Depeche Mode open up about the loss of Andy Fletcher: “He was the band’s biggest fan”
Depeche Mode are back with new music for the first time since Spirit in 2017. In the intervening years, the electro band lost their keyboard player and founding member Andy Fletcher after suffering an aortic dissection in 2022.
The Essex band have since been reflecting on this loss and how it has informed their new music. “I think Dave [Gahan] said recently that he was the band’s biggest fan,” Martin Gore told Zane Lowe. “And believe it or not, I honestly believe that he enjoyed being in Depeche Mode more than me or Dave. I mean he was larger than life.”
Gahan added: “I think as we get to actually miss Fletch and grieve him through the process of making the record his presence was there. I know that sounds weird, but it was. And it continues when we’re rehearsing now and when we’re doing things and we’ve been out on a promo trip for a while and doing things. Everything that we do without Fletch is a first.”
Speaking about the unknown territory the band are heading towards, Gore continued: “The first show is going to be kind of… it could be weird for us being there with the audience for the first time. It’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be something that we think about all the time. He’s not here any more. Physically, he’s not here. He was always on my left side. And I looked, even now when we were rehearsing often or when we’ve been doing things when we did our first TV.”
He then concluded by reflecting on the sombre experience of their first show without Fletcher: “Actually, the whole experience was, for me, felt awful. Everything about it was wrong. And although everybody afterwards said, ‘Oh, it was great. It was great.’ All that kind of stuff. I kept thinking about how strange it felt to not have Fletch behind me on there.”
Depeche Mode’s new album, Memento Mori, is due for release on March 24th via Columbia. With a global tour coinciding that runs up until December.
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