“Personal Jesus” is the first single and third track on Depeche Mode’s seventh and most successful album Violator. It peaked at #28 in the US in March 1990. It also reached the top 20 in several countries overseas and became Warner Bros. Records' biggest-selling 12" single in its 40+ year history. Rolling Stone later named “Personal Jesus” as one of the 500 greatest songs of all time in 2011.

According to vocalist Dave Gahan, Priscilla Presley calls her husband Elvis “her own personal Jesus” in her book Elvis & Me and that is what inspired songwriter Martin Gore to write this song. Gore confirms the track was inspired by Priscilla Presley’s idolatry of her husband. Taking the lyrics literally, “Personal Jesus” is about a person who offers relief through a second-rate confessional via the telephone.