Depeche Mode release their new album, Sounds of the Universe, today and Martin Gore just did an interview with Out magazine.
Here's a sample:
You were playing with the ideas of sexual ambiguity at a time when pop stars who were actually gay were dancing around the issue or denying it.
We didn't feel like it was harming our career at all. I wasn't doing it for shock value. I was just playing with it, enjoying it. I look back at some of the outfits, and I laugh now. We saw some pictures recently and were laughing because I had on like a knee-length leather dress. I remember underneath it, I was wearing stockings and suspenders, and I was going on TV like that. It seemed like fun at the time, and I didn't think too much about the consequences. I think it some ways it was a little bit groundbreaking. It did help some people deal with their identities.
These days, every guitar band is taking their turn at the electropop you pioneered -- what do you think of The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, et. al.?
I like them, and MGMT. I think the stuff they do is great. It's always really flattering. We seem to have influenced many different genres of music: someone you don't expect very much, like Kanye West. It's nice.
What electronic music do you like now?
I DJ about two or three times a year, and I listen to a lot of dance music. My favorite artist at the moment is somebody called Rekorder. I think there's a lot of good electronic dance music that's being made. Personally, I think the majority of the challenging and interesting stuff is coming out of Europe. This may sound sacrilegious over here, but the American dance scene has been stuck in a time warp for the past 20 years. It doesn't seem to move. The whole house scene seems to be the prevalent one.
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