E Unit

Looks like me and the wife be seeing them Sept 20th.

JeffTheAlpaca

They will perform on the Tonight Show with Fallon today.

MBoyd

Ive been doing some kind of thing on Facebook to buy tickets early. I know they aren't what they once were but I haven't seen them in 23 years. Anyway, with the Facebook thing I am number 124 in a virtual line. Might be meaningless.

JeffTheAlpaca

Or Construction Time Again

Daytripper

Saw it. And unfortunately that dreadful song didn't fare any better live. And for fuck sake, why does Christian have to beat the shit out of those drums on every single track? I wish like hell if Depeche Mode had to have a drummer at all (and I don't think they should) they could do electronic drums like the Human League when they play live. My friend had the best comments about Depeche Mode these days:

"I haven't seen them since the unexciting Exciter tour. It breaks my heart that my favorite band, a band I have tattooed into my arm, has failed to excite me for the past decade and a half. Their last four albums have been fifty fifty. I liked half of it and the rest was just blah. The remixes have been dogshit for the most part, even on the remix compilation CD. A rare few nuggets of gold and the rest were polished turds passed off as diamonds. The last couple albums had crappy production with weak assed synths and tinny tinkertoy drum samples, and the live footage I've seen has Eigner overdoing the drums like Lars Ulrich. Peter Gordeno is no Alan Wilder. Looks like a goddamned cadaver. Creeps me out. I refused to buy the Delta Machine tour DVD and instead recorded the edited down version on AXIS on my DVR... Dave needs to skip the Mick Jagger prancing and wash off the guy liner. I think Fletch does more now in concert than in previous years, or at least learned to mime better, but still does less live than Vince Clarke does, and I saw an Erasure show where Vince literally had a fucking Heineken during a song. Dave should also spend more time singing and less time holding the mic out over the crowd; you paid 85 bucks to hear him sing, not to hear 12,000 out of tune dickheads sing it for him. The version of Black Celebration in this last tour was abysmal. After watching Alan explain the Emulator in 101 using that song, it is just pale imitation without him. After decades of ignoring But Not Tonight as a throwaway fluff b-side despite being a fan favorite, they gutted it and made it a dirge."

MBoyd

you guys are doing a good job at talking me out of going. And I even dropped to number 45 in line for referring a friend! Taking into consideration it's at the F1 racetrack and it takes and hour to walk in and get out back to your car...

BDB

I was 120 on the list for Seattle, now I'm 520.

dex14

Reading the comments on Facebook about the presale... I can't believe people actually bought 100 copies of the album thinking that it would actually matter. I don't know why anyone would do that. All it guaranteed was the band getting $$ from the albums. They should've just spent the money on 3rd party website tickets. People are so uninformed about things. There is no ticket system or possible way that if you are Number 1 "in line" that you would actually be the first person to be able to buy tickets.

I got an email that I can't buy tickets until 30 mins after the presale starts as apart of "Group 2". I didn't really do anything because I'm not going to jump through hoops. I can try this presale...or AMEX...or the venue one... whatever.

BDB

I got in for the 930 group 2. Easy enough.

I thought if you were high enough up the list you got to a meet and greet level??

Still spendy though for lower level seats - 150ea with fees.

E Unit

I was in group 3, but got tickets as soon as they went up for sale. Pretty decent seats as well.

Raul3

Group 3, in San Jose, CA (Silicon Valley), tried at 10:00 am, and found good lower level tickets (not floor tickets of course), but after all the fees it was $172! Parking is $20 at least, so I decided to wait.

If by October I'm in the mood I'm sure I would be able to get decent tickets for around that price, maybe not that good, like the ones Ticketmaster offered me, but decent enough.

Although I really don't like the acoustics of that concert venue.

Edit: I was 1850 in the list

dex14

Wow...this whole onsale has been a real turn off. First the fan presale is just shitty. Then today, they changed the prices and eliminated the $55 range and made all the tickets that were $55 $75 instead.

DVD Josh

A friend of ours was 450 and she completely shit the bed on the presale. Without asking, she panicked and bought four 400 levels tickets. i told her there was no way i was paying her back for that nonsense. i'm sure something will come up on stubhub closer to the show.

