"4:13 Dream" by the Cure

Austin show tonight, the only 100% General Admission show of the tour (as far as i know)...

If you don't get up there and stage-dive and hug Robert and all that you're not a real fan. (I am the fakest fan ever.)

All hail "Fat Bob"! :)

Just got back from the Austin show, wowee! Great show. They played forever and ever!

Can't remember the main set list very well (they did all the singles from Disintegration, and from Pornography we got The Figurehead, 100 Years, The Hanging Garden and Strange Day) but the encores were classic:

1st encore: At Night, M, Play for Today, A Forest
2nd encore: Three Imaginary Boys, Grinding Halt, Boys Don't Cry, Jumping Someone Else's Train, Fire in Cairo, 10:15 Saturday Night, Killing an Arab

Made me wanna rush to the next town and see 'em again, they sounded so good!

Made me wanna rush to the next town and see 'em again, they sounded so good!

Yeah this was a great show. I'm going to Houston tomorrow, you oughta too!

We got a seriously great setlist in Austin tonight, lots of stuff that either hadn't been played before at all on the tour (Torture, The Hanging Garden) or had only been played 2-3 times (The Figurehead, A Strange Day, Catch, Signal to Noise, The Big Hand, Doing the Unstuck), plus the Seventeen Seconds encore -- all pretty lucky I'd say.

More discussion of Austin in the morning though, I'm tired.

Urgh. I wanna bang my head against a wall for missing this tour. Fantastic setlist. i can't believe they'd play "Torture". I don't really care for this song but it seems so random.

I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU GUYS GOT THREE IMAGINARY BOYS

woulda gone down to see the houston show tonight but i had work... sounds like they got a nice set with plenty of stuff from head on the door, i would have liked that.

last time i actually saw them play was 1989! bob's voice is still great, and the sound was just excellent. looked like they were having fun, too. i forgot how goofy robert smith was!

only real downside is that the austin music hall couldn't deal with the crowd on a day where the temp hit the upper 90s... the A/C couldn't cope and it was stifling in the thick of the crowd. made people cranky, just near us there a couple of fights! security didn't give a shit at all.

a couple years later, what's the fan consensus on "The End of the World"? 'cause i still think it's awesome and catchy and nice to listen to when i'm sorta sad (a companion to "Boys Don't Cry," i guess)

Good song, worked very well live at the Bowl.

I actually loved that single when it came out.

I must say I like "Freakshow" - its quirky and twisted, good stuff.

So, Austin on Sunday night:

Definitely the most "hipster"-oriented setlist of the Texas shows, lots of rare stuff, b-sides like "The Big Hand" and "Signal to Noise" plus 4 (!!!) tunes from Pornography and 4 more (!!!) from Seventeen Seconds. Not a lot of "pop" stuff was played, no singles aside from the ones they're doing every night.

Music Hall venue was great, though a bit stuffy. I was front/center about 10 feet from the rail, got there an hour before doors opened. This was the only General Admission show of the USA tour (as far as i know) and also the tiniest venue (4,500 capacity), it was like a small theater compared to the arena shows in Dallas and Houston.

The bad: It seemed like the band took about 6-7 songs to really get going at this show. Robert's singing was FLAT during "Alt.end," "Torture" (great set choice, fucked it up though) and "The End of the World" but by the time "The Big Hand" came around 35-40 minutes into the night, it was all good.

The good: Lots and lots of highlights! "Doing the Unstuck" was incredible. "Catch" was perfect. "The Figurehead" straight into "A Strange Day" was killer, just like the album transition (I recall Louis J. stating recently on ILM the necessity of these songs being paired together). "The Hanging Garden," only time that's been played all USA tour, awesome performance there. And it was great to hear "The Big Hand" and "Signal to Noise," both very nice songs. The Seventeen Seconds encore was FANTASTIC, "At Night" --> "M" --> "Play for Today" --> "A Forest" = WOW.

