'Disintegration' vs 'Violator': a POLL

I remember a Smash Hits cover with New Order that had the headline: "We're the last punks left!" in 1987. As a North American teenager it was really confusing to me, because I had no idea of their background and associated them with dance pop like the Pet Shop Boys and Madonna.

If this helps the Smiths' last three albums are certified gold in America, NO have three, and Depeche Mode and the Cure each boast several albums that have gone at least platinum.

I vividly remember tons of folks in high school with "Disintegration" t-shirts after the show. Never saw a "Violator" shirt. But in college, I saw tons of "Songs of Faith and Devotion" shirts.

Violator makes the best shirt of these.

I had 4 different tshirts from the Violator tour, I remember spending all of my disposable income on them. I wish I still had them, they were awesome.

yeah, "Love Song" was an honest smash, but DM were a party band by comparison

i didn't hear depeche mode (or the smiths) until somewhat later, but there was a guy in my high school who was into hot hot hot.

he was on my basketball team and was the fucking dirtiest player you can imagine -- he'd step on peoples' feet, yank your jersey, spit on you, whatever.

i'm curious what he thought of disintegration.

I was waiting for you to say he hooked up with the power forward.

Roffle.

haha i was the power forward

iykwim

what

disintegration is pretty good so i voted for it

no one in 20 odd years attempted to recreate the sound of disintegration, i'm constantly amazed by that. lots of bands are taking cues from early cure these days but you won't get disintegration-type records any time soon. for such an era defining album that's pretty weird, the lack of inheritors i mean.

well, no one is as sad as robert smith

Absolutely, in my experience. Depeche Mode, New Order and the Cure were the holy trinity for my friends when I was 15, 16.

everybody in my circle would rep for New Order & the Cure, Depeche Mode was not even considered anywhere near that level & I'd still argue that. "Words like violence/break the silence" Jesus Christ dude even Barney is better than that & he's terrible

oh shi

Here comes love, it's like violence/You can't buy it with silence

Well, at least Barney does not impart his nonsense with portent. You get the feeling he views lyrics as a formality. Martin Gore one imagines considers his lyrics poetry of the heart.

Or the music of the night.

Absolutely, in my experience. Depeche Mode, New Order and the Cure were the holy trinity for my friends when I was 15, 16. We all had Disintegration, Violator and Technique - three big post-punk bands hitting their commercial (and arguably creative) peaks at around the same time. They felt inseparable to me.

― Get wolves (DL), Tuesday, May 15, 2012 6:30 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and

I knew that people lump(ed) these groups, and even the Smiths, together in North America

lol, yeah

For most of my life (from early teens through pretty recently) if you'd asked me who my all time fav bands were My answer would have been these four though which order I'd rank them in has changed throughout the years.

My best friend's mom let her older sister paint the walls of her bedroom black and paint the lyrics to "Pictures of You" on it in swirly Cure script. I thought it was just about the coolest thing I'd ever seen.

Echo & the Bunnymen was certainly a big part of that milieu, too, for a while at least. John Hughes knew what was up.

Didn't think E&tB had anything close to the stature of these other bands this side of the Atlantic? According to Wikipedia, they peaked at #51 on the US album charts, #41 on Canada's. No silver or gold albums afaik.

yeah &B had a clutch of college radio singles played a bit in the US but nothing like the Cure, NO, or Depeche's sales.

I just know what people in my class had on their Trapper Keepers.

*E&B

I could ask Will Sergeant what he thought about it all, I'm meeting him this Saturday.

I like E&B a lot but didn't get into them until later and never as much as the others. TBH the BIG THREE to me have always been The Cure, DM and The Smiths. I would put NO in there now but that wasn't always the case especially when I was a young teenager.

violator by a million miles. sorry dan

"disintegration" is where I dropped the CURE. I just don't like all that spacious sound. I love all the albums before it, and sort of became a singles fan after it.

I'm not voting because I can't stand Depeche Mode

'disintegration' was the first cure record I anticipated in advance having heard 'kiss me x3' months after it was actually out and worked my way back from there. Also the first band I loved as a teenager. I had HUGE HUGE HUGE expectations for 'Disintegration'. It surpassed them.

decided to listen to both for the first time back-to-back since i enjoy these bands mainly as singles acts and was kind of curious to answer the question for myself. i generally think of myself as preferring The Cure, but right now I gotta go with Violator, Disintegration is such a slog, even the songs i like on it kind of get the air sucked out of them in the context of the album.

otm, I've tried soooo many times to get beyond the singles on Disintegration (which I love) & I lose focus every time.

The second of Disintegration defines "mire" (except for "Untitled").

Again, that's silly, since that ignores "Prayers for Rain" and the title track, which are about as tough and exiting as the band in this guise gets.

I mean, I would be lying if I said I ever listened to "Blue Dress" or "Clean" after "Policy of Truth" is done.

(hah, exciting, I meant)

Maybe thrilling is a better word?

I don't either!

re listen to "Clean" or "Blue Dress."

Which sort of detracts from the album, no? And reduces it to more of an ... awesome EP? Minus those two tracks it drops down to 35 minutes. It's in some ways I think more forgivable for "Disintegration" to go on too long, seeing as it's designed to be sort of oppressive, monolithic, even hypnotically turgid, than it is for "Violator" to peter out after it blows its wad with the incredible "Policy of Truth." "Homesick" and "Untitled," on the other hand, are the perfect comes downs after the epic-ness of "Disintegration."

(BTW, I once interviewed Robert Smith, and I asked him if he made Simon Gallop play those repetitive basslines on songs like "Disintegration" as a form of torture. He laughed and claimed Gallop actually liked playing those parts.)

but Violator FEELS shorter

I never think, "Ugh -- second side coming"

Because you (like me) skip the last two songs! That's a full quarter of the running time.

Whereas "Disintegration" is at least designed as a slog. As opposed to, say, the last two Red Hot Chili Peppers records, which are simply too long. (Just as an example)

But Violator boasts "Halo," "The Sweetest Perfection" and "Waiting For the Night" besides the singles while Disintegration only coughs up "Untitled" at the end.

I dunno. I think we're all just dancing around the consensus that "The Same Deep Water As You" is what drags down the second side; the rest of the non-singles on "Disintegration" are pretty strong.

same deep water is great
clean is great