"Too Much Information" is the third single released from Duran Duran's 1993 album, Duran Duran, popularly known as The Wedding Album.
The song's lyrics deal mainly with the commercialisation of the music industry and feature the tongue-in-cheek line "Destroyed by MTV / I hate to bite the hand that feeds me / so much information", alluding to the belief that MTV were largely responsible for the band's success in the United States in the early 1980s.
In the UK, "Too Much Information" became the band's third Top 40 single from the album. The song fared poorly on the U.S. Billboard pop and adult contemporary charts, though performed much better on the alternative rock and club charts.
The video for "Too Much Information" was filmed by director Julien Temple in Santa Monica on 27 August and featured the elaborate stage setup designed for the band's 1993 Dilate Your Mind tour.
"Come Undone" is a song by British band Duran Duran. It was released in March 1993 as the second single from the album Duran Duran (The Wedding Album). It is their 24th single overall.
With their commercial and critical success reestablished by the previous single "Ordinary World", "Come Undone" continued to showcase more of the band's entry into the adult contemporary radio format. The single proved to be the group's second consecutive US top ten hit from The Wedding Album. It was also popular in the UK and other international markets, with Israel being the only country to make it the number one song of 1993.
The group's guitarist at the time, Warren Cuccurullo, is credited with developing the instrumentation for "Come Undone", most importantly its guitar hook, which he developed while trying to do a re-interpretation of "First Impression" from their 1990 album Liberty. In 2005, Cuccurullo revealed to author Steve Malins that he and Nick Rhodes had originally planned on using the song for a project outside of Duran Duran with Gavin Rossdale, but had changed plans when singer Simon Le Bon took a liking to the music and began to come up with lyrics on the spot.
Rhodes expanded on the song's creation during the album's 20th anniversary in 2013.
It was something that Warren and I started writing alongside some other stuff that we’d been playing around with, and Simon came in and heard what we were doing. He said, 'Wow, I love that!’ And so it became a Duran Duran song. [Simon] came up with a really great melody – we already had the 'can’t ever keep from falling apart' section – and he very quickly made it his, or himself part of it".
The song was included as a last minute addition to their self-titled album in 1993, with the lyrics being written by Le Bon as a gift for his wife, Yasmin.
The group's bassist, John Taylor, did not actually play bass on this track, although he does in the music video. Nick Rhodes and John Jones both contributed synth bass on the track during his absence. Tessa Niles was credited with backing vocals. The song also contains a sample from The Soul Searchers' song "Ashley's Roachclip".
According to John Jones,
at the time we had completed and mastered the Wedding Album and had started the cover album "Thank You". One day we took the drum loop and bass groove from a demo of mine called "Face to Face" and added the ultra cool guitar riff that Warren had come up with for a new "cover" version of "First Impression". After a couple of hours of tweaking we played the track over the phone to Capitol in Los Angeles and they loved it and said they wanted it on the Wedding album! When Nick arrived that afternoon the intro was carved into a song that we played to Simon that night. He was back the next day with the lyrics and the melody and I think we finished the vocals the day after that. On the fourth day we finished the track detail and sent it to David Richards in Switzerland to be mixed.
Lamya Al-Mugheiry sang the backing vocals in the Unplugged version of the song for MTV in November 1993.
The "Come Undone" video was directed by Julien Temple. Shots of the band were filmed in the London Aquarium, prominently featuring an arowana; these were interspersed with short vignettes of people "coming undone" in various ways. These vignettes include a little girl seeing her parents together, an older couple who have survived a flood, an alcoholic and a man who is revealed to be a cross-dresser. Also seen in the video is a woman struggling underwater to break free of the chains that bind her. LeBon and Taylor's Vivienne Westwood wardrobe were likely a nod to the band's early New Romantic era.
A portion of the music video can be seen in the "No Laughing" episode of the MTV show Beavis and Butt-head, which was aired on July 1993.
"Ordinary World" is the first single from Duran Duran's self-titled 1993 album, commonly known as The Wedding Album. The single reached number one on the US Hot 100 Airplay, the US Mainstream Top 40, and the Canadian RPM Top Singles charts. It also peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot 100, number two on the US Modern Rock Tracks chart and number six on the UK Singles Chart.
The song won an Ivor Novello Award in May 1994. Lead vocalist Simon Le Bon sang the song with Luciano Pavarotti, in a War Child benefit concert.
By the early 1990s, Duran Duran's popularity had faded. Their album Liberty had proved a commercial failure, its two singles failing to make a significant showing on British or American charts. It was not until Capitol leaked "Ordinary World" to a radio station in Jacksonville, Florida in the second half of 1992 that it looked like Duran Duran mania might yet hit again. The single proved so popular that Capitol had to push the US release date up, ultimately releasing it in December.
The keyboards in the song were arranged and performed by Nick Rhodes and John Jones. The drums were played by Steve Ferrone at Maison Rouge. The guitar solo that characterizes this song was arranged and performed by Warren Cuccurullo, former player with Frank Zappa. His instrumental rock trio version became a staple of his solo shows and was included on one of his solo albums "Roadrage".
The music video was filmed by director Nick Egan at Huntington Gardens in San Marino, California and the song later featured in the soundtrack to the film Layer Cake in 2005.
