It is my firmly held opinion most people do not have all the Depeche Mode music they probably should. Although really that could be said for many bands, in various genres. Because the average consumer can only reasonably be expected to purchase and consume so much music before they go flat broke. And except for in extreme cases, most humans do not have an entire wall of their home to devote to a small mountain's worth of CDs.

Record labels, in all of their infinite compassion and selfless generosity, understand this dilemma. And their solution is a reasonable one: the best-of compilation. They're geared towards people who might be interested in an artist, but not so interested that they've been keeping up with their proper albums all this time. Casual to moderate fans, we'll call them. And now those multitudes of listeners have such a release for Depeche Mode,The Best Of, Volume 1.

Depeche Mode would seem a great candidate for just such a release. So great, in fact, there have been several others before. Catching Up With Depeche Mode attempted to familiarize U.S. fans with some of their earlier hits, 101 attempted a similar feat with a live setting, and most recently there have been two sets of releases showcasing a more exhaustive best-of for all their singles. And now we have one more. So is this release even worth mentioning, given their proclivity for milking their back catalog?

Actually, yes it is. The Best Of... is the first proper audio compilation of their hits. Their previous attempts, both Singles 81-85 and the double-CD set Singles 86-98, were cobbled together sets of all their radio singles (regardless of whether they were hits or not, in fact, a few of them are dubious selections at best). Not to mention that at three discs, it was two discs too large. And they were meagerly loaded discs at that. All told, consumers were expected to buy too many discs at too high a price, to receive too few necessary songs.

The Best Of... attempts to right this wrong with almost the right formula. Finally, the breadth of releases has been distilled to a generous single CD. It still has a few problems, but is a much stronger contender than its predecessors.

The most curious aspect of the release is the inclusion of Volume 1 in the title. Since I don't have any inside information on their future plans, I can only speculate that it means one of two things. (1) Depeche Mode plan on staying together for a while longer, and will at some point in the future release a Volume 2 to accommodate future releases and further back catalog. Or (2) there is already a Volume 2 in the works to hold tracks that didn't fit on the first CD, in addition to fan favorites.