Dave Gahan Tears Of My Tracks (Q, 1997)

[demoderus]

Tears Of My Tracks
[Q, March 1997. Words: Phil Sutcliffe. Pictures: Andy Earl.]

Mercilessly-detailed in-depth conversation with Dave on all things related to his drug troubles. A lot of the narrative in this piece was used almost unchanged by Steve Malins for his biography and is a harrowing account of events surrounding Dave's suicide attempt, marriage breakup no. 2 and overdose. Second section of a three-part feature: the other parts being a more general article and a discography.

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" "I'm lying on the floor with wounds open and everything. I say, "It's not what it looks like, Mum, I'm sick, I have to take steroids for my voice..." All this fucking trash comes out of my mouth. Then I look up at my mum and she looks at me and I say, "Mum, I'm a junkie, I'm a heroin addict." And she says, "I know, love." "

It's a late Monday evening at Abbey Road. Dave Gahan pronounces himself worn out. However, the long day has meant a lot to him. He got up at 6am. His 9-year-old son, Jack, had spent the weekend with him in London, but Jack's mother, Gahan's first wife Joanne, had stipulated he must be back home in Sussex by early that morning.

Because of Gahan's heroin addiction it was the first time she had allowed him to see Jack alone for a couple of years. Since he cleaned up, there had been regular Sunday afternoon phone calls and an exploratory tripartite meeting in Sussex. Then this breakthrough.

"I couldn't sleep last night, I was so worried about not waking up in time," he declares. "Joanne was very strict about getting him back on time."

You can see her point?

"Fuck, yeah. Now I can. It used to be (whimpers) Oh no, she won't let me see Jack. But that was rubbish. I wasn't available."

He is "available" now, he asserts: facing life to the last syllable of the pain he has suffered and inflicted on those who love him. Haltingly, yet with the naked candour of a recovering addict to whom concealment has come to represent personal disgrace, he begins his story.

Why did you start taking heroin?

Million dollar question, that. Well, it's no secret that I've been drinking and using drugs for a long tome. Probably since I was about (pauses, calculates)... 12 years old. Popping a couple of my mum's phenobarbitones every now and then. Hash. Amphetamines. Coke came along, Alcohol was always there, hand in hand with drugs. Then all of a sudden I discovered heroin, and I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me feel, well... like I've never felt before, I felt like I really belonged.

To what?

I've no idea. I just felt nothing was gonna hurt me, I was invincible. That was the euphoria. But the euphoria was very short lived.

You've implied you planned the transition from plain Dave of Basildon into...

A monster. Well, I did. During the Violator tour. Not overnight. There were a couple of ingredients missing: a companion in doing everything it took to be a rock'n'roll star - which turned out to be Teresa, my second wife - and...the drug. I wanted to lead that very selfish lifestyle without being judged.

Your second wife was the person who wouldn't judge you?

Yeah, because she was joining in. In fact, she introduced me... (he pauses to rephrase this, carefully not ducking the responsibility)...she didn't make me take heroin, she gave me the opportunity to try it again. I'd actually played around with it back in Basildon.

Did you inject it when you were a boy?

No. But from the moment I first injected I wanted to feel like that all the time and...you can't. After a few months I was forever chasing that high and I never found it again. I was just maintaining a very sad existence. On schedule, I'd start shaking. In the morning, then in the afternoon, then in the evening. I needed my fix.

Andrew Fletcher and Martin Gore had their crises on the Songs Of Faith And Devotion Tour. What pushed you over the edge?

After the tour ended, I spent a few months in London and that's when my habit got completely out of hand. In fact, Teresa decided that she wanted to have a baby and I said to her, Teresa, we're junkies. Let's not kid ourselves, when you're a junkie, you can't shit, piss, come...nothing. All these bodily functions go. You're in this soulless body, you're in a shell. But she didn't get it.

 

[demoderus]

Weren't you living in Los Angeles most of the time?

Yeah, I was in deep shit there and I didn't know whether I was going to be able to get myself out. I was so fucking paranoid, I carried a .38 at all times. Going downtown to cop, those guys you hang out with are heavy people, they have guns sitting on the table in front of them. I was scared of everything and everyone. I'd wait until four in the morning to check the mailbox and then walk down to the gate with the gun tucked in the back of my pants. I thought they were coming to get me. Whoever "they" were.

That was when I started toying with the idea of going out on a big one. Just shoot the big speedball to heaven. Disappear. Stop. I wanted to stop being myself, I wanted to stop living in this body. My skin, was crawling, I hated myself that much, what I'd done to myself and everyone around me.

When did your first wife stop you seeing your son?

Usually, when he came out to visit me I'd been able to stop fixing for a while and keep it together. But it came to a point where I was so sick I rang my mother in England and said, "Mum, Jack's due here in a couple of days and I've got terrible flu. I can't cope on my own, can you come over?" I lied. There was a lot of lying going on.

