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This doesn't mean that they were all the way there yet. If Speak and Spell and A Broken Frame are Depeche Mode's childhood, then Construction Time Again is their adolescence, not their adulthood. But as Gore seemed to gain more confidence in his songwriting ability, his songs became stronger and more definately dark. This isn't dark like some of the other "dark" bands I've heard. Depeche Mode's songs act more as a catharsis: they are dark and quite frankly depressing, even almost suicidal, but you feel better after listening to them. Go figure! There was another lineup change for this album, this one would last for over a decade; the temp they hired for their tour joined them permanantly. This is Alan Wilder, of course, and he started off with a bang, penning two of the songs on the album. For some reason his own songwriting was dropped, he only wrote one song on the next album, and none after that, but I thought his songs were among the best on the albums they appeared on. The tracks start off with "Love, In Itself," one of the singles from the album. It's beat is not quite fast enough to be danceable, and the juxtaposition of the upbeat and faster line in the chorus is perfect for the lyrics. It's as if the song itself sings the words without the vocals even. There was a time when the group believed in love, but that time is now gone to be replaced with the colder realisation that love isn't enough "in itself." "More Than a Party" is interesting because it is very reminiscent of the next album, especially "Is There Something to Do." "Party" isn't quite as good, and the lyrics are a bit sillier, but the direction the group is moving is very obvious. "Pipeline," the song after that is the infamous one song that I don't like on this album. The Volga boatmen fake choral effects may be appropriate for the song, but they get very tiring very quickly. I guess it's not technically a bad song, but it's boring enough I can't really stand to listen to it for very long. Depeche Mode's biggest hit from this album, and one of their most well-known songs ever is next, "Everything Counts." This is a great song, and quite frankly deserves all the attention it has garnered over the years. I doubt anyone reading this review hasn't already heard the song before, so I won't go on too much about what it's like, though. I'll just stick with it's real good! "Two Minute Warning" is the first Alan Wilder track. In some ways, it's a little bit more of a mature sound than many of Gore's on this album, as it lacks the dancing strangled reedy sound that Gore seems to have been so fond of this year. Other than that, though, it fits seamlessly into the album, and without the credits you would never guess that it had a different writer. If you skip a track, you get to Wilder's other work, "The Landscape is Changing." It's hard to put my finger on exactly why these tracks (and the whole album, actually) don't sound quite like the mature Depeche Mode sound of the next year, but I think it may be the tone. It's much darker than Speak and Spell or even A Broken Frame, but nowhere near the sound that started with Some Great Reward. The sound library they use seems to be more limited too, as in many of the Gore songs, flat blaring trumpets are very popular in "Landscape." Wilder's formula is a little different, too. After having the song go on for a while, it shifts into an instrumental coda that sounds quite a bit different than the rest of the song. He did this again on his one song in Some Great Reward, which is one of my favorite songs on that album. Anyway, enough skipping ahead! Wilder's work on this album proves to be just as skillful as Gore's, and I would have liked to have seen him put pen to score (or whatever) more often. Sandwiched in between Wilder's two songs is "Shame", featuring, again, flat trumpet effects. I think that not only the sound repertoire, but the jerky rhythms of many of these songs combine to give them their own feel. As I said, from this point on, all of DM's albums really hold together as albums, not just as collections of songs. This sound repertoire/subject matter/rhythmic unity feature holds out still in "Shame" which is a track that fills it's purpose but isn't especially wonderful. "Told You So" is very much like the rest of the album in sound, style and lyrical content, but the frantic hook that fills the background marks it as different. It's a solid song, but like "Shame," nothing too wonderful. But the last song, "And Then..." is truly one of the best songs on the album. Gore rises above his style, and looks forward into what is coming down the road for Depeche Mode. This soulful, serious song is lyrically beautiful, stylistically more mature than anything else on the album, and a fine swan song for Construction Time Again.
In conclusion, I think this album is moving forward from A Broken Frame's territory and into what would become DM's new style in 1984. The standout tracks are truly wonderful, "Everything Counts," "And Then..." and, for me at least, "The Landscape is Changing" are worth listening too again and again. The rest of the album, however, is a not quite as memorable, unlike later DM albums where almost every single track is one you can't stand to skip. Because of these minor faults, I can't rank this album better than the last one, and although the style is more mature, it really isn't a better album anyway, but it's certainly not a worse on either.
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