Personal Jesus

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3. Personal Jesus
List of Violator songs
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Personal Jesus
Single-PJ.jpg
Song Personal Jesus
By Depeche Mode
Songwriter Martin L. Gore
Produced by Depeche Mode
Flood
Recorded at Logic Studios, Milan
Length (mm:ss) 4:56 (album version)
3:44 (single edit)
Tempo 129 BPM
Time signature 4
4
Key F♯ Minor
Engineered by Pino Pischetola
Peter Iversen
Steve Lyon
Goh Hotoda
Alan Gregorie
Dennis Mitchell
Phil Legg
Engineering assistance Daryl Bamonte
Dick Meaney
David Browne
Mark Flannery
Mixed by François Kevorkian
Design Anton Corbijn
Area
Recorded May 1989
Originally released 29 August 1989
Live performances as Depeche Mode 982 times *
Total live performances 1058 times *

"Personal Jesus" is a song from the 1990 album Violator by Depeche Mode. It was released as a lead single on 29 August 1989.

Notes

Songwriter Martin Gore described how the book Elvis and Me by Priscilla Presley inspired the song in an interview for Spin magazine:

It's a song about being a Jesus for somebody else, someone to give you hope and care. It's about how Elvis [Presley] was her man and her mentor and how often that happens in love relationships; how everybody's heart is like a god in some way. We play these god-like parts for people but no one is perfect, and that's not a very balanced view of someone is it?

Dave Gahan told Gear Magazine in 1998:

"Having somebody you can really trust and talk to and get the right answers from. It's a very optimistic song. What it's saying is that if you can grasp on to something that's much bigger than yourself and believe in it, then you have a faith and it's always there. Really, I think it's just about believing in yourself. The answers are inside, if you dig deep enough."

Johnny Cash (who covered the song in 2002) offered his interpretation of the song in an interview for NPR:

It's a very fine, fine evangelical song, probably the most evangelical gospel song I ever recorded, although I don't know if the writer meant it to be that, but that's what it is. It's where you find your comfort, your counsel, your shoulder to lean on, your hand to hold on to your Personal Jesus.

Alan Wilder wrote in an editorial on Shunt, the official Recoil website:

The track itself was a significant move forward for the group but still retained elements of [Depeche Mode's] former experimental self. For example, the main 'stomp' was a recording of 2 or 3 people jumping up and down on flight cases working alongside Martin's John Lee Hooker guitar riff and the Kraftwerk-style synth parts.

Gore described initial doubts about the song's potential for commercial success prior to its record-breaking release in BONG 37, 1998:

This song was our first experiment we had working with Flood and François Kevorkian, and we were really unsure about how that whole relationship would work. We were really happy with the song and we realised that it was a potential single, but we didn’t have any idea of the mass appeal that it would have. We thought that it was the sort of thing that we liked but the radio programmers would hate, and we’d be lucky if it reached no. 25 – it was one of those sort of feelings we had in the studio about this song. We were especially worried about America, because the moment you mention the word Jesus in the title, you’re asking for trouble, but the single eventually turned out to be Warner Bros.’ biggest selling 12” of all time.

Vince Clarke stated in a 2001 interview for BBC:

To me, "Personal Jesus" is like a rock sound, I suppose. It's not really like a typical American rock. I think it's far more clever and imaginative than that. If you told me that there would be a record like Violator, that they might have written Violator, 20 years ago, I would not have believed you. Going for that amount of time, then they're a band that have had a huge influence.

Musician Charlie Marchino, who was at Logic Studios during the recording of "Personal Jesus", describes the experience in an interview for Libero Quotidiano:

I was at Logic Studios where Depeche Mode was recording Violator, and one day, I am playing ping pong with one of them. They play and challenge each other with ping pong every day. But then they are recording "Personal Jesus" and I am wondering how they make the drumming loop in a military marching style at the beginning of the song. I am wondering what instrumentation they are using, what technological effects. So I follow after them and my jaw drops. They are on the metallic stairwell, and using its [railing], they are beating their feet on the staircase, all together, tum, tum, tu tu tum. Record and mix. Unbelievable.

2011-05-14 Mute Short Circuit analysis

As part of a programme of talks and films at the Mute Short Circuit event in May 2011, producer Flood gave a presentation in which he recalled the production of several Depeche Mode tracks through looping audio examples and commentary. Among the tracks included in his presentation was "Personal Jesus". An abridged transcript of his comments can be viewed below.

