Songs of Faith and Devotion

The best depeche mode record and one to the best of all time

Favourite songs: Walking in My Shoes, I Feel You, Higher Love, Rush

Least favourite songs: One Caress

3/5

It's a fine album and if it were the only Depeche Mode album on the list, I'd be going with a 3. Thing is this is the 3rd Depeche Mode album that I've seen (so far) and I don't think it has something new or different enough to offer.

Not nearly as good as other DM offerings, but a decent enough listen. Don't know if it is anything above average though. 2.5/5

I thought this was fine. I liked some of the other Depeche Mode stuff more and I thought the album started stronger than it finished.

I wish I understood the appeal of Depeche Mode. Most of the time I'm just bored.

Songs of Faith and Devotion is the album that introduced me to Depeche Mode, and Walking in My Shoes has been a personal favourite for years after it came out. When I first heard it, it was a five star album. It isn't anymore.

Getting deeper into the Depeche Mode catalogue changes how you hear this. Violator's restraint and minimalism makes Songs of Faith and Devotion's maximalism more audible in retrospect. This is an album that throws a lot at the wall. The gospel influences, the live drums, the religious imagery, the organic guitars dialling back the synthesizers. Some of it sticks brilliantly. Mercy In You and In Your Room are genuinely excellent. Some of it doesn't. Judas or Get Right With Me feel like they wandered in from a different album entirely, and the religious theme tips into overdone territory more than once.
The organic quality of the music, especially compared to Music For The Masses, Violator, Black Celebration or even Ultra for that matter was of course a deliberate response to the grunge moment and it was the right call for 1993. It just hasn't aged as gracefully as the more minimal work surrounding it in the catalogue.
Still an album I love. Just not the masterpiece I once thought it was.

I mean look I like Depeche Mode, but there's already been a lot of them on this thing, and Violator's really the only one I'd call a must-listen

Depeche Mode are so freaking good. I love the darker and more rock-oriented direction of this album. The title does a great job of conveying the themes of faith but in a more ominous manner.

Much better than I had expected, not sure why I never really rated them before. I liked the guitars, the vocals, and the times they sounded a bit like NIN.

Yes if I was to add another Depeche Mode album to
The list it would be this one.