Songfacts®:

• Written by band member Martin Gore, this song is a call for people to put aside their differences and work toward unity. It's unusual for Depeche Mode because the lyrics are so blatant and leave little to the imagination. For this reason, Gore doesn't consider it one of his stronger songs and has not played it live since the '80s. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Brian - Elizabethtown, PA
• This was Depeche Mode's breakthrough hit in the United States; they had several chart hits in the UK to this point. The song earned them a great deal of freedom, allowing them to create more music on their terms.
• Artists to cover this song include A Perfect Circle, Dope and Rupaul.
• The percussion on this song incorporates various culinary implements. Lead singer Dave Gahan explained in Entertainment Weekly: "We used to go into studios, and the first thing we'd do, we'd ask where the kitchen was - literally for pots and pans and things that we could throw down the stairs, and record the rhythms they would make crashing around, and then make it into loops."
• The band played this in concert for the first time on June 2, 1984 when they opened a show for Elton John in Ludwigshafen, Germany.