First of all, I am a very avid fan of both Depeche Mode and Alan Wilder (as in his work both in DM and Recoil), so do not make the assumption that I am not aware of Wilder's contributions to DM's repertoire in the past. I find him to be an impressive musical talent without whom DM probably could not have survived. But now both Wilder and the band have progressed to the point where they can now do things beyond anything they did together. Second of all, this album is perhaps the most musically mature DM have ever been, even including their previous two albums "Violator" and "Songs of Faith and Devotion." "Ultra" is the best album DM have ever produced. Between Martin Gore's intelligent and thoughtful songwriting, and David Gahan's soulful vocals (with some help from Martin on a few songs), this collection of songs is the album that got me into Depeche Mode and to this day remains my favorite.

-"Barrel of a Gun": The opening track is perhaps the most edgy, and ranks up there with songs like "I Feel You," and "Rush." The guitars are very raw and the rhythm is very pulsing. This song is the kind of song to bang your head to in a goth club. The vocals punchy and aggressive, this is one of DM's best singles.

-"The Love Thieves": Now this is a very sad and kinda jazzy song. It was featured in the TV show "La Femme Nikita" and was used very expertly to portray a brooding character. Very appropriate, and the song just fits those moods of sad solitude. The kind of song to listen to after a bitter breakup. It's sadness is the type that just might uplift your spirits...

-"Home": Beautiful is all I have to say about this song. Martin's vocals are great, and the use of a string quartet to close out the song adds that lovely ambience. A very pleasant and beautiful song.

-"It's No Good": The breakthrough single. When I first heard this song, I at first thought DM was some brand new band with that Zoo-TV image that U2 cultivate in the early '90's. Not too far off, except this song revels in its dancehall beats and sonic darkness. This is the song that started my obssession with DM, and it will forever remain my second favorite song by them (next to "Enjoy the Silence").

-"Useless": Tin Simenon's influence can be heard especially on this track, as it is very reminiscent of Curve, another band Tim has worked with. A great song.

-"Sister of Night": Now this song is a guilty pleasure. It is perhaps Gahan's best vocal performance on the album, and ironically it is the last song he ever performed while still under the influence of drugs. While it is wonderful that his much publicized bout with heroin is over after this song, there is still something to be said about the passion in his voice on this song.

-"Freestate": Another favorite of mine. The guitars are very edgy, and the use of acoustic slide is just impressive. A very underrated song that should've been a single.

-"The Bottom Line": Gore's other vocal on the album, and probably the closest DM will ever get to recording a country song, and it's still based in their distinguishably gothic synthesized style. A qunadary of a song, but still worthy of DM's talents.

-"Insight": The return of that gospel sound that made "Condemnation" and "Get Right With Me" great, trimmed down to an inspirational closer that ends the album on an upnote towards DM's future without Wilder, without Gahan's drug problems, and without the obstacles of arrogant youth. Only the clear road of musical excellence and mature progression.

The instrumental breaks, "Uselink," "Jazz Thieves," and the hidden track, "Junior Painkiller" (which can be heard in it's full version as the B-side to "Barrel of a Gun") are reminiscent of the interludes from "Violator," but with that atmosphere that surrounds this album with musical passion. "Ultra" is without a doubt the best album DM have ever released, both in terms of the songs, the music, and the band itself. This album is one of the best ever produced...period. To those who miss Alan Wilder...listen to Recoil's albums...they're also great, but don't think he made DM what it was. DM was a combination of people, and when one person leaves, they readjust the combination into something else...and that something else is this jewel of an album. "Ultra" Cool!

I have been waiting for this release for over a year now.

I currently own the Music for the Masses, Violator, and Songs of Faith 5.1/Remasters.

Ultra is by far my favorite Depeche Mode work, while others are close there is something about the way the music on ultra as well as the vocals blend together. This is a smooth album.

The CD like all the remastered albums are not the highlight. I cannot audibly tell the difference between my original 1997 CD and the remastered, aside from some songs sounding a bit more bright or clear, the bass is a bit more punchy in some songs as well. That may be placebo effect.

On to the 5.1 mix. DTS and Dolby Digital

I have a mid to high end audio system that is properly calibrated, and the bass management is setup properly.

This is the first Depeche Mode album with a 5.1 mix that actually makes the songs sound different and not just up-mixed to surround sound.