She came and I tried to do the whole thing - get up in the morning, make him his little egg, tried to be the dad. But I was kidding myself. I was cheating my son and I was cheating my mother. I knew it.

One night after I'd put Jack to bed and my mum was asleep I got my outfit together and banged up in the living room. Then I blacked out, overdosed. When I woke up I was sprawled across the bed. It was daylight and I heard voices from the kitchen. I thought, "Shit, I left all my shit out."

I got up in a panic, ran down to the living room and it was all gone. So I ran into the kitchen and mum and Jack were sitting there and I said, "What did you do with my stuff, mum?" She said, "I threw it in the rubbish outside." I ran out the door and brought in six black bags. If you can picture this insanity, I'm with my son and my mother - who, as far as I know, don't know anything about what's going on with me - and I brought in six bags, five of which were my neighbours' and emptied them out on the kitchen floor. I was on my hands and knees going through other people's garbage until I found what I needed.

Then I shut myself in the bathroom. Shortly after that, there's a knocking on the door. It bursts open and my son and my mother are there and I'm lying on the floor with wounds open and everything. I say, "It's not what it looks like, Mum, I'm sick, I have to take steroids for my voice..." All this fucking trash comes out of my mouth. Then I look up at my mum and she looks at me and I say, "Mum, I'm a junkie, I'm a heroin addict." And she says, "I know, love."

Jack took my hand and led me into his bedroom and knelt me down on the floor and said to me, "Daddy, I don't want you to be sick any more." (Gahan swallows hard, forges on) I said, "I don't wanna be sick any more either." He said, "You need to see a doctor." I said, "Yeah."

Anyway, I guess my mum must have rung Joanne. She came and picked Jack up and that was the last I saw of them for a long while. My mum stayed on for a bit to settle me down. She'd say, "We don't want you to die." And that didn't stop me. That didn't do it.

You didn't try to clean up at that point?

I did, a few weeks after that, I spent Christmas with Teresa and I tried to kick it on my own. I lay on the couch for a week like a zombie. Then, one night, I turned to Teresa and said, "I need help." So I went into rehab for the first time.

When I came out, Teresa met me. We went to get some lunch and she said, "I'm not gonna stop drinking or using drugs just because you have to. I'll do whatever I want to do." She didn't use like me, regularly. But in rehab they said that if one of us wasn't going to give up, it would be impossible for the other. At that point, I knew our relationship would have to be over if I was gonna have any chance. I'd thought we loved each other. Now I think the love was pretty one-sided.

Actually, she soon left me to get her life together, as she put it. She always used to say to me, "It's all about you, Dave - if only you could love yourself." Well, that's come full circle now, because she's suing me for a ridiculous amount of money, claiming I'm responsible for her life.

After she left I stayed clean for a little while, but I slipped back into old habits and found myself going to another rehab in August 1995.

What happened?

When you're abusing yourself to that degree there's a lot of chaos around you, people who are supposedly your friends but maybe aren't. My little world, Daveworld, was completely falling apart.

 

[demoderus]

I checked into the Sunset Marquis as usual. I didn't want to live at home because it was too big and empty. When I went up to my house to get some clothes I found it had been looted - my two Harleys, the studio, tapes of a few songs I'd written, the stereo system, everything down to the cutlery.

There were metal gates which you opened with an electronic clicker and the house had a coded alarm system which they even had the fucking cheek to reset, so it must have been...an inside job. Some of my so-called friends had gone in there, knowing that I was away in rehab. I thought, I can't believe this, this is my fucking life.

How did you react?

I went back to the Sunset Marquis. I rang my mother and she said Teresa had told her that I hadn't been to any rehab, I wasn't even trying to get clean like I'd promised - and I was trying, I was doing the best I could. I quickly got loaded and drank a lot of wine, took a handful of pills. I went into the bathroom and cut my wrists. Uh, there was a friend with me.

It was a cry for help then?

Absolutely. Now I realise that. I wanted someone to fucking help me, but I didn't know how to ask. And do you know why? Because I thought I could do it on my own. The biggest pisser to me was realising that I couldn't. I'd had all the success and I wasn't prepared to admit I was powerless over fucking drugs and alcohol. And I was. And I still am. And will be every day of my life. Now, where was I?

Your suicide attempt.

Yeah. In fact I remember now, I was in the middle of that phone call to my mum and I told her to hold on, I'd be back in a minute, went to the bathroom and cut my wrists, wrapped towels round them and came back to the phone and said, "Mum, I've got to go, I love you very much." Then I sat down with my friend and acted like nothing was going on. I put my arms down by my sides and I could feel them bleeding away. She didn't have a clue what was happening until she noticed this pool of blood gathering on the floor.

When I woke up I was in a psychiatric ward, this padded room. For a minute I thought I might be in heaven, whatever heaven is. Then this psychiatrist informed me I'd committed a crime under local law by trying to take my own life. Only in fucking L.A., huh?

