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M II M promo mix featuring tracks from DVA Damas, Autumns & Primitive Knot for their upcoming show on 13th May @ Shacklewell Arms. Tickets available here- http://bit.ly/2pvEVjE

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Depeche Mode, DVA DAMAS

Last Monday night, Depeche Mode played a nine song set at the Letterman-occupied Ed Sullivan Theater. This was the band's first public performance in three years and was used to highlight the strength of their new album, "Delta Machine". Broadcast live online and used as a warmup for their slightly longer (by one song) SXSW performance, this performance showed a band not yet ready for a long tour, but ready to promote their latest work. It takes a lot of confidence in recent material to fill half a set with unheard music and still expect people in the audience to move, and keep the crowd at home tuned in especially with our seemingly unlimited options compared to when the band began and MTV was one of the only places to go for a dual visual/aural stimulation. They pulled it off though and pulled everyone into the "Delta Machine", their thirteenth record and first since 2009's "Sounds of the Universe".

Starting with the live debuts of "Angel" and "Should Be Higher", fans were excited no matter the sound just at the sight of the band. They were here on time and playing new stuff, and hey it sounds exactly like Depeche Mode should sound. They've had a close to flawless track record over the last thirty years by sticking with their niche and not veering too far into territory they might not feel as comfortable in. Comfort is a funny word to describe this band as they were one of the first groups to jam discomfort into the pop world. Coming at a time just in between punk and new wave, Depeche Mode culls from the industrial world Throbbing Gristle founded, while stamping their signature pop sound on it, heading straight into a more accessible field with rhythmic rather than out of time drum patterns and, increasingly over time, soaring vocals. Dave Gahan has become a bit of a rock icon and despite his good looks and crooning call, he has had all the pratfalls to go along with the title. All of these characteristics for better or worse have laid the groundwork for Depeche Mode as they are now. By song three "Walking in My Shoes" from 1993's "Songs of Faith and Devotion", the band was all in. The small crowd of a couple hundred was on their feet from the go with the new music, but this familiar favorite really reeled everyone in. Coupled with the first performance in fifteen years of "Barrel of a Gun", people were sent into a frenzy between dancing and texting their friends letting them know that Depeche Mode is switching up their setlist a bit for the tour to come.

Anton Corbijn's "Devotional" document of their 1993 tour was an early favorite of mine in terms of how a live show can be captured on film. Corbijn caught all the visuals that appear dated now but are emblematic of an era when ticket prices were rising and set designs were getting more intricate. The way colors reacted along to the music and how Gahan put himself in motion against the towering backdrop proved the point MTV made all through the '80s: it was never just about the music, and now we have the technology and funds to show you all about that. The performances Depeche Mode are doing this spring have been back to basics in their under an hour sets without detailed lighting plots and wild visuals, but once the arena shows begin, first in Europe and then later in the year in the US, the band will return to teaming their music with the all-out experience everyone deserves out of it. These stripped down shows have given us the chance to live these new songs for the first time on their own, and it's a testament to the power of their music that is always the backbone of this enterprise.

There's a new band coming out of California called DVA DAMAS who have appropriated a lot of the same machines as Depeche Mode and put them to use in a less poppy but more snotty way. If both bands had industrial as a template and Depeche Mode went more towards the new wave, DVA DAMAS went headfirst into punk. They rip a too rarely explored section of post-punk along with bands like Richmond's Lost Tribe and Barcelona's Belgrado. There was more to pull from than got played, and these three bands are mining for sounds their predecessors may have missed out on. DVA DAMAS' first 12" is called "Nightshade" and its twenty minutes go by in a blur. A voice that sounds like it is mocking or haunting you the entire time guides you through infinite bliss of synths and programmed drums. They've stripped away even more than post-punk revivalists of the late '00s like Blank Dogs and Cold Cave, and have created something that sounds authentic. The hiss sounds like it belongs where many new punk or noise bands will add an extra layer of noise now just to appear like there is something different when there really isn't. This really feels isolated yet completely relatable, exactly how punk should be. I'm not these people or anyone else and we'd probably never get along, but there's something there we latch onto whether we like it or not. DVA DAMAS is minimal perfection that traps you in its short spurts of music and then release you refreshed still believing in punk.