Simon LeBon later performed the song with Pavarotti at a WarChild benefit. The performance was released on home video as Pavarotti & Friends: Together for the Children of Bosnia.
The lyrics to "Ordinary World" were written by Simon Le Bon as the second of a trilogy of songs for his late friend David Miles; the others being "Do You Believe in Shame?" (1988) and "Out of My Mind" (1997).
"Ordinary World" is one of two Cuccurullo-era songs ("Come Undone" being the other) which were played when Duran Duran did their reunion tour, both Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor insisting on playing it. Cuccurullo was brought in to teach Andy Taylor how to play it. It has remained in the set list ever since.
"Skin Trade" is the second single from Duran Duran's Notorious album, and the band's 15th single in total. It was released in January 1987, reached #22 on the UK Singles Chart, and #39 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The music for "Skin Trade" was written long before Simon LeBon finally finished the lyrics. The title for the song was derived from the Dylan Thomas book Adventures in the Skin Trade which John Taylor had on him during recording of the album. It was shortened to "Skin Trade" and LeBon eventually wrote the melody and lyrics for the track while spending an evening in Taylor's Upper West Side Manhattan apartment. The lyrics reflect on how everyone is selling themselves, and "there's a little hooker in each of us".
The single was quite a departure for the band. Not only was Simon LeBon singing in a Prince-style falsetto, but a horn section played a prominent role in the track, as played by The Borneo Horns. The band persevered with the single and many aspects of their future business took inspiration from "Skin Trade". They called their publishing company Skin Trade Music Ltd. and the Notorious tour was called the "Strange Behaviour Tour". Likewise, a 1987 remix EP and a 1999 double CD collection of remixes were also called Strange Behaviour.
In a retrospective review of the single, Allmusic journalist Donald A. Guarisco praised the song. He wrote: "The music lends contrast to the angry tone of the lyrics by creating a sultry, mellow melody that juxtaposes verses with a soft, hypnotic ebb and flow with an ever-ascending chorus that revs up the song's inherent drama."
The "Skin Trade" video was the second filmed for the band by directors Peter Kagan and Paula Greif, after "Notorious". Film of band members performing was treated with a rotoscope-like effect, adding vivid colors to details like a person's eyes or jewelry. Like so many other Duran Duran videos, "Skin Trade" included a beautiful woman - in this case German supermodel Tatjana Patitz. Her image was rotoscoped for some scenes as well, and her dancing figure was superimposed on several different vividly colored abstract backgrounds.
Session drummer Steve Ferrone and guitarist Warren Cuccurullo, who would later become a full member of the band, appeared in the video, although their faces are not often seen. Cuccurullo also contributed the power chords and harmony parts on the bridges of the album track, with session guitarist Nile Rodgers playing the others.
"Skin Trade" was nominated for Best Special Effects in a Video and Best Cinematography in a Video at the 1987 MTV Video Music Awards, but lost to Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" and Robbie Nevil's "C'est La Vie", respectively.
"Skin Trade" was the first chart disappointment in the band's career. Not only did it fail to repeat the huge success of "Notorious" but it failed to get the top 20 on either side of the Atlantic, and that was a first for the band since their very earliest releases. "Skin Trade" later grew to become a fan favourite, but the change of style and direction were shocking at the time.
"Notorious" is the fourteenth single by the English new wave band Duran Duran. It was released internationally by EMI on 20 October 1986. "Notorious" was the first single issued from Duran Duran's fourth album Notorious (1986), and the first released by Duran Duran as a 3-piece band after the departure of Roger Taylor and Andy Taylor. It was a commercial success worldwide, reaching number seven on the UK Singles Chart and number two on the US Billboard Hot 100, behind "Walk Like an Egyptian" by The Bangles, and was a success in various other countries.
"Notorious" marked the debut of the new streamlined trio version of Duran Duran, as Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor had left the band by the time the album was released. In fact, the acrimonious nature of Andy Taylor's departure was reflected in the song to a certain degree. According to songwriter Simon Le Bon, the lyric "Who really gives a damn for a flaky bandit" was a direct dig at the guitarist.
As a trio, the band had enlisted the help of Nile Rodgers to take over production duties. His funk influences can be heard throughout the single - for example, the tempo and the use of The Borneo Horns brass section. Rodgers also played the guitar on the single.
The video for "Notorious" was shot on 23 September 1986 by directors Peter Kagan and Paula Greif, and bore an uncanny resemblance to the video the duo had filmed in June of that year for Steve Winwood's "Higher Love". The video was shot in black and white Super-8 with a hand-held camera, with quick cuts and changes of zoom and focus. It featured the three-piece band performing the song on a sound stage, with scantily clad dancers in the background choreographed by Paula Abdul.
The young model Christy Turlington appeared in outdoor scenes with the band. A still photo from this location was used as the cover of the album Notorious.
"The Wild Boys" is the twelfth single by the English new wave band Duran Duran, released on 26 October 1984 in the United Kingdom and on 3 November 1984 in the United States.
The song was the only studio track on the band's live album Arena (1984), and was produced by Nile Rodgers, who had previously remixed the band's previous single "The Reflex". It was recorded at the end of July 1984 at Maison Rouge Studios in London.