In fact some of the songs sound very different. The sound engineers did not just take the original stereo recording and spread it out there was some obvious thought behind making Ultra a 5.1 album. Like it was made from the ground up again.

There are different sounds in different places, sounds you could not hear in the 2 channel recording and things that also don't even sound the same anymore. The clarity is superb, the use of the surround channels is just right, sometimes they get distracting though.

What I really like is that they did not just stick the vocal tracks on the center channel like in some of the previous remasters.

The vocals are very well spread through the front speakers and carefully carry to the rears in some tracks.

The Dolby Digital and DTS mix are nearly identical. The difference in my opinion is fidelity. Some bass and clarity deviations between the two. But very hard to detect.

If you like or liked Ultra and have a 5.1 system, this is a must buy.

This is one of the things I fear that will be disappearing from the market with the dawn of digital downloads. High quality audio is rarely emphasized, and this mix is a complete reversal of that.

Since first hearing Violator last year, I've purchased several DM albums but always concluded that Violator was their best, along with their earlier pre-Black Celebration material. I held off buying "Ultra" thinking I'd be disappointed with the direction they'd taken their music in. However, upon seeing it going cheap in a bargain bin, I had to get it just to see what it was like, fully expecting to hate it. To my surprise, I didn't hate it. . .I loved it. As with Violator, I had to listen a few times to really appreciate all the songs, but after doing so I'd have to say this ranks right up there with Violator. "Home" is the best cut, followed closely by "The Bottom Line" and "Insight". The singles, "Barrel of a Gun" and "It's No Good" are next best. The rest of the songs fill out the album, but I feel if any of them were removed it would detract from the listening experience.

If you're still stuck in DM's past as I was, give "Ultra" a listen and instead of looking back, you'll be looking forward to their next album.

Depeche Mode nearly fell apart after the gargantuan Devotional tour was finally completed. Dave Gahan was clinically dead for a few minutes and Alan Wilder had left to pursue his own project, Recoil. Once Martin, Dave, and Andy resurfaced to take a stab in the recording studio, their goal was not to make another Violator; it was just to put down a few tracks and nurture the band back to health. It wasn't time for another party album followed by another exhausting tour. It was time to just heal by doing something low-key and taking it easy for a while. And that's why Ultra sounds the way it sounds.

With this perspective in mind, Ultra is as good an album as we could have expected from Depeche Mode in 1997, and is in some ways pleasantly surprising. The first single, "Barrel of a Gun," is actually nothing like the rest of the album. It's got a beat like an automated stapler and a funky guitar riff pulled from hell's own orchestra. Not DM's best song by any means, but it's catchy and it hits hard. Other aggro offerings include: "Useless," a very moody, bluesy, beat-up number well-suited to Dave's post-recovery voice; and "It's No Good," which might just be the greatest stalker anthem of all time (perhaps second only to The Police's "Every Breath You Take"). I was shocked to hear an ex-girlfriend's younger sister and her friends singing along when I played "It's No Good" in the car, but I guess this is just evidence that DM are not dead yet.

The remaining tracks are much more subdued and introspective in nature. Many of the songs on Ultra deal with Dave's drug problems, but "Sister of Night" probably handles the issue with the most heart and sensitivity. "Freestate" is a mellow, optimistic song with a closing guitar solo reminiscent of The Cure. This song and its kin "Insight" are the most upbeat songs DM had written in over a decade; perhaps you can only be a sad sallow goth for a finite amount of time. "The Love Thieves" is the most narrative song on the album, depicting the kind of woman with more followers than she can count. A song rich both in wisdom derived from experience and in sympathy for the smitten. Finally, Martin's vocal performances in "Home" and "The Bottom Line" stand shoulder to shoulder with anything he's done in the past, yet keep in line with the mature, languid feel of the album as a whole.

Ultra is not an album that even a DM fan will instantly love. It takes some time to win the listener over. That Depeche Mode actually managed to put together an album at this stage of their career is miraculous enough; that they managed to put together a different yet GOOD album is just gravy on top of that. Four stars for an album that is not the best in the DM library, but still gets better with age.