We started off with this particular song, this was the first song that we recorded. The demo was pretty much a smaller version of what you know and love, but everything about it was all a bit of a test.

So the first day in Milan with Depeche Mode, what are we going to do? We're going to record ourselves kicking a bit of metal in the booth, me and Fletch, while Dave Martin and Alan and the engineer, whom I'd never met, are all sitting and looking. So, that was the first I'd ever done. And that took a long time to do, which wasn't something I was expecting. A foot stomp? How hard could that be? Oh boy...

Anyway, so we do this, and then it's on to the main riff of the song. Now, Martin, felt very, very strongly that it should be acoustic guitar. So, OK, you're the boss, I'm working my way in here, so let's do the acoustic guitar.

So, well, he's written it. He's a pretty damn fine guitar player, which I didn't realize at the time. Depeche Mode, they don't do guitars, do they? So he spent a long time playing this, and playing it, and playing it, and then we all agreed it sounds pretty good. But personally, I felt it could go a bit further... but I had to wait. So we're going along, it sounds pretty good, it's basically the demo. So obviously Depeche are going 'Hmm, how much are you charging?'

Anyways, so maybe we can make the footstomps a bit bigger.

[plays room track of footstomp behind the sound of the main footstomp channel, producing a thicker sound]

So, OK, they're going 'Right, big deal, you recorded a bit of room'. Sure, anyone can do that.

So then another idea that was going along was to use acoustic-y type of instruments, so you'd have harmonica or... one idea for the bass was actually to use the Jew's harp.

[plays Jew's harp track]

So we're going 'OK, that sounds pretty good. Sounds a bit like a blues band. We're Depeche Mode... what's going on? Where are you leading us now?'

So anyway, try and re-address the balance. We're going to introduce something a little more Depeche Mode-esque.

[plays resonant synth bass track].

It's starting to sound halfway decent now. OK, so that's pretty good, that's not a bad start off. That's probably a couple of days worth of work. A lot of testing, a lot of 'Is this as good as it gets?'

There are loads of other pieces in there that you just start to see -- essentially all I was doing was enhancing what they already had and trying to help them go to a new place, and it was very difficult. In the end, in order to get the life out of the guitar that I thought it needed, I finally persuaded Martin to actually put [in] an electric [guitar]. Maybe the acoustic had taken half a day to record, I remember he just did the electric guitar parts in one go. [He was] just like 'Ah, really, is that all I've gotta do? Alright. Uh, can I go now?' Small victories!

If I had the slide guitar part here, I could show it, but I always heard that as screaming voices, and there was one evening when they're all looking at me going 'What are you talking about? It's a slide guitar.' And Dave going 'What, just screaming to something?" I go 'Yeah, just scream to anything!' He goes 'What, like this? Rahhh!' I went 'Great!' So they sampled it and put it with the guitar that slides up, and that's why it sounds — it sounds like a slide guitar, but it's not quite a slide guitar, and that's something that they'd obviously learned from Daniel, and I had learned from Daniel, this thing of meticulously crafting something and building it.

So that's the way that that track was built up. Each part of that track is very, very crafted, and it was just trying to enhance effectively what was there ... It's a fantastic piece of music, but it was only a better version of the demo. That's the job of the producer, sometimes, to go, 'Look, it's great, I don't need to do anything,' which is a bit hard when the artist is looking at you going 'What exactly have you done in the last hour? How much are we paying you?'

Lyrics


Personal Jesus

Reach out and touch faith


Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who cares

Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who's there


Feeling unknown

And you're all alone

Flesh and bone

By the telephone

Lift up the receiver

I'll make you a believer


Take second best

Put me to the test

Things on your chest

You need to confess

I will deliver

You know I'm a forgiver


Reach out and touch faith

Reach out and touch faith


Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who cares

Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who's there


Feeling unknown

And you're all alone

Flesh and bone

By the telephone

Lift up the receiver

I'll make you a believer

I will deliver

You know I'm a forgiver


Reach out and touch faith


Your own personal Jesus


Reach out and touch faith


Songwriter: Martin L. Gore
Publishing Information: ©1989 Grabbing Hands Music Ltd/EMI Music Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.