"The Wild Boys" became one of the band's biggest hits, reaching number two on the US Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks, behind "Out of Touch" by Hall & Oates and "Like a Virgin" by Madonna, and also hitting number one on the US Cash Box. It peaked at number two on the UK Singles Chart, and also reached the top position in Germany, Italy and Canada. It also became the band's biggest charting single in Australia, reaching number three.
The idea for the song came from longtime Duran Duran video director Russell Mulcahy, who wanted to make a full-length feature film based on the surreal and sexual 1971 novel The Wild Boys: A Book of the Dead by William S. Burroughs. He suggested that the band might create a modern soundtrack for the film in the same way that Queen would later provide a rock soundtrack for Mulcahy's 1986 film Highlander. Singer Simon Le Bon began writing some lyrics based on Mulcahy's quick synopsis of the book, and the band created a harsh-sounding instrumental backdrop for them.
The single was issued with six separate collectible covers – one featuring each individual band member and one of the band collectively.
The video for "The Wild Boys" was directed by Russell Mulcahy. The cost totalled over one million pounds, a staggering sum for music videos at the time, as his design filled one entire end of the "007 Stage" at Pinewood Studios with a metal pyramid and a windmill over a deep enclosed pool, and called for a lifelike robotic face, dozens of elaborate costumes, prosthetics, and makeup effects, and then-cutting-edge computer graphics. The choreography of dance routines was undertaken by Arlene Phillips, including intricate stunts and fire effects added to the cost. Mulcahy meant the video to be a teaser for his full-length Burroughs film, demonstrating his vision to the movie studios he was wooing, but that project was never made.
The video featured all of the band members imprisoned and in peril, wearing uncharacteristically rough and ragged outfits similar to the pieced-together clothing of the film Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior. John Taylor was strapped to the roof of a car suffering a psycho-torture with pictures of his childhood and early past, Nick Rhodes was caged with a pile of computer equipment, Roger Taylor was put in a hot-air balloon that was dangling from the ceiling, leaving him high off the ground, and Andy Taylor was bound (guitar and all) to a ship's figurehead. Singer Simon Le Bon, strapped to the spinning windmill which dunked his head beneath the water with each revolution, supposedly found himself in real difficulty when the windmill stopped with his head underwater. He was given a tube to breathe through and the issue was promptly fixed, but the British tabloids had a field day exaggerating Le Bon's "near death experience". Le Bon himself has dismissed this story in more than one interview as an "urban myth", claiming nothing of the sort happened.
"The Wild Boys" was named British Video of the Year at the 1985 Brit Awards.
The 8:00 12" "Wilder Than Wild Boys" extended mix, the only official contemporaneous remix, is actually the full length version. It continues after the album/single version's fade out with another instrumental section, then repeats the chorus to fade. This mix was also used for the full length promo video.
To promote the release of the compilation album Greatest in 1998, EMI commissioned a number of remixes, including two mixes of "The Wild Boys" that were released only on promo discs:
"The Wild Boys [ASAP & PM Project Remix]" 3:42 appeared on a one-track promo CD in Spain
"Wild Boys 98 [4 On Da Floor Remix]" 3:10 appeared on a one-track promo CD in Belgium
In 2004, noted remixer Paul Dakeyne produced the 7:30 "Wicked 'n Wild Dub" for DMC, the UK-based remix service.
The original single B-side, "(I'm Looking For) Cracks In The Pavement (Live)", was recorded at the 5 March 1984 show at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. This is the same concert where the video for "The Reflex" was filmed.
"The Reflex" is the eleventh single by Duran Duran, released worldwide on 16 April 1984. The song was heavily remixed for single release and was the third and last to be taken from their third album Seven and the Ragged Tiger.
"The Reflex" became the band's most successful single. It was their second single to top the UK Singles Chart, after "Is There Something I Should Know?" in 1983, topping the chart on 5 May, and would prove to be their last UK no. 1. The single entered the charts in America on 21 April 1984 at no. 46, became Duran Duran's first of two singles to hit no. 1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 (for 2 weeks) on 23 June 1984 (see 1984 in music), and was a huge hit internationally. (Their only other single to hit no. 1 in the US was the title song to the James Bond film "A View to a Kill".) It was also the first of two songs that kept "Dancing in the Dark" by Bruce Springsteen out of the top spot (the other one being Prince's "When Doves Cry"). The band wanted it to be the lead single from Seven and the Ragged Tiger, but their label didn't like the warbling singing during the "why don't you use it" segments, thinking this would hinder its success as a stand-alone single track.
The remixes for both the 7" and 12" singles were created by Nile Rodgers, of Chic fame. It was his first work with the band, and he would later go on to produce "The Wild Boys" single as well as the album Notorious (1986) and several tracks on Astronaut (2004).
Producer Ian Little recalled the sound Nick Rhodes came up with on his Roland Jupiter-8 keyboard: "...whenever I hear that steel-drum part it always brings a smile to my face because it's so out of tune. Steel drums always are, but it was exactly right in terms of rhythm and tone. So a wood-block sound was mixed in to make it even more percussive and, successfully, it did the job."
Main photography for the video for "The Reflex" took place during the Seven and the Ragged Tiger tour at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto, Ontario on 5 March 1984. Director Russell Mulcahy filmed some of the closeup footage in the indoor arena that afternoon, and the band's performance was filmed live during that evening's concert.
