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Strangelove (song)

"Strangelove"
Strangelove single.jpg
Single by Depeche Mode
from the album Music for the Masses
B-side "Pimpf", "Agent Orange"
Format
Length 4:55
Label Mute (catalogue number: BONG 13)
Writer(s) Martin Gore
Producer(s)
  • Depeche Mode
Depeche Mode singles chronology
"But Not Tonight"
(1986)
"Strangelove"
(1987)
"Never Let Me Down Again"
(1987)

"Strangelove" is a single by Depeche Mode from their sixth studio album Music for the Masses. It reached number 16 on the UK Singles Chart, number 2 in West Germany and in South Africa, and was a Top 10 success in several other countries, including Sweden and Switzerland. In the US it reached number 76 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was the first of 9 number-ones on the US Dance charts, where it stayed for three weeks at the top.

The original version of "Strangelove" is a fast-paced pop track. Though successful, this did not seem to fit with Music for the Masses's darker style, so Daniel Miller made a slower version that became the album version. Alan Wilder, in the Q&A section of his Recoil website, writes that the band felt the single version was "too cluttered" and was the reason Miller's remix was commissioned. Miller expounded on this in the Music for the Masses re-master documentary DVD, stating he felt the original single version was too complicated and would benefit from being simplified.

It was remixed by production team Bomb the Bass and released again as a single in the US as "Strangelove '88", finally reaching number 50 on the Hot 100.

There are two B-sides for "Strangelove", both instrumental. "Pimpf" is a dark instrumental that is mostly piano, named after a magazine of the Hitler Youth organizations. "Pimpf" later shows up as the final track on Music for the Masses. There is also a remix available on some "Strangelove" single releases called "Fpmip" ("Pimpf" backwards).

The second instrumental is "Agent Orange", named after the herbicide used in the Vietnam War. At the end of the song, you can hear some Morse code. Rumoured to mean "If anybody can hear this, please help me", it is actually just gibberish (LAXI ".-.. .- -..- ..", several times repeated). "Agent Orange" later shows up as the first bonus track on the CD/Cassette version of Music for the Masses.


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