Daytripper

Fans, I heard the album tonight and I'm relieved to tell you that it's really good. "Where's the Revolution" is still a terrible song though. And "The Worst Crime" is the second only "meh" song on the album. But this is unlike anything DM have ever done. Gone (LONG gone) is that 80's and 90's DM sound. But this just works. Beautifully. If you can let go of the past. It's also not a commercial sounding album. "So Much Love" is possibly the only track that could and should be a single. Other stand out tracks: "Scum", "Going Backwards", "You Move" and "Cover Me". Which at the 3:00 minute mark forward is pure Kraftwerk sounding bliss. I was expecting the worst going into this after "Revolution". Pleasantly surprised.

Supermallet

Wow, I'm really glad to hear that! I'm looking forward to giving it a spin.

hdnmickey

Was able to listen to the whole album this morning. While not terrible, I also wouldn't say it in any way compares to their best work in the 80's and 90's. At best it's as good at the better songs on the more recent albums. In a way, it sounds like it's made up of the better b-sides that were never released with singles off those more recent albums. I'm definitely glad I didn't try to score tickets to their upcoming tour. Not at all excited to see shows supporting this album.

Daytripper

Well, like I said, this is nothing like anything they've done before. Definitely not like anything they did in the 80's. Which I think is the golden age of DM. Here's how the new music will play out on this tour. They will premiere them on the first leg which is in Europe. Most songs won't work live. Probably because of those fucking drums. And they'll ditch whatever isn't received well from the audience. This happens all the time with them. So by the time they come to America, we hear maybe 3 live tracks of their new album. And the rest is older material. I actually think most of these new songs could be great live if they stuck with all keyboards and computers on the stage. You know, how they were recorded in the studio.

hdnmickey

The comparison to their 80's and 90's material wasn't from a perspective of the sound, but the quality. As for playing any of the new songs on the tour, even three of them is pushing it. If this was a middle of their career album I would be surprised if any of these songs were included in set lists after a few years.

Daytripper

I'm in complete agreement with you. I meant quality too of course. Their new material and sound are such a pale comparison to their glory days. And you're absolutely right. None of their new materiel would be included in their show if this was middle career.

dex14

Wow... they raised the price again for MSG. The lowest price now $95 (excluding fees). And it looks like they have different prices between Saturday and Monday. I know dynamic pricing happens... but I've never seen it before a show even officially goes on sale. I'm glad I was able to get some uppers that are atleast close to the stage during presales at a lower price.

Supermallet

I'm listening to the album and it's not offensively awful but there's no real meat to grab on to. I'll need to give it a closer listen when it officially comes out and the high quality rips surface. Right now it's just kind of there.

Daytripper

I finally heard the non-leaked album today. It's a cleaner version and I still think it's pretty good/great. But it's a new Depeche Mode. If you're looking for that early DM mode sound, you are going to be extremely disappointed. If you can move beyond that, I think you will enjoy this album.

http://www.metacritic.com/music/spir...he-mode?ref=hp

ken_572002

I listened to it twice now. At best, it is an 'okay' recording. Perhaps after a few more spins I'll move that rating into the 'good' range. But for now, it's just 'meh'.

Nothing on the album jumps out like 'Wrong', which in my opinion, is still their best song in the last 15 years.

Daytripper

Best song or best single? I respectfully disagree on both. And I love "Wrong"! But it's no where near as good as "Precious", "Suffer Well" or even "John the Revelator" if we're talking singles from the past 15 years. IMO of course. Other than "Wrong", I don't think Depeche Mode have done any "great' songs after "Playing the Angel". Just merely passable. "Cover Me" on this new album is kind of brilliant though.

hdnmickey

I too was able to score a better sounding download and it did cause me to enjoy this a bit more. The songs worked a little better the second time around as well. But the whole album does still seems like a collection of unreleased b-sides from the last few albums. Some of those have always been just as good as the songs on the ablums, but most of them are pretty average, and were not included on the albums for a reason.