"The Reflex" is primarily a concert video, accurately portraying Duran Duran's Sing Blue Silver tour performance style. However, in keeping with the band's insistence that their videos "never be ordinary", the video screen above the stage displayed bits of naked models wearing collars and chains illuminated with black light, occasionally interrupted by computerized video white noise. At one point, a computer graphics generated waterfall appears to pour out of the video screen above the stage to soak the audience.
Keyboard enthusiasts have taken special note of the Fairlight CMI (the first digital sampling synthesiser) that Nick Rhodes operated with a light pen in this video, and throughout the tour.
Some symbolic scenes from the official video were taken and later mixed with the alternate version shown in the band's concert film Arena (An Absurd Notion); in the final segment when the band, the crowd and even the fans undertake the final and crucial battle against the evil Dr. Durand Durand.
"New Moon on Monday" is the tenth single by the English new wave band Duran Duran, released on 23 January 1984 in the United Kingdom.
The second single to be taken from the band's third album Seven and the Ragged Tiger (1983), the song was another success, reaching the top-ten on both the UK and US charts. On 11 February 1984, the single reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and on 17 March, it reached number ten on the US Billboard Hot 100, after entering on 14 January 1984 at number 56. It did not chart well in Australia and Scandinavia, territories where its predecessor, "Union of the Snake", had been a big hit. This trend was reversed with the next single, "The Reflex", which became a worldwide number-one hit.
The music video for "New Moon on Monday" was filmed by director Brian Grant during the morning of December 7, 1983, in the village of Noyers in France. It has a loosely sketched storyline in which the band appear as members of an underground rebellion called "La Luna" (the name is one of the few connections between the video's content and the song lyrics), organizing a revolt against a modern (1980s-era computers are used) oppressive militaristic regime, apparently in France.
"We set out to make a little movie," recalled Grant. "I'm not sure we succeeded." He was not the first choice to shoot the video, as Russell Mulcahy, director of many of the band's other videos, was unavailable.
Several versions of this video exist. The longest is a 17-minute "movie version" which includes an extended introduction before the song starts (including a scene of dialogue between Simon Le Bon and the story's female lead, played by Patricia Barzyk, winner of the Miss France title in 1980; a brief snippet of "Union of the Snake" is also heard on a radio), and is set to an extended remix of the song. A shorter version, with a spoken French-dialogue intro, was originally submitted to MTV, who then later requested an even shorter version without the prologue.
Yet another version was produced for the Dancing on the Valentine video collection, showing blue-lit scenes of the band members in front of a full-moon backdrop. All but one of the versions were included as easter eggs on the 2004 DVD compilation Greatest.
Both Andy Taylor and Nick Rhodes say this is the band's least favourite video. "Everybody ... hates it, particularly the dreadful scene at the end where we all dance together," Taylor wrote in his memoirs. "Even today, I cringe and leave the room if anyone plays [it]." He recalls that they were miserable since their Christmas holiday had been cut short to shoot the video, and spent most of the day on the dark and cold set drinking, to the point that he was "half cut" by the time the last scenes were shot. "It's one of the few times I've seen Nick dance."
"New Moon on Monday" was backed with a remix of the instrumental "Tiger Tiger" done by Ian Little. The original version of the instrumental was found on the Seven and the Ragged Tiger album. The release was rounded out by an extended version of the title track.
"Girls on Film" is the third single by Duran Duran, released on 13 July 1981.
The single became Duran Duran's Top 10 breakthrough in the UK Singles Chart, peaking at Number 5 in July 1981. The band personally selected the song for release following the failure of its predecessor, "Careless Memories", which had been chosen by their record company, EMI. Its popularity provided a major boost to sales of the band's eponymous debut album, Duran Duran, which had been released a month earlier.
The song did not chart in the United States on its initial release, but it became popular and widely known after receiving heavy airplay on MTV when the Duran Duran album was re-issued in 1983. The song was used as the opening theme song for the anime series Speed Grapher in the Japanese language version (the song wasn't able to be licensed for releases outside of Japan), and the night version appeared on 2012 Square Enix video game Sleeping Dogs.
The song begins with a recording of the rapid whirring of a motor drive on a camera. Both manager Paul Berrow and photographer Andy Earl claim to have supplied the camera for the recording.
Over the years, "Girls on Film" has become a staple of the encores for Duran Duran's live performances and is often the final song of a concert, during which lead singer Simon Le Bon introduces the rest of the band.
The song, along with "Rio", was originally omitted from the 1984 live album Arena to make room for newer and less familiar album material from 1983's Seven and the Ragged Tiger. Both tracks were included as bonus material in the 2004 CD reissue of Arena.
The song fared well on the radio and the charts before the video was filmed, but the controversy that ensued helped to keep the band in the public eye and the song on the charts for many weeks.
The video was made with directing duo Godley & Creme at Shepperton Studios in July 1981. It was filmed just weeks before MTV was launched in the United States and before anyone knew what an impact the music channel would have on the industry. The band expected the "Girls on Film" video to be played exclusively at nightclubs that had video screens. The raunchy video created an uproar, and it was consequently banned by the BBC and heavily edited for its original run on MTV; the band unabashedly enjoyed and capitalised on the controversy.
