Strangelove (4:55)

Strangelove is Depeche Mode’s eighteenth UK single, released on 13 Apr 87, and the first single for the then upcoming album Music for the Masses. It reached #16 in the UK charts (Depeche Mode would fail to make the Top 10 of the UK singles chart throughout the second half of the 1980s), but hit #2 in West Germany and in South Africa, and was a Top 10 success in several other countries (Sweden, Switzerland, etc.).

The original version of “Strangelove” is a fast-paced poppy track. Though successful, this didn’t seem to fit with the Music for the Masses’s dark style, so Daniel Miller made a darker slower version of “Strangelove” which became the Album Version. It got its own single in the USA called “Strangelove ‘88”.

==B-sides==

There are two B-Sides for “Strangelove”, both instrumental. “Pimpf” is a dark instrumental that’s mostly piano, named after the members of one of the Hitler Youth organizations. It is famous for having strange unknown chanting that has caused speculation on what the chanting says. It turns out that the chanting is actually just well-done synths, even though it sounds a lot like Dave and Martin. Piano instrumentals would become more abundant with Depeche Mode for the next 3 years. “Pimpf” later shows up as the final track on the vinyl version of Music for the Masses.