Depeche Mode can still surprise

When Britain's Depeche Mode started in 1980, you'd hardly imagine they'd become what Q magazine called "the most popular electronic band the world has ever known."

Their earliest singles - written by Vince Clarke, later of Yazoo and Erasure fame - were tinkling and twee, hardly the stuff of the grand, dark electro they became under songwriter/lyricist Martin Gore. Between Gore and baritone mouthpiece David Gahan, Depeche songs swelled with Euro-cosmopolitan chord changes and words of despairing romanticism the likes of which sold 100 million-plus records.

Friday night at Revel Casino's Ovation Hall in Atlantic City, Depeche displayed the fruits of its 33 years, reinvented its earliest hits, and showed off the alluringly strange sounds of its latest album, 2012's Delta Machine.

With keyboardist Peter Gordeno and drummer Christian Eigner, the band's core - Gore, Gahan, and Andrew Fletcher - tickled the fancy of its fan base with a mix of smashes and rarities. Throughout, Gahan's buoyant baritone took the lead with Gore's high harmonies drifting in the background during moments such as the eerily percolating "Enjoy the Silence."

While "Halo" received a soft, celestial, glitchy remix, the intro to the usually thudding "Personal Jesus" was reborn as a pensive, devilishly bluesy riff until it hit its hard-as-nails stride. With "Higher Love" transformed into something epically folksy a la Scott Walker or David Bowie, the broken beats of "Policy of Truth" gave it an oddball limp, a busted-up glory in tune with Depeche's recent explorations of off-kilter rhythms.

Those newer songs were as impressively haunted as Depeche's catalog smashes. Starting with the sparse "Welcome to My World" and its rivalry between good and evil, the beats were twisted, askew. Rather than use his high voice for backgrounds, Gore sang in a low rumble in tune with Gahan.

The lead singer had several tricks up his sleeve. While the halting "Angel" became a ramped-up and speedy rant worthy of one of Nick Cave's biblical tirades, Gahan turned the slow, slippery "Should Be Higher" into his loudest, brassiest moment. It's nice to know that after 33 years, Depeche Mode can still surprise.