A Video 45 for "Girls on Film" and "Hungry Like the Wolf" was released in the United States in March 1983. The VHS-format tape contains the MTV-friendly edited "day version" of "Girls on Film", while the Betamax and CED Videodisc format contained the original uncensored "night version". The Video 45 won the Grammy Award for Best Short Form Music Video in 1984, the first year the Academy gave that award. The uncensored video was also included in the Duran Duran video album (1983) and the Greatest video collection (released on VHS in 1999, and on DVD in 2004, which was given a restrictive 18 rating in the United Kingdom and Ireland). The edited version would later be used in the 2008 karaoke video game SingStar Pop Vol. 2.
Simon Le Bon commented in the audio interview on the Greatest DVD collection that the scandal of the music video overshadowed the song's message of fashion model exploitation.
Summary of the uncensored full-length music video:
The band performs on an elevated stage behind a models' catwalk, which resembles a boxing ring, as various scantily clad women act out a series of erotic vignettes. A number of these scenarios feature mild depictions of BDSM, sexual fetishism and fantasy and recurring themes of seduction and abandonment:
Two models in lacy black teddies mount the catwalk carrying pillows. They straddle a shaving cream-covered post at either end and move toward the centre, sliding their crotches along the horizontal candy-striped shaft in a slow and suggestive manner. The models proceed to have a pillow fight, which causes their breasts to become partially exposed. Upon finishing, they kiss and return to their dressing room and pour champagne on each other's cleavage.
A petite female Sumo wrestler with her hair flared up in a tall tophawk ponytail mounts the catwalk to confront a lumbering, heavyset male Sumo wrestler. The woman is wearing a sheer top and a mawashi loincloth; the camera follows her as she enters, offering a generous, fetishistic view of her partially exposed buttocks. In the confrontational tachi-ai stance, she seizes her opponent by the shoulder and flips him forward head-over-heels. He somersaults and lands on his backside with a thud and she gives the ceremonial rei salutation (i.e., a bow) and walks away victorious.
A masseuse in a white nurse's uniform with white garter suspenders and sheer white stockings administers a full-body hot-oil massage to a man (the sumo wrestler) on a steam-bath table. She later walks away leaving the man unconscious.
A woman in a cowgirl costume rides on the back of a muscular, G-string-wearing, black male model who is fetishistically costumed as an equine. She later soaps his semi-nude body with a wet sponge and then leads him on a leash while he cavorts behind her.
A model wearing a one-piece swimsuit and high-heels struts and poses on the catwalk before falling backwards into a child's inflatable plastic wading pool and collapsing. She is "rescued" and revived by a male lifeguard. She responds by embracing and kissing the lifeguard so intensely that he becomes unconscious from exhaustion and is left in the pool while she walks away. The model is later seen reclining on a chair, nude, drying herself with an electric blow dryer before rubbing ice cubes on her nipples in closeup.
A brunette model removes her fur coat to reveal her breasts and skintight see-through plastic knickers underneath. She mud-wrestles with a blonde woman wearing a one-piece swimsuit. The blonde woman loses and is left behind in the mud, while the brunette woman is attended by a clothed male assistant who sprays the mud off her body with a water hose.
Halo es una canción del grupo inglés de música electrónica Depeche Mode compuesta por Martin Gore, publicada en el álbum Violator de 1990, la cual además se realizó en vídeo promocional.
La canción “Halo” se dio a conocer en el álbum Violator de 1990 sin convertirse en sencillo promocional, sin embargo, tuvo una edición promocional en Inglaterra y en Estados Unidos para complementar toda la parafernalia surgida alrededor del éxito logrado por el disco.
El tema fue uno de los que provocó las reseñas más dispares, en buena parte por el carácter inclasificable de su arreglo. Algunos medios la consideraron una canción elegante, otros, seductora, y otros, simplemente una fusión original.
Comienza con un efecto que pareciera un canto de monos y una musicalización selvática. Continúa con modulaciones de sintetizador al minuto de duración una melodía compuesta con todo y sampler de bajo, así como las características notas graves del teclado de Alan Wilder. El coro a cargo de David Gahan con Martin Gore dice “Cuando nuestros mundos se hagan pedazos, cuando los muros caigan, aunque puede que lo merezcamos, habrá valido la pena”, con un cierto tinte de melancolía.
Lo más llamativo es sin duda lo inusual de su musicalización, que de algún modo remite a los primeros años de experimentalismo del rock progresivo, mezclando diversos sonidos extraños para lograr una verdadera melodía. Aunque por lo mismo pareciera una función de jazz electrónico, la canción en ningún momento cae en los patrones de música suelta improvisada.
Sobre la edición promocional, en realidad, se planeaba publicarlo como sencillo regular, pero esto no se concretó.
“Halo” es uno de los temas de Depeche Mode de los que se ha realizado vídeo promocional sin haber sido publicados como disco sencillo; los otros son “Clean” también del álbum Violator, el tema acústico-sinfónico “Pimpf” del álbum Music for the Masses y “One Caress” de Songs of Faith and Devotion. Estos dos últimos sí fueron lados B.