Composition

Sample sources

"Personal Jesus"
Depeche Mode
1989
Self-made samples
Sample Notes Audio
Drum elements Wilder recalls in separate Q&A and Editorial features on Shunt, the official Recoil project site: "The main stomps... [were] a recording of 2 or 3 people jumping up and down on flight cases."[1][2]
Guitar, vocal elements Album producer Flood recalled the unique slide guitar sound recorded on the second day of production on "Personal Jesus" in his 2011 Mute Short Circuit presentation:

I'd said, well, I always thought that on the original demo [for Personal Jesus], [the slide guitar part] sounded like voices. Somebody going "Rahh!" And they all looked at me as though I was mad. I said [...] if we just combine the two sounds, it would be unique, it won't be just a slide guitar [...] And [Dave Gahan] finally turned around and goes "What, like this? Rahhh!" I went "Yes, exactly like that!" So Dave went, alright then, sample this then: "Rahhh!" I went "Yep, that's perfect!" They were all looking at me as though I was mad! But, that is half of the sound that you hear when you hear the finished article.

Vocal elements Album producer Flood describes the origin of the "Personal Jesus" breathing rhythm recorded on the third day of the song's production in his 2011 Mute Short Circuit presentation:

The next day, we [started] to do the famous breath. And the breath came about because we wanted to do, we were trying harmonica actually, to do the bass part and that type of sound. And the sound just wasn't right, but what we did like was the sound of someone going "Haah", and so we got a load of "Haah" from [Martin Gore], and I think [Alan Wilder] as well, and then chucked them all together. And that makes up the "ooh-ooh-ooh-ahh-ahh-ahh", it's all from trying to get the harmonica for a bass sound.

Drum elements, tom drum An ambient drum sample originally recorded for use with 1983's "Pipeline" is utilised in combination with a tom drum sound originally recorded for use with 1987's "I Want You Now" to form a series of two unique drum fills preceding each verse section.

Sample sources
Sample Source Status Notes Audio
Drum elements Emulator II factory library disk #71: DAS Synth
Confirmed
A lo-fi synthesizer sample derived from Emulator II factory library disk #71 "DAS Synth" is played several keys above its root key to produce a metallic ticking sound that is used in place of a hi-hat starting from the second chorus section of "Personal Jesus".

Click to display/hide audio example

Drum elements Emulator III OMI Universe of Sounds - Volume 2 - Tough Tones - "NOISE BURST"
Confirmed
A treated copy of a clap-like percussive sound derived from the Emulator III OMI Universe of Sounds "Tough Tones" voice is utilised throughout "Personal Jesus" starting from the second chorus section.

Click to display/hide audio example

Drum elements, snare drum Fad Gadget - Fireside Favourites - "Newsreel" - 7 November 1980
Confirmed
A manipulated snare sound derived from the opening moments of "Newsreel" from the 1980 Fad Gadget album Fireside Favourites is utilised throughout the outro of the album version of "Personal Jesus". Notably, this sample would also see use throughout "World In My Eyes". Former Depeche Mode member Alan Wilder recalled the snare drum sound of "World In My Eyes" in an undated Q&A on Shunt, the official Recoil project site: "[...] I think we made it from scratch or it could be a combination of analogue and a sample."[1]
Bass guitar elements Emulator III OMI Universe of Sounds - Volume 1 - Machine Set - "Stein Bass A1", "Stein Bass D2"
Confirmed
A series of bass guitar samples derived from the Emulator III OMI Universe of Sounds "Machine Set" voice are utilised throughout "Personal Jesus".

Click to display/hide audio example

Vocal elements Anthony Thomas - Thy Kingdom Come... Thy Will Be Done (1988 TV Movie) - 6 April 1988 (television release)
Confirmed
A series of audio excerpts derived from filmmaker Anthony Thomas's 1988 TV movie Thy Kingdom Come... Thy Will Be Done featuring sermons delivered by American televangelists Jim Bakker, W.A. Criswell, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Robison, Jimmy Swaggart, and motivational speaker Zig Ziglar, originally sampled for use in the "Pump Mix" of "Personal Jesus", are utilised sporadically throughout the outro section of all live performances of "Personal Jesus" since its debut.[footnotes 1] The phrases sampled for use in live performances of "Personal Jesus" include: "[...] the lord Jesus Christ Himself"; "I'm not crazy anymore!"; "Listen to me!"; Pat Robertson exclaiming: "[...] because the bible's the truth"; filmmaker Anthony Thomas inquiring: "Tell me what you've learned about God's love [...]"; and "[personal] [Jesus!]".

