California’s Color Theory is a one man band, that ‘one’ being Brian Hazard. Having already banged out five albums of original material since 1994 this DM tribute therefore represents a departure from the norm.
I’m totally unfamiliar with Color Theory’s previous works and my appreciation of Depeche Mode is at best sporadic and marginal. I have an enduring fondness for their early 80s geeky Essex boys electro-pop cheese, would count ‘Violator’ as the pick of their second career phase when they transformed from ‘nice boys next door’ into depraved stadium giants Stateside but their mature musical statesmen period has passed me by, as has their recent solo ventures.
It quickly becomes apparent that this is a song-writer’s tribute to another songwriter rather than to the band as a whole. Color Theory has chosen to ignore the rock excesses of Dave Gahan and instead homes in on the innocent sweetness of Martin Gore, thus denying himself access to much of what makes Depeche Mode the enigmatic band that they are. Hazard’s vocals are uncannily similar to Gore’s but at times on tracks like ‘It Doesn’t Matter’ his delivery strays into syrupy sentimentality to the point that the song sounds more like a tribute to some Lloyd Webber musical.
Color Theory also plays it safe with the musical arrangement, sticking primarily to the clean and tasteful synthesised sounds of the eighties rather than embracing the harsher ‘rock’ edges that came into Depeche Mode’s music and was subsequently developed by the likes of NIN and Ministry. The effect of this retrospective decision is to render the project somewhat redundant as it offers no new perspective with which to view the songbook of Gore or the dynamics of the band. With voice and music having so many close parallels to the band itself you soon wish for Color Theory to throw a radical curve-ball into at least one of the ten Mode tracks on this album. Wither the bluegrass version of ‘Sweetest Perfection’ or the hard house mix of ‘Here is the House’?
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To be fair, Color Theory is upfront about why he loves Depeche Mode in his sleeve notes, citing the touching ballad ‘Somebody’ as the track that made him enamoured in the first place; I also recall being struck by its dissimilarity with what I’d come to expect from the band. His approach though plays too much like the efforts of an adoring fan rather than a valid reappraisal by a creative musician and it’s frustrating to this listener because the professional quality of the production and arrangements are clear signposts of Hazard’s talent.
An interesting footnote: the last track ‘Ponytail Girl’ is in fact a Color Theory original that was touted by bootleggers of Depeche Mode’s ‘Exciter’ album as one of their own and continues to be traded as such by Depeche Mode fans over the web despite the official site clearly stating that it is not their song. If nothing else it only goes to prove that there is no such thing as bad publicity and I’m sure such close association will have been a significant contribution to shifting a few units of this album.
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