1981-07-25 Zuiderpark, The Hague, The Netherlands

Notes

The first concert outside the UK. A local band called Check The Computer played before DM, and DM played before Tuxedomoon.

This concert had the same "metallic" intro that was played at 1981-08-02 Jenkinsons, Brighton, England, UK (which has a complete recording available to stream & download). The intro sounds like a slowed down version of Shout.

In the documentary from 2008 on the DVD in the 'Sounds Of The Universe' boxset, Martin Gore stumbles upon a poster of this gig, and he and Daniel Miller have the following exchange:

Daniel: That was the first gig outside of the UK, wasn't it? Where I was told that it was gonna be 30,000 [people] or something?

Martin: Yeah. Daniel was telling us, "it's 30,000 people, we gotta get all the way to Holland."

Daniel: It was a festival.

Martin: Yeah. And it was like, 300 people. And half of them had come with us, because they thought they'd come to some huge festival in Holland!

Deb Danahay wrote for Electronic Sound magazine in 2013:

The stage at the Zuiderpark was on an island. It was surrounded by a moat and the only access was over a little bridge. The headliners of the event were Tuxedomoon, an experimental new wave band from California, who were very popular in the Netherlands and Belgium. They were also Andy Fletcher's favourite band and I remember Fletch was very excited that Depeche were sharing a stage with them. It was a lovely sunny day and the gig went without a hitch. The band got a great reception as they'd already managed to attract a number of Dutch fans.

Swie Tio had interviewed the band in 1981 for Dutch magazine in 'OOR'. In 2007, he remembered a nice anecdote (translated):

Question: Do you have any funny anecdotes from your career?

Swie: Depeche Mode were a long time ago [in 1981], when they were not so big, playing at Zuiderpark in The Hague. There was this open-air theatre in the middle of the park, with a little lake in front of it and behind that, the public can stand/sit. Clearly this is a super nice location. Before Depeche Mode started playing I did an interview with two of the band members. After a while they were getting a little fidgety and they suggested to go walking in Zuiderpark. We then did the the interview while walking. It was such an animated conversation that we totally did not pay attention to where we were walking and, you guessed it, we became totally lost. This was not so great since Depeche Mode had to go and perform. There were no passers-by to be seen. The only people we met were people who had no idea where the theatre was located. Eventually we arrived too late and the band members had to run to go on stage on time.

It is said by fans who attended this gig that some of Depeche Mode's crew (including Daryl Bamonte perhaps?) dived into the moat while 'Just Can't Get Enough' was being played.

Set list

1. Summer 1981 Intro
2. Television Set
3. Boys Say Go!
4. New Life
5. Puppets
6. Ice Machine
7. Big Muff
8. Just Can't Get Enough
9. What's Your Name?
10. Tora! Tora! Tora!
11. Photographic
12. The Price Of Love

Sources

• Source 1 is a good audience recording.