Born on July 23: Martin Gore, Depeche Mode’s hit machine

He was born in London in 1961. Despite his low profile, his role within Depeche Mode is pivotal.

For it was indeed he who penned such masterful tracks as “Enjoy The Silence,” “Strangelove,” “Black Celebration,” “Everything Counts,” “Dream On,” “Personal Jesus,” “People Are People,” and a host of other equally famous songs.

Martin, however, was raised in a modest family. Before moving to Basildon, his mother and stepfather worked at a Ford factory. His stepfather later became a truck driver, and Martin himself began working at a bank at the age of 16.

Driven by a passion for music, he invested his first paycheck in a Moog Prodigy (cheaper than the miniMOOG produced at the same time), an analog monophonic synthesizer of which just over 10,000 units were produced between 1977 and 1984. This instrument, now a museum piece, was something of a Holy Grail in the eyes of the pioneers of British synth-pop. The shrill sound it produced is, in a way, the auditory signature of the album Speak & Spell, Depeche Mode’s debut album from 1981. On that album, however, Martin Gore remained in Vince Clarke’s shadow and composed only two tracks : “Tora! Tora! Tora!" and the instrumental "Big Muff. " After Vince Clarke left to form Yazoo with Alison Moyet, Gore refined his songwriting and became the driving force behind the quartet.

While his solo career has been limited to a handful of releases (“The Third Chimpanzee” in 2021 is his most recent), Martin no longer hesitates to occasionally swap the keyboards for a guitar—most often a Gretsch White Falcon—and, on stage, to grab the mic for “Strangelove.”

A resident of Santa Barbara, California, since the early 2000s, Martin Gore was spotted there in early 2026 in recording studios. It was therefore speculated that, with Martin Gore—one of the band’s last two remaining original members—they might be preparing a follow-up to the 2023 album “Memento Mori.” Wait and see!

Photo: In September 1987, Depeche Mode stopped in Brussels to promote the album “Music For The Masses.” From left to right: Alan Wilder, Dave Gahan, Andy Fletcher, and Martin Gore