El vídeo se hizo en exclusiva y hasta la fecha sólo aparece en la colección Strange Too de ese mismo año. Como la mayoría de vídeos de aquella época de auge de Depeche Mode, fue dirigido por el fotógrafo y diseñador de arte holandés Anton Corbijn, quien realizó un montaje más con forma de cortometraje que de vídeo musical tradicional. El vídeo muestra a David Gahan como el hombre fuerte de un circo, probablemente el más adinerado ya que es el único que parece tener una casa donde dormir, teniendo una relación de pareja con una payasita; la relación va desapareciendo durante el transcurso del vídeo ya que ella tiene a otro payaso como amante, interpretado por Martin Gore. Finalmente ella deja su cómoda vida con Gahan por el que vendría a ser su verdadero amor, el payaso Gore, sin importarle tener que ir a dormir a la intemperie ya que con él es feliz. La última escena muestra un celoso Gahan contemplando la felicidad de la pareja que duerme bajo su casa rodante. A todo esto, Alan Wilder y Andrew Fletcher son un par de acompañantes del espectáculo sin una participación especifica en la historia.
Anton Corbijn aparece en dos escenas del vídeo alimentando un asno.
Para la gira Delta Machine Tour, bajo su versión de Goldfrapp, Corbijn realizó una proyección en la que se ve a una chica deambulando por escenarios berlineses.
Como todas las canciones del álbum Violator, el tema “Halo” fue uno de los más consistentes en conciertos de DM durante la correspondiente gira World Violation Tour, las que le siguieron, Devotional Tour y Exotic Tour, y hasta la gira Exciter Tour, en donde fue de los únicos temas permanentes en cada presentación. Posteriormente, se retomó para la gira Delta Machine Tour, pero en la versión realizada por Goldfrapp en 2004, que fue presentada como lado B del sencillo Enjoy the Silence 04.
Más recientemente, se incorporó en algunas fechas europeas al inicio del Global Spirit Tour.
En vivo, el coro se canta a tres o hasta a cinco voces, como en el Exciter Tour, dependiendo si cuentan con acompañamiento de coristas. Como otras canciones de aquella época de apogeo del grupo, sólo se cambia el efecto de percusión electrónica por batería acústica, pues es meramente sintético. Cabe mencionar que, en esencia, “Halo” es de los pocos temas que se interpretaron exactamente igual a como aparece en el álbum hasta antes de Delta Machine Tour, ya que en esta gira decidieron incorporar la mezcla de Goldfrapp. Para el Global Spirit Tour volvió en su forma epónima.
"World in My Eyes" is a song by English electronic music band Depeche Mode. It was released on 2 September 1990 as the fourth and final single from their seventh studio album, Violator (1990). It peaked at number 17 on the UK Singles Chart and at number 52 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
"Martin did the demo on his own," recalled Andy Fletcher. "I don't remember it standing out when we heard it then. But somehow, in the studio, it all came together brilliantly… Whenever I'm asked which of our tracks is my favourite, I always say 'World In My Eyes'."
The "World in My Eyes" single release included two exclusive B-sides, making Violator the only Depeche Mode album with all four singles having at least one exclusive B-Side, including instrumentals. The B-sides are "Happiest Girl" and "Sea of Sin". "Happiest Girl (Jack Mix)" and "Sea of Sin (Tonal Mix)" are the main 7" versions. "Original" versions were never released, or rather, these mixes are the regular versions, according to interviews and the official website. The cover art for "World in My Eyes" has a photo of one of the band members making a shape similar to that of glasses with their hands. On the Limited 12", there are pictures of all four members. The 2004 re-release of the EU single includes a longer-intro version of "World in My Eyes (Oil Tank Mix)".
The music video for "World in My Eyes" is directed by Anton Corbijn. There are two versions; the original version was not originally released to the public until The Videos 86-98. The original music video features some footage from the World Violation Tour, while Dave Gahan and a girl he's with watch it from a drive-in cinema. The alternate version on Strange Too features the band in the car instead, more live footage, and the silent ending with Gahan is longer.
"Policy of Truth" is a song by English electronic band Depeche Mode, released in May 1990 as the third single from their seventh studio album Violator (1990). Although the song was less successful than the first two singles before, it is the only Depeche Mode single to chart higher on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart (#15) than on the UK Singles Chart (#16), as well as peaking at number two on the Billboard Dance Club Songs chart. It also became the band's second chart-topper on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart.
"Enjoy the Silence" is a song by the English electronic band Depeche Mode, taken from their seventh studio album, Violator (1990). The song was recorded in 1989 and released on 16 January 1990 as the album's second single.
The single is Gold certificated in the US and Germany. The song won Best British Single at the 1991 BRIT Awards.
"Enjoy the Silence" was re-released as a single in 2004 for the Depeche Mode remix project Remixes 81–04, and was titled "Enjoy the Silence (Reinterpreted)" or, more simply, "Enjoy the Silence 04".
Songwriter Martin Gore created a ballad-like first version of the song, which the band took into the studio in 1989. At band member Alan Wilder's insistence, the song was re-worked into the up-tempo version released on the album. The "Harmonium" mix, released on the 12" single, is not the demo version, but rather a new version created to sound like the original demo.
The Anton Corbijn-directed music video for "Enjoy the Silence" references the themes and storyline of the philosophical children's book The Little Prince from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Footage of Dave Gahan dressed as a stereotypical king wandering the hillsides of the Scottish Highlands, the coast of Algarve in Portugal and finally the Swiss Alps with a deck chair is intercut with black-and-white footage of the band posing. Brief flashes of a single rose (which is also on the album cover of Violator) appear throughout the scenes.
