There’s a reason I always have a Hawaiian pizza in the freezer and it’s spelled Andy Fletcher. But we will return to that. I was born in the same year, 1980, when he together with Vince Clarke, Martin L Gore and David Gahan formed Composition of Sound which would soon become better known as Depeche Mode – the world’s largest and most influential synth pop band.
Let it be known that today’s trio – Gore, Gahan and the recently deceased “Fletch” – during the 2000s many times were closer to arena rock. But on stage, Fletcher has been the one who continues to appear at his keyboard, even though it has been highly unclear what he is actually contributing. Or as he himself put it in DA Pennebaker’s classic documentary “101”: “Martin’s the songwriter, Alan’s the good musician, Dave’s the vocalist, and I bum around.”
Read more: Depeche Mode member Andrew Fletcher dies
When the group often underrated musical craftsman Alan Wilder left Depeche Mode in 1995, Fletcher became perhaps even more of the diplomat in the band. The one who communicated and was the adult in the room. When I interviewed the group in London in 2009, he acted as an extension of the conflict-ridden and rather quiet songwriter Martin Gore. The fact that the singer Dave Gahan gave his interview in a completely separate suite says something about the discord that has long existed in the group. For that reason, it is now extremely difficult to imagine a future for Depeche Mode. Musically, Fletcher was perhaps primarily the extra, but it was undoubtedly he who held together two very different musical wills and personality types.
When Gahan and Gore during the break of four years that preceded the album “Playing the angel” released their own albums in each direction, Fletcher instead invested in his record company Toast Hawaii. It was named after a hot sandwich with ham, cheese and pineapple that is said to have been his favorite dish during the filming of “Some great reward” in the 80’s. Nowadays, it’s my bad eating habit. Depeche Mode could have put an end to his career a long time ago. Still, the middle-aged men from Basildon have continued to make electronic music that not only appeals to the older fans, but also to a younger audience.
Gahan was declared clinically dead after an overdose in 1996, but returned and has undergone cancer treatment in recent years. Gore has also struggled through addiction and sobered up. That it was the third man, the permanent secretary Fletcher, who passed away first is in every way highly unexpected and sad.