"It's Called a Heart" is Depeche Mode's fourteenth UK single (released on 16 September 1985). It was included as one of two new songs on the compilation The Singles (81-85) the same year, along with "Shake the Disease". It reached number 18 in the UK singles chart. The American version of The Singles 81>85, Catching Up with Depeche Mode, also includes the B-side, "Fly on the Windscreen".
Martin Gore and Alan Wilder have often been quoted as saying "It's Called a Heart" is their least favourite single ever recorded by Depeche Mode, and is not particularly well-liked by many fans either. On the documentary included on the remastered edition of the Black Celebration album, it is revealed that the band wanted to release "Fly on the Windscreen" as a single, but the Mute Records publicist nixed that idea, as the song starts with the word "death". However, the so-called "Final" version of the song was included on Black Celebration, released the following year.
There is no limited edition ("L12 Bong") version of this single in the way that most other Depeche Mode singles have been. Instead there was a "D12 Bong", a double 12", that featured both the standard 12" and the remix 12".
The music video was directed by Peter Care and shot on location in a Berkshire cornfield.
Famous quotes containing the words called and/or heart:
“you see, we live in a cold climate
and are not permitted to kiss on the street
so I made up a song that wasn’t true.
I made up a song called Marriage.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“Public opinion contains all kinds of falsity and truth, but it takes a great man to find the truth in it. The great man of the age is the one who can put into words the will of his age, tell his age what its will is, and accomplish it. What he does is the heart and the essence of his age, he actualizes his age. The man who lacks sense enough to despise public opinion expressed in gossip will never do anything great.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)