When Corbijn presented the concept of the video to the band, which at the time was simply "Dave dressed up as a king, walking around with a deck chair", they initially rejected it. They changed their minds, when he explained that the idea was that the King (Dave) represented "a man with everything in the world, just looking for a quiet place to sit"; a king of no kingdom. Andy Fletcher jokes that he favoured the video because "[he] only had to do about an hour's worth of work".
The video uses a slightly different mix of the album version of the song (the most notable difference being a new and extended introduction) that has not been released in any audio format. The final long shots of the king walking through the snow are not Gahan but rather the video's producer, Richard Bell. Gahan had left the set, tired of the cold in Switzerland (recounted by Gahan in the intro to The Videos (86-98) and to the DVD of The Best of Depeche Mode Volume 1).
There are two edited versions of the Corbijn-directed video. One version begins with Andy Fletcher looking towards his right as the song begins. Shots of Dave Gahan dressed as a king singing directly to the camera are intercut with scenes of his walking through the Scottish Highlands, the coast of Portugal and the Swiss Alps. The video ends with Gahan singing the last line, "Enjoy the silence.", then putting his finger in front of his lips as if to quiet the viewer. This video is blocked in Japan, Mexico, United States. The second version begins with Martin Gore looking to his right as the song begins. This version omits the shots of Gahan singing directly to the camera. In this version, the only lines Gahan is shown singing are "Words are very unnecessary/They can only do harm." The video ends with Gahan sitting on a deck chair in the snow while the last line, "Enjoy the silence.", is sung. There are also differences in the group shots of the band standing together between the two versions.
In 1990, a promotional video for "Enjoy the Silence" was shot by French TV (for the TV Show "Champs-Élysées" with Michel Drucker) featuring Depeche Mode lip-synching the song while standing atop the World Trade Center at the WTC rooftop World observatory, south Tower #2.
"Personal Jesus" is a song by the English electronic band Depeche Mode, released on 28 August 1989 as the lead single from their seventh album, Violator (1990). It reached No. 13 on the UK Singles Chart and No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100. The single was their first to make the US Top 40 since 1984's "People Are People", and was their first gold-certified single in the US (quickly followed by its successor, "Enjoy the Silence").
In Germany, "Personal Jesus" is one of the band's longest-charting songs, staying on the singles chart for 23 weeks.
In 2004, "Personal Jesus" was ranked No. 368 in Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", and in September 2006 it was voted as one of the "100 Greatest Songs Ever" in Q magazine.
"Personal Jesus" was rereleased as a single on 30 May 2011 for the Depeche Mode remix album Remixes 2: 81–11, with the leading remix by the production team Stargate.
The song has been covered by numerous artists, including Gravity Kills, Marilyn Manson, Johnny Cash and Sammy Hagar. "I was never a huge fan of synth music in the eighties," Hagar remarked, "but that song has a badass groove and a cool lyric."
In mid-1989, the band began recording in Milan with record producer Flood. The result of this session was the single "Personal Jesus", which featured a catchy bluesy riff and drum-based sound, radically different from anything the band had released thus far. The song became a big hit across the world, and is one of Depeche Mode's most successful songs, along with the single "Enjoy the Silence". Although not the first Depeche Mode song to feature guitar parts ("Behind the Wheel" and their cover of "Route 66" featured a guitar; "Love, in Itself" and "And Then..." from Construction Time Again and "Here is the House" from "Black Celebration" featured an acoustic guitar), it was the first time a guitar was used as a dominant instrument in a Depeche Mode song.
Prior to its release, advertisements were placed in the personal columns of regional newspapers in the UK with the words "Your own personal Jesus." Later, the ads included a phone number one could dial to hear the song. The ensuing controversy helped propel the single to No. 13 on the UK charts, becoming one of Depeche Mode’s biggest sellers. The single was particularly successful commercially thanks to the fact that it was released six months prior to the album it would later appear on. Up to that point, it was the best selling 12" single in Warner Bros. history.
"Personal Jesus" had a plethora of remixes, almost unprecedented for Depeche Mode at the time. While most other Depeche Mode singles prior to "Personal Jesus" usually had band-made extended mixes, Depeche Mode started to invite more DJs and mixers to the fold, which would become the mainstay for all future Depeche Mode singles. François Kevorkian (who did the mixing for the Violator album, in general) mixed the single version, the "Holier Than Thou Approach", the "Pump Mix", and the lesser-known "Kazan Cathedral Mix" (which was not available on any of the singles), while producer Flood mixed the "Acoustic" version and the "Telephone Stomp Mix" as well as the single version and "Sensual Mix" of the single's B-side "Dangerous". The "Hazchemix" and "Hazchemix Edit" of "Dangerous" were mixed by Daniel Miller.
The back-cover of "Personal Jesus" features one of the band members and the back-side of a naked woman. The band member she is with depends on whether it is the 7" vinyl (Martin Gore), the 12" vinyl (Dave Gahan), the cassette (Andy Fletcher), or the original CD (Alan Wilder). On some copies she does not appear at all, such as the 2004 CD re-release, and on promo copies. On some limited releases, like the GBong17, all four photos are available plus one photo of the full group with Martin hugging the woman.
