On December 1st, 2023, I took some magic mushrooms two hours before a Depeche Mode concert (from their Memento Mori tour).

I created a new 8-minute video to share what that experience was like – deeper, richer, and more beautiful than I’d imagined. I think it’s the best video I’ve made thus far.

My Letter to Depeche Mode

Dearest Depeche Mode,

My intention in writing this is simply to thank you for what your music has meant to me.

I first becoming aware of DM during the 80s (I was born in ’71). I have a fond memory of singing “People Are People” with my classmates to our teacher on a school bus during an 8th grade field trip in 1985. Sitting in L.A. traffic introduced me to many more DM songs, thanks to Richard Blade and KROQ.

I remember having this a-ha moment when I learned that so many cool songs I liked – Just Can’t Get Enough, Get the Balance Right, Everything Counts, Master and Servant, Blasphemous Rumors, and more – were all from the same band. One band made all those incredible tunes???

During my 20s and 30s, I could honestly say that fully half of my music listening was of DM songs. I’ve since broadened my repertoire, but for many years I listened to your songs at least as much as those of all other musicians combined. While I enjoyed many other bands during those years too – New Order, Erasure, Duran Duran, The Cure, REM, and more – nothing else pierced right through me like so many of your songs did. In my early 20s, I reveled in long walks at night under the stars listening to your music on a Walkman cassette player, often while trying to make sense of my life’s strange highs and strange lows.

Of all the music that has made my heart smile, yours has been the most impactful. Even after listening for decades, I’m still discovering new layers of truth in your songs, from the vibes as well as the words.

My favorite song of all time is “Enjoy the Silence.” It’s the most perfect song I’ve ever heard in my life. I never tire of listening to it. It feels like it’s beyond human, on another level entirely.

Listening to your music taught me how to listen with more than just my ears – to myself, to life, to spirit, to truth.

Your music helped to set my soul on fire with sustainable passion and devotion, as I sensed the kind of life that seduced me more deeply than the grabbing hands and their world full of nothing.

Your music put me to the test and invited me to pay the price, to change events, to face the consequences.

You helped me shake the disease of my old brittle life and let it crumble to dust. I had to be torn apart and stripped down to the bone, so I could dream on and discover what was kicking and screaming to be seen, felt, and lived.

You gave me permission to feel, to caress, to love, and to explore my sea of sin to find the halo within. You revealed that the darkness can be both dangerous and wondrous.

And I know this will come as no surprise, but hot damn your music is the best accompaniment for kissing and sex!

I appreciate that even with all the highs and lows of your individual lives, you kept creating music and touring. I feel immensely lucky that my #1 favorite band has had such longevity and endurance. I’ve loved your many solo works as well.

Much love and gratitude to you for your precious role in playing the angel when I most needed it… thank you!

Until we’re all ghosts again, I’ll gladly take more than another river full and keep enjoying your sounds of the universe. ❤️

Steve