for 40 years, so I’ve already been doing my homework [laughs]. Over the years – not right from the beginning – that has become a thing where I hear the song, I hear Martin’s words, his melodies and then I’ll work with the song before I go back the next day with a suggested key change or tempo or arrangement or whatever. That’s what we do when we’re in the studio together. It’s the same thing: how do I make this my own? Martin and I have had that kind of relationship for years where there’s a synergy between us, so we’re able to get out of the way and just work on what is best for the song.

Like everyone you have had ups and downs. Is there anything you regret? SisterOfNight

Regret is a weird word. I don’t look back on my life like that any more, or use excuses for choices I made [Gahan was technically dead for two minutes following a heroin overdose in 1996]. Good or bad, they have consequences, but I’m leading a pretty blessed life here [in New York]. I just enjoy what I’m doing as much as I can.

Which performers helped inspire your stage craft? Phrippy450

From an early age, Mick Jagger. When I was a kid I danced around a lot and mimicked people on Top of the Pops. Bowie was a big influence, but when I was 14 I was infatuated by Dave Vanian from the Damned, his whole stage persona. As a teenager I saw all the glam stuff on Top of the Pops and then took from people like James Brown, Prince and Elvis. When I first started performing, I was paralysed with terror. I’d hang on to the microphone and my knuckles would still be clenched afterwards. Then I found that if I moved around, I didn’t feel so nervous. I kept moving and gradually, within all the stuff I was nicking, I found something of my own.

What’s the best book you’ve ever read? JimboSpain

I really liked Philip Norman’s biographies of the Beatles [Shout!] and especially the Stones [The Stones]. I’m currently reading Hunter S Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas again and laughing a lot more, cos I know that stuff [laughs]. When you think you’re on a mission and it’s nuts. That first line – “We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold” – sets it up.

What are your current favourite albums that are inspiring you to make music? Mstapachuau

I’ve been playing the Stones’ Exile on Main Street a lot, this shambolic but beautiful thing. I’ve been playing along to it – badly, probably – but I love that feeling of [laughs] “I’m in the Stones!” I’ve just got the new album by Bobby Gillespie and Jehnny Beth from Savages. It’s a step out of the norm for them, which drew me to it.

When were you last in Basildon? Are you aware of that weird roundabout that doesn’t really go anywhere on the A127? Comfortably_Dumb

[Laughs] I kinda know which one this is about, but I don’t really remember. Nowadays, because I’m living in the States, when I go back to England I sometimes drive on the wrong side of the road, especially at roundabouts! On the last tour I took my son and daughter to my old road, Bonnygate, and pointed to the little council semi where I grew up. I had to explain it was two houses, attached together. It was good for them to see where I came from.

What has been the best teacher for you in life: pain or love? Jaciara

They are both very, very close in line for me. I’m not going to say any more because I’d get myself in trouble [laughs].

If you could record a song with anyone, living or dead – singer, musician or producer – who would it be? Plastique303

I think Daniel Lanois’s ethereal sound might bring something really interesting to Martin’s hardcore electronics. [Brian] Eno’s name came up once, but then he started working with Coldplay so we couldn’t do that even if it was a possibility. We always try to take a risk. We did some great records with Flood. I’d like to work with him again.

How much have the events of the last two years affected you and will we hear it in future songs? Terry_S

It affected all of us. If I’m not working, I spend a lot of time isolated but I’ve grown more comfortable with that and now see it as a friend. I have had a spurt of inspiration. So … we’ll see.

I think it was Bobby Gillespie who once said in an interview that you would chastise your band members for putting cutlery into the dishwasher the wrong way up. Is this true and have you got other domestic-based chunks of wisdom? PaddyPilgrim

[Laughs] I do have a pet hate with people putting stuff in the dishwasher, and will turn things around if somebody has loaded it incorrectly. With our current machine you lay the cutlery in line on a rack, which makes it even more obsessional. My tip is never use an oven self-cleaning facility more than twice because any more than that and it will overheat and destroy the oven, as I found out recently.

What was the best concert that you have attended by another band? GavinTheLegend

Sigur Rós, Beacon Theatre, New York, around 2002. The sound, the beauty and the sheer power of the music was incredible. I was so overwhelmed with feelings that it brought me to tears.

If you hadn’t been a musician, what would you like to have spent your life doing? wenders14

I could have been some kind of thief. When I was 16, it wasn’t looking good. I was easily led, but I also liked painting. Aged 17, I went to the same art college as Alison Moyet and a couple of guys from Talk Talk. Out of that scene came the chance to participate in music, which gave me a sense of purpose. It felt like the weirdos were my kind of people. I still hang out with weirdos!

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Dave Gahan and Soulsavers "Imposter" Vinyl 12" test pressing US