Violator engineer Pino Pischetola describes the origin of these samples in Kevin May and David McElroy's 2022 book Halo: The Story Behind Depeche Mode's Classic Album Violator:

During another mix of "Personal Jesus", I remember François listened to it many times and then he had this idea to put American-style preachers as a sample. That’s what became [the] "The Lord Jesus Christ himself" sample. In order to get that, François called a friend in Los Angeles that had a recording of everything you might want. So he calls him late at night and says, "Listen, I need something very quick. Something with preachers speaking." And his friend says, "Okay. I will FedEx it to you in a couple of hours." So two days later, using what must have used the fastest courier in the world [...] we got a cassette from LA with all the preachers on it. We spent two hours listening to all the preachers and different phrases, and then François picked up on that one and a few others to put into a sampler and fly in the song at a certain moment. That was really a fun thing to do.[3]

Click to display/hide audio example

Music video

Live performances

Main article: Available recordings of "Personal Jesus"
Main article: List of dates where "Personal Jesus" was played

Live versions

This section provides an example of a live version of Personal Jesus from each tour that it was played.

In the media

"Personal Jesus" is featured in the acclaimed 2004 video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas on the fictional alternative rock in-game radio station Radio X. Non re-encoded audio extracted from the game featuring fictional radio host Sage (voiced by Jodie Shawback) can be heard below:

Sage: "The Mode are up next. 'Personal Jesus'. Incredible. I've found one – and I think it's me."

Sage: "You just can't argue with Depeche Mode, you can't. I've tried, I've spent nights, hours and hours. You can't do it. I want David Gahan to move into my house – he said 'No.'"

Trivia

Notes

  1. Excerpts from Thy Kingdom Come... Thy Will Be Done would later see use in several Recoil songs, including "Faith Healer" and its remixes, the "Poison Dub" remix of "Drifting", and "5000 Years".

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 Wilder, Alan. "Shunt Q&A: ARCHIVES : DEPECHE MODE : VIOLATOR". recoil.co.uk. https://web.archive.org/web/20181128152225/http://oldsite.recoil.co.uk/forum/qa/dmviol.htm. Archived 28 November 2018, p. 1.
  2. Source: SHUNT : ARCHIVES : REPORT : EDITORIAL : VIOLATOR
  3. May, Kevin, and David McElroy. Halo: The Story Behind Depeche Mode's Classic Album Violator. Grosvenor House Publishing, 2022, p. 112.


1981-1985: Dreaming Of MeNew LifeJust Can't Get EnoughSee YouThe Meaning Of Love
Leave In SilenceGet The Balance RightEverything CountsLove In ItselfPeople Are PeopleMaster And ServantBlasphemous Rumours / SomebodyShake The DiseaseIt's Called A Heart
1986-1989: StrippedBut Not TonightA Question Of LustA Question Of TimeStrangelove
Never Let Me Down AgainBehind The WheelLittle 15Personal Jesus
1990-1998: Enjoy The SilencePolicy Of TruthWorld In My EyesI Feel YouWalking In My ShoesCondemnationIn Your RoomBarrel Of A GunIt's No GoodHomeUseless
Only When I Lose Myself
2001-2009: Dream OnI Feel LovedFreeloveGoodnight LoversPreciousA Pain That I'm Used To
Suffer WellJohn The Revelator / LilianMartyrWrongPeaceFragile Tension / Hole To Feed
2013-2017: HeavenSoothe My SoulShould Be HigherWhere's The RevolutionGoing Backwards
Cover Me
2023: Ghosts Again
1992-1998: Faith HealerDriftingStalker / Missing Piece
2000-2008: Strange HoursJezebelPreyAllelujah
2003-2008: Dirty Sticky FloorsI Need YouBottle Living / Hold OnA Little PieceKingdomSaw Something / Deeper And Deeper
2012-2015: Longest DayTake Me Back HomeAll Of This And NothingShine
1989-2003: CompulsionStardustLoverman
2012-2015: SpockSingle BlipAftermathsEuropa Hymn • "Pinking" (Christoffer Berg Remix)
Official releases