I was locked up in there for a while, but as soon as I got out I was up to my old tricks. I'd clean up a bit, then use again. Every time I needed more, wanted it quicker - there was never enough. I just have to keep fucking going till I black out or whatever. That's my problem. Any addict's problem. They don't know when to stop. I didn't know when to stop.

Which is why, when you went to New York last spring to record the vocals for Ultra, you could hardly sing a note?

The only vocal on the album that I recorded at Electric Lady - the only vocal I performed high - was Sister Of Night. I can hear how scared I was. I'm glad it's there to remind me. I could see the pain I was causing everybody.

What did you do after the band meeting in New York where they asked you to clean up?

I flew back to L.A., the Sunset Marquis, and promptly went on a massive binge, totally out of control. By then I was shooting a mixture of heroin and coke because neither of them were cutting it on their own. It was a particularly strong brand of heroin called Red Rum which has killed quite a number of people recently. Of course, I just thought it referred to the racehorse until someone pointed out that it spells 'murder' backwards.

 

[demoderus]

There was something weird about that night, May 28, 1996. I remember saying to the guy I was with, "Don't fill the rig up. Don't put too much coke in it." I felt wrong. I woke up in hospital hearing one of the paramedics saying "I think we lost him." I sat up and said, "No you fucking haven't." I'd had the full cardiac arrest, my heart had stopped for two minutes. I'd been dead, basically. [1]

Later, a detective read me my rights and I was arrested for possession of cocaine and needles. I was handcuffed to a trolley. Straight from hospital they threw me into the county jail for a couple of nights, in a cell with about seven other guys. A scary experience. But not enough to scare me into quitting.

As soon as I was bailed, I got what I needed, checked into the Marquis and carried on for another couple of days. Until I suddenly started thinking, "What the fuck am I doing? I died!" I went back to the house I'd rented in Santa Monica and, um, sat on the couch and realised I was going nowhere...I thought I was going to die. When I shot up, there was absolutely no feeling at all.

Then our manager, Jonathan Kessler, rang and told me there was a meeting with my lawyer about the bust. But when I showed up, it turned out it was a full intervention. A Los Angeles specialist called Bob Timmons was there. He's worked with a lot of addicts in the entertainment business.

They all said, "You're going into rehab right now," I said, "No fucking way." They said, "You are." I said, "All right, tomorrow" - thinking I could go home and cook up before I went, you know? But they said, "No, now." I was like, "What about this evening?" "No." I said, "A couple of hours. I need to call my mum." They let me go. Jonathan said he'd come and pick me up. I went home, did my last deal, had my last little party and checked into the rehab.

This time it worked?

I've been more than six months clean now, and when I say clean, that's no drink, no pills, no dope, no heroin, absolutely nothing. If God handed out drugs and alcohol I had my fair share and I'm done.

How did you make the break when all your previous efforts had failed?

With addiction, you've got to be willing to give it up.

What made you willing?

Falling flat on my face again and again. Being picked up by a couple of very close friends - one being Jonathan, who was always there for me, always the first face I saw when I woke up in hospital, another being a friend I met in my first rehab who I could ring and who would tell me what I didn't want to hear. I was a very fortunate junkie - I am - because I have a lot of people who care about me and weren't going to let me disappear into oblivion.

The whole way I felt changed. I was sick of hurting everybody around me. I didn't want to lose my son, I didn't want him to grow up wondering why his dad killed himself. All that hit harder and harder. And suddenly I got it. There was hope. I could change. I could have a choice...and now I have a choice every day. I have a choice about what I want to do, where I want to go, how I want to be.

The only thing I don't have a choice about is my feelings...they come and go, but they're really difficult to deal with when you've been using for a long time. You've blocked them out for so long and they come on like a speeding freight train.

You mean depression?

Yeah, this low-grade depression that you might sit in for weeks. But it passes, it really does.

I feel awkward inside about trying to explain all this because I feel like I'm trying to justify myself...but I guess I'm not really trying to justify being a heroin addict. I'm trying to explain, for the record. You get yourself into this mess. Nobody makes you take drugs. You can either take them or you can live.

What's fantastic now is spending a couple of days with Jack. Being there. Being really there. Last night at the hotel when I heard him kind of moaning and I went into his bedroom and climbed into bed with him and just cuddled him and he went back to sleep...six months ago I wouldn't have been able to do that. I wouldn't have wanted to. Because of the guilt and the shame I felt about myself.

Gahan collects himself. He mutters, "Erm, that's about it, really," and laughs, rather embarrassed, at the peculiar sensation of saying all this in public. He reiterates that he's not asking for pity or respect or trust from his friends or Depeche Mode fans. Sympathy is not so much unearned as largely irrelevant to the internal quest for a sustaining sense of balance. One day at a time is his motto.

With a firm handshake, tired as he is, the singer says goodbye and trudges upstairs to lend Martin Gore some support in his continuing struggle with a pesky B-side.

[1] - This detail is questionable: apart from the difficulty of suddenly springing into life moments after being declared dead, it's not mentioned in any other retelling of events.