So Much Love in Me

I heard a live recording of Depeche Mode’s So Much Love for the first time today that amplifies the level of menace to the lyrics that’s in the original version, though much less viscerally and in your face:

I can’t run
I have tried
There’s a thorn
In my side
There is something
I can’t hide

There is so much love in me.

Dave’s voice sounds angry against the mechanical rum-pum-pum beat that’s a lot more spartan and martial than the original mix, giving the whole a charged air of protest.

There is something so resonant in this for me. I have said this a few times in different ways: this year is changing me.

I feel a return to form. Like I’d tried something on for a while and decided I’m better off without it, tbh. Like I’m less willing to fake it to make it. Less interested in learning the rules of the game.

You can forsake me
Try to break me
But you can’t shake me
No.
You can despise me
Demonize me
It satisfies me
So.

I spent many years learning to be more open in search of something I might be missing, something I might have gotten wrong. It was good. It’s taken me this far. But now I’m learning when to shut the gates.

There is so much fucking love in me.