On her sublime Two Suns concept album of 2009, Bat for Lashes (aka Natasha Khan) was most obviously in debt to the theatricality of Kate Bush and the mysticism of Stevie Nicks, but the dark majesty of Depeche Mode also played a role. The song was actually kind of a ringer for the album – it had been a B-side four years earlier – and when critics went after the album, they took care to note that at least the Pumpkins had made the effort to do something different. I actually like their version a lot better than ours.” Indeed, while there’s still a hint of Billy Corgan’s trademark whimper/howl/whimper, the song gets a measured guitar treatment, holding onto its reins in a way that gives a sense of the power behind the quiet, ready to be unleashed. “t’s kind of like the opposite of what you’d expect the Pumpkins to do with it. “I particularly like the Smashing Pumpkins version of ‘Never Let Me Down,'” Dave Gahan said in an interview about the aforementioned 1998 Depeche tribute album For the Masses. The Smashing Pumpkins – Never Let Me Down Again It echoes British indie-soul acts like Jack Garratt and James Vincent McMorrow – if they’d recorded at Muscle Shoals. They bring a side of soul to this grooving slow-burn. The hard-to-Google trio love+war’s “Go Your Own Way” appeared on our Best Covers of 2017 list, and “Policy of Truth” comes off that same covers album, Nine Lives. Their appreciation – and their own talent – still shines through. Two decades and change later, they had gained much critical and commercial success as Röyksopp, and they returned to the song, this time bringing Suzanne Sundfør to the microphone. “Ice Machine” is a good example – it’s the B-side to their first single, backing “Dreaming of Me.” Svein Berge and Torbjørn Brundtland, barely in their teens, took the time to learn it in salute to one of their musical heroes. Röyksopp – Ice Machineĭepeche Mode are the sort of band that finds their every track amassing its own following. Drums pound hard, gospelly backing vocals enter the fray, and swirling synth sounds fade in and out, all of which escalate on the impressive wigout of an outro.- Adam Mason 6. There’s certainly no shortage of passion in Molko’s occasionally broken delivery, nor in the way the band exploit the inspired guitar riff to the max, and transform the track into a six-minute epic. With the nasally voiced Brian Molko at the helm, Placebo proved more than capable of reinterpeting Gore’s song of sexual/spiritual ecstacy, which they originally released on a fan-club-only cassette. Placebo similarly adopted an androgynous image and specialized in glammy songs about sex and bisexual identity, most famously “Nancy Boy” and their 1998 US hit “Pure Morning.” It seemed only right, therefore, that they should deliver a blinding cover of Depeche Mode’s “I Feel You” from 1993’s Songs of Faith and Devotion. Gahan and the boys had forged their own path of purist electronic music combined with sleazy tunes and a provocative look (particularly around Gore’s eyeliner and occasional bondage gear). Like so many devotees of the group, English rock band Placebo related to Depeche Mode as outsiders, being out of step with what co-founder Stefan Olsdal called the “straight lads from the pub” culture of the UK music scene in the late ’90s, in the wake of Oasis and Britpop. The harmonies that creep in add to the overall haunting mood.
The piano line becomes a little more fluid yet still understated in the choruses. Simple, piano chords are the only background instrumentation, and they punctuate Amos’s words in the verses with a little drama. The dissonance in the opening lines “words like violence / break the silence” of this cover contrast heavily with the upbeat opening of the original. Tori Amos’s “Enjoy the Silence” is a sparse one with a darker tinge. Like Duncan Sheik (#18), it finds away to bring Depeche Mode to a more Starbucks-y style without stripping the song of its underlying darkness. One of the many highlights on Greg Laswell’s 2019 album Covers II, “Never Let Me Down Again” teams the California singer-songwriter whose songs were used constantly in Grey’s Anatomy with Molly Jenson, another San Diego-born songwriter. The lead singer gets more and more earnest as the song goes on, urging us like any heartfelt preacher would to “reach out and touch faith.” – Sara Stoudt 9. The song starts out rather monotone like the original, but after the first of many synth solos, variation increases. A mix of driving bass and spunky synth come together to support the deep lead vocal and the background singers’ crooning. “Personal Jesus” gets a gospel groove in this cover.