For many DM fans, amidst the chaos and aftermath of Songs of Faith and Devotion, it was a strange era indeed, with most of us wondering what would become of the greatest electronic band of all time? With the substance abuse problems of lead singer, Dave Gahan, and the sudden departure of key member, Alan Wilder, the future of the Godfathers of techno/electronica seemed highly uncertain. But as it happened, none of these things would stop the passion of the remaining members from creating more truly expressive and inspiring music...proving, just as they'd done earlier in their career, that despite the losses, Depeche Mode would live on.

Things got off to a rather fragile/shaky start (at first) with what we all refer to now as the "Ultra sessions." Actually the original idea was to get together for a proposed short EP release, with only a handful of songs initially being recorded. But as it turned out, this collaboration went so well that Martin, Dave, & Andy found themselves working together again in the studio with the ideas and enthusiasm flowing and gelling together nicely. Any previous problems seemed to fall by the wayside. It was also a nice idea to get Tim "Bomb the Bass" Simenon to sign onto the project as producer, having previously first worked for the band in the late 80s on remixes of "Everything Counts" & "Strangelove." Tim's familiar presence helped to keep things steady, which allowed for a much lighter atmosphere, without a lot of stress and pressure.

The first track and first single off the album: "Barrel of A Gun," was a very bold choice. Whether Martin wrote this song with Dave in mind as his own personal influence or not, the song itself seemed tailor connected to Gahan, on many levels. The music video that would follow only made this realization much clearer...with a rather pale faced Dave blowing bubbles in a bathtub, later found strolling blindly through outdoor corridors with eyeballs painted over his closed eyelids, and a look of cold death upon him. This was probably the darkest we'd ever seen Dave in a music video...much darker than even any of the videos from SOFAD. The shots of Gahan staring straight into the camera (with that chilling stare and deathly grin of his) while his hair begins to dance around and change shape into different hairdos is both funny and terrifying all at the same time. The song itself is richly dark and moody, with a great beat and electronic feel to it that any fan can appreciate.

The second single off Ultra would be the biggest hit from the album as well as hearken back to the band's earlier techno sounding greatness: "It's No Good". With a nicely heavy and fast moving beat along with an electrifying, yet hauntingly surreal sound quality, "It's No Good" represents Depeche Mode at their very finest. The music video is another highlight and subsequent standout, showcasing Dave as a has-been front man way passed his prime, who still thinks he's the greatest thing in the world. There's even an interesting storyline involved, as the band performs at some lowlife dive, while their cash payment is stolen by some guy. When Gahan rubs his fingers together asking for his money, and the owner just sort of shrugs, not knowing what happened to it, Dave's girls and the rest of the band walk out, with Dave going after them, screaming, "C'mon! It's no good! Losers!" It's truly a classic music video with director/photographer Anton Corbijn at the top of his game.

Two wonderful lead vocal tracks by Martin Gore can also be found on Ultra, including The Bottom Line (a slow, moody number) and the album's third single: Home. It's a lovely piece, with a nicely done orchestral accompaniment, along with Martin's very passionate voice work and emotionally affective guitar playing. Home is definitely one of Martin's personal best and a true highlight from Ultra. The music video is also a very interesting visual interpretation of the song, with what appears to be an angel-like figure walking around and observing human interactions and emotions (some happy, some sad), which are all quite thought provoking.

Other standouts from Ultra include Useless (the fourth and final single from Ultra), Sister of Night (which is performed on the album by Dave but has since been performed live by Martin), The Love Thieves, and Insight. Q does a fine engineering job, while Kerry Hopwood & Dave Clayton handle the program duties for the album admirably. There isn't too much of a noticeable sound difference between the original 1997 CD release and this 2007 remastered 10th anniversary edition. But the 5.1 and DTS audio mixes found on the DVD are worthy of purchase all by themselves. As with all the DM remastered album editions, additional songs ("Only When I Lose Myself," "Surrender," etc.), live tracks ("Barrel of A Gun," "It's No Good," & "Useless" all from London `97) and a documentary (Depeche Mode : 1995-1998 "Oh Well, That's The End of The Band...") are also included on the DVD.

While some will still say that Alan Wilder's contributions are sorely missed, Ultra still holds its own without him, and shows us once again that Depeche Mode are here to stay, and will continue to do so for years to come.

Stay Devoted!

Ultra (Remastered) - "Like a cat dragged in from the rain, who goes straight back out to do it all over again...I'll be back for more." - M.L.Gore