Grade: A- (would have given an A, had the first 30 minutes not seemed "off")

Compared to the Dallas show? Definitely a setlist for the bigger Cure fans than the casual ones. No pop encore like in Dallas, not as many new songs. But i think overall, i enjoyed Austin a little more.

Houston last night:

This was my favorite of the three shows, and mostly I'll chalk that up to song selection. The band opened the main set with "Out of This World" and closed it with "Bloodflowers," both personal favorites from Bloodflowers the album (their most underrated, and a fucking GREAT album), and they squeezed "Maybe Someday" into the middle of the set, their best pop song of the past 15 years (to these ears). I was hoping for some Bloodflowers stuff this show, so that worked out very well.

Additional highlights: "Want" was the second song of the set, absolutely destroyed. A couple nice tracks from The Head on the Door, "Kyoto Song" and "The Blood," both awesome. "How Beautiful You Are," "A Letter to Elise" and then the first encore consisting of "Plainsong" into "Disintegration," all great songs. "Disintegration" and "Bloodflowers" in particular, mindblowing performances both.

The bad: I'm hard pressed to name anything here. The performance was solid the entire night, Robert and the other guys all seemed like they were enjoying themselves more so than Dallas and Austin.

Venue was fucking massive, almost a full arena, maybe 9,000 to 10,000 capacity. Pretty packed too. I was down 12th row center (seated), a bit closer than Dallas, not nearly front row like Austin. Great seats though.

Overall grade: A

In comparison, if Dallas was the most "pop" of the Texas shows, and Austin the most "hip," then Houston just seemed like they wanted to play a big, expansive set with lots of massive songs; one part of the set reads "One Hundred Years" --> "Bloodflowers" --> "Plainsong" --> "Disintegration," which is a lot of sprawling, heavy songs in a row. A lot to take in. But I have no complaints about this show, it was out of this world. Har har har.

You are forgiven. For now.

Anyway.

Very glad that I went to all the Texas shows, now that it's all over. I heard about 15 songs unique to each night, and I'd be kicking myself if I'd missed the highlights unique to any of these shows. I counted up, looks like i saw 67 unique songs over three shows, AWESOME. (The only songs I didn't hear that they've played elsewhere: "If Only Tonight We Could Sleep," "The Kiss," "Other Voices" and "Faith.")

YouTube highlights, all decent quality audio/video:

The Cure - Underneath The Stars - Dallas 06.06.08 - I think Ned mentioned he loves this new song. And rightly so.

THE CURE DALLAS 060608 PRAYERS FOR RAIN - Did i mention how great this was???

The Cure One Hundred Years Dallas, Texas - "It doesn't matter if we all die..."

The Cure live at Austin Music Hall 6/9/08 The Figurehead - This gives an idea what it was like in the midst of that packed General Admission crowd. Very happy this was played.

Doing The Unstuck - The Cure live at Austin Music Hall 06.08.2008 - My favorite song from this show.

The CURE Maybe Someday LIVE Houston June 9 2008 - Incredible.

The Cure at Toyota Center Houston, Texas. June 9th, 2008. Just Like Heaven, and A Letter to Elise. - "Elise" especially was a winner.

I said "unique" in that first paragraph a lot, huh.

i'm so mad i missed this tour but told myself don't see them until there is a new album out. now, after reading this thread, that was a huge mistake. can't wait for the new album and looking forward to seeing them real soon or end of this year, beginning of 2009.

Another video showed up on YouTube, definitely worth checking out. This is a new song they played in Houston (for the first time on the USA tour), and along with "Underneath the Stars," it's by far the best new song they've played live.

LIVE! A Boy I Never Knew - The Cure Toyota Center in Houston, Tx 6/9/08

Alright, the new single "Freakshow" is seriously great. I haven't been so excited about a new Cure album since "Wish"

"Freakshow" is their best single since "The 13th".
And this line-up is definitely ace.

"Freakshow" is their best single since "The 13th".

