“That hit a nerve”: the album that changed Dave Gahan’s life
While Depeche Mode started out as teen starlets of the new wave, the changing of the tides to a darker, more brooding electronic sound heralded a new era for the band and music at large as the shiny pop canon developed an edgier depth. This typified much of the synth-rock revolution of the period, allowing frontmen like Dave Gahan to lead the charge for a sonic rebellion.
However, within this is a much more eclectic backstory of musical inspirations than the heights of the charts, which would perhaps provide him the room to demonstrate. Naturally, for a pioneering mind that combined the forces of electronic music with the slickness of pop and the provocativeness of rock, some of Gahan’s most seminal sonic guiding lights are hardly the most conventional but nevertheless paved the way for a life of rapture.
Yet somewhat surprisingly, music appeals to Gahan on more than simply an auditory front. It was the combination of iconography, art, and visual symbolism that ultimately drew the singer toward the album that changed his life. As he recalled in a 2021 interview, “I love to browse through the shelves until I see a cover that appeals to me. I don’t have to know the band or artist, not at all. It was like that with Ágætis Byrjun from Sigur Rós. I didn’t know the band or music behind it, but kept seeing this artwork. No typography, just that image of an embryo.”
He continued: “So, I bought the record, and what I heard knocked me out. Not through force and noise, but through the simplicity of the songs and the understatement of the band. That hit a nerve with me. These mysterious musicians from Iceland spoke through their music (in their strange fantasy language) and gave me all these credos on the way: ‘Take yourself back. There is strength in serenity. Less can be more’.”
Thus, with Icelandic power coursing through his veins, the 1999 album set Gahan on his own path, freed from the constrictions of his band. Garnering Sigur Rós their first tastes of international acclaim from not only Gahan but the likes of David Bowie and Radiohead, their sophomore record Ágætis Byrjun explored the cosmic expanse of the stratosphere, combining classic rock recording techniques like backmasking with their native Icelandic tongue and own gibberish language.
Although the lyrics themselves mainly wouldn’t have been discernible to the untrained English ear, the sheer velocity of the sound had a more profound impact on Gahan than he ever could have imagined. Noting that, “A few years later, I felt ready to record my first solo album,” he explained. “It would sound different without Sigur Rós – if it would exist at all.”
Ultimately, it is the mark of visionary minds like Gahan and Sigur Rós themselves that can recognise the space for something completely alien and transcendental in the music sphere. Amid a litany of formulaic pop tunes, it truly demonstrates that the rock canon can offer fresh horizons—and even inspire some of its most blazing exports in the process.