The Anton Corbijn-directed music video for "Personal Jesus" is his first Depeche Mode video in colour, and features the band in a ranch (suggested to appear as a brothel), placed in the Tabernas Desert of Almería, in Spain. MTV edited out some suggestive mouth movements of Martin Gore during the bridge and replaced it with some other footage from the video.
Violator is the seventh studio album by English electronic music band Depeche Mode. It was released on 19 March 1990 by Mute Records. Preceded by the singles "Personal Jesus" and "Enjoy the Silence" (a top-10 entry in both the United Kingdom and the United States), Violator propelled the band into international stardom. The album yielded two further commercially successful singles, "Policy of Truth" and "World in My Eyes".
Violator reached number two on the UK Albums Chart, and is the band's first album to chart inside the top 10 of the Billboard 200, peaking at number seven. The album was supported by the World Violation Tour.
Compared to previous efforts, the band decided to try a new approach to recording. Alan Wilder said, "Usually we begin the making of a record by having extensive pre-production meetings where we decide what the record will actually sound like, then go into a programming studio. This time we decided to keep all pre-production work to a minimum. We were beginning to have a problem with boredom in that we felt we'd reached a certain level of achievement in doing things a certain way." Martin Gore elaborated, "Over the last five years I think we'd perfected a formula; my demos, a month in a programming studio, etc. etc. We decided that our first record of the '90s ought to be different."
With co-producer Mark "Flood" Ellis, Wilder began a complementary working relationship, with Flood able to provide the technical know-how and Wilder working on the arrangements and song textures. "That's how we made the group work at that time", clarified Wilder, "by accepting that we all had different roles and not actually all trying to do the same thing. So we ended up with this unwritten agreement in the band, where we'd all throw together a few ideas at the beginning of a track. Then Fletch and Mart would go away, and they'd come back after we'd worked on it for a while to give an opinion."
There was also a notable change in Gore's demos. After the rigid, limiting effects of almost-finished demos for Music for the Masses, Gore, agreeing to Wilder's request, kept them less complete this time around. Several of the basic recordings consisted of vocals over a simple guitar or organ part, with the odd percussion loop, but less sequenced material. The sparse demos allowed the band to take creative liberties with the songs. For instance, "Enjoy the Silence" started out as a slow ballad, but at Wilder's suggestion became a pulsating, up-tempo track.
The band convened to work on the record with Flood at Mute's WorldWide programming room in London for three weeks after which they flew to Milan for the new sessions at Logic studios. According to Flood, they didn't do a substantial amount of work in Milan, except for the song "Personal Jesus", which was crucial in setting the tone and spirit of the album. "Everybody was feeling each other out, because they wanted to try working in a different way. The idea was to work hard and party hard and we all enjoyed ourselves to the full." After Milan the band relocated to Puk studios in northern Denmark, where most of the album was recorded.
Martin called the track "World in My Eyes" a very positive song. "It's saying that love and sex and pleasure are positive things." The song "Blue Dress", which Gore called "pervy", is simply about "watching a girl dress and realising that this is 'what makes the world turn.'" With "Halo", Gore said, "I'm saying 'let's give in to this' but there's also a real feeling of wrongfulness [...] I suppose my songs do seem to advocate immorality but if you listen there's always a sense of guilt." The closing track, "Clean", was inspired by Pink Floyd's song "One of These Days", from their 1971 album Meddle. Said Wilder, "they [Pink Floyd] were doing something very different to anyone else at that time – you can hear electronics in there, and the influence of classical music. It's got a very repetitive, synthesised sound, and the bass riffs with the echo have a very hypnotic groove that underpins it. We basically nicked that idea [for 'Clean']".
Regarding the album's title, Martin said, "We called it Violator as a joke. We wanted to come up with the most extreme, ridiculously Heavy Metal title that we could. I'll be surprised if people will get the joke."
As a sign of their rising popularity when Violator was released, a signing party for fans at a Wherehouse record store in Los Angeles that was expected to draw only a few thousand fans ended up drawing around 17,000. The band were forced to withdraw from the event due to security concerns, and their early exit nearly caused a riot. Violator reached number 17 on the Billboard 200 year-end chart of 1990, and was the first Depeche Mode album to sell a million copies in the United States.
The success of Violator introduced the band to a wider audience, and this increased exposure led to their 1993 follow-up album Songs of Faith and Devotion debuting atop the charts in both the United States and United Kingdom. "Before this, we'd been going along quite nicely," recalled Andy Fletcher. "Then when it came to Violator we inexplicably went huge. It was just incredible, and in many ways we never really recovered from that. After that, we just felt like we wanted to muck it up a bit."
Track listing
All tracks are written by Martin L. Gore.
"World in My Eyes" 4:26
"Sweetest Perfection" 4:43
"Personal Jesus" 4:56
"Halo" 4:30
"Waiting for the Night" 6:07
"Enjoy the Silence" 6:12
"Policy of Truth" 4:55
"Blue Dress" 5:41
"Clean" 5:32
Total length:47:02
"Enjoy the Silence" includes the hidden track "Interlude #2 (Crucified)" starting at 4:21.
"Blue Dress" includes the hidden track "Interlude #3" starting at 4:18.
According to the band's website, the original title for "Waiting for the Night" was "Waiting for the Night to Fall" and the rest of the title was omitted due to a printing error.
Both the original US and the original UK vinyl editions have a shorter version of "Personal Jesus".