Very apt comparison. And HI DERE Marco!

still able to find 5 minutes to check ILM every now and then.
and ciao to you, Ned! :)

I still don't care for "Freakshow," bah.

"Freakshow" is a bit like a successful "Screw". HI DERE

Whatever, "Screw" is not half bad. Killer bassline.

"Screw" is awesome! (So is "Freakshow".)

oh shit I am finally listening to "Baby Dog Rag Book" and wau

lol or whatever it's called

It's called something like that! And see, I TOLD you you'd love it.

O SHIT IM FINALY LISTENNG 2 BABY DOG RAG BOK AND WAU

-- HI DERE, Saturday, June 14, 2008 10:58 AM (43 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

LOL OR WUT ITS CAL3D

-- HI DERE, Saturday, June 14, 2008 10:58 AM (43 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

ITS CALED SOM3THNG LIEK TAHT!1!11! OMG WTF LOL AND SE I 2LD U U LUV IT
!!!1!!!!! OMG

-- Ned Raggett, Saturday, June 14, 2008 11:17 AM (24 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

You kids today.

The English-to-12-Year-Old-AOLer Translator

U KIDS 2DAY
!111!!1! WTF

-- Ned Raggett, Saturday, June 14, 2008 12:00 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

JUST SAW THE CURE FOR THE FIRST TIME LIVE

a set so good but they didn't play a few tracks I'd been expecting -- is this like the first concert in 20 years where they haven't played a single note of "Plainsong"? :(

They didn't play it at the Bowl! Luck of the draw, duder. But glad you caught 'em. :-)

NU ALBUM.!!11111!!!!!1!1111 WTF LOL 5/3/206 42941 PM - BY CUREROBRT
NO RAAL NEWS
WHICH SI Y THEIR SI LITLE POST3D HERE
BUT.
THIS!!1!1!!!1!!!11!!! OMG LOL WEK SI OUR SIXTH IN TEH STUDIO
AND W3 WIL FINISH TRAKNG (EI RECORDNG DRUMS/BAS/GUITARS/GUIED VOIEC) OUR 20TH SONG THES FRIDAY.
EVARYONA!1!1!1!!!!!!!!1!!1!!! OMG WTF SI V3RY HAPY
AND IT SOUNDS GORGAOS
WE!!!111 WTF R TAKNG A BR3AK NEXT WEK SO I CAN FIGURE OUT DA A-LIST SONGS AND G3T DA WORDS 2 WORK.
AND!1!11!11!!!!11!! OMG TH3N W3 WIL B BAK IN2 SNGNG AND OV3RDUBS AND R3-RECORDS AND MIXNG.
STIL!11!!!!!!11!1!1!1 OMG WTF HOPNG FOR A HALOWEN RAL3AES
BUT UNTIL IT HAP3NS.
IS!!!!1!1!11!!11111!!11 OMG LOL THES NAWS!
RX?!???!!1111111!1! WTF LOL

Going to see them on Wednesday night... for the first time ever!
I didn't even know they were coming because I don't really stay in touch with things. my wife tells me today "hey we're going to see the Cure. i bought tickets ". WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

anyway, im excited. i hope they play.. hell i don't even care what they play

Hahaha, that's pretty nice.

Curt1s, who cares about "Plainsong"? Looks like you Atlanta dudes got "Charlotte Sometimes," only time they've played that all tour. I would've killed for that one in Texas. Good setlist though, I bet it was a blast.

(Tell us more about the show!)

NU CUR3 ALBUM OMG

I was standing there listening and it just sort of hit me what a phenomenal event was going on in front of me & thank god I was alive in the 21st century so I could see Robert Smith alive and in person. It hit me how much they are really one of the biggest influences in the sound & style of modern rock. This is the first band I've seen that's had that kind of mystique, and certainly the first act that's had this sort of charisma. In every note they played you could hear them outclassing every sad mallindie band that tries to sound like them. The most beautiful, emotional, playful, dark, hypnotic