FASHIONED from the wreckage of singer Dave Gahan's full blown heroin addiction and the shock departure of Alan Wilder, Ultra was nearly the album that Depeche Mode never made.
Mute Records boss Daniel Miller now describes it as "arguably their most important record"
with the band having seemingly been on the verge of breaking up.
A raft of musicians were drafted in to provide inspiration, along with Bomb The Bass beatmaster Tim Simenon, who filled Wilder's studio shoes.
Recording suffered Gahan in freefall and barely able to provide a single useable vocal. After an overdose in May 1996 almost claimed his life, he checked into a detox clinic, and pulled himself together to start recording again.
His lurid confessions over his drug use, while exiled and living in Los Angeles, later made for great stories for music journalists and gave the record a huge, but unexpected, publicity boost.
Thirteen months in the making, Ultra charted at No1 in the UK in April 1997 and No 5 in the US, eventually selling about four million copies.
It also spawned two of the Mode's strongest ever singles, the gritty sabre-toothed groove of Barrel Of A Gun, which appeared inadvertently to tell the story of Gahan's headlong rush into nearoblivion, and the slinky disco-pop of It's No Good. Miller says: "It was make or break for Depeche Mode.
It almost didn't matter what the album was like, there just had to be one. It pulled them back from the edge of the abyss."
In contrast, 2001's Exciter had a less troubled conception with Mark Bell, formerly of techno act LFO, now at the mixing desk.
However, it received lukewarm reviews and was not particularly well liked by the fans.
Despite containing one of the band's most upbeat singles for years, I Feel Loved, many disliked the sonic trickery and the sparse electronic sound.
The band regrouped four years later with 2005's Playing The Angel, widely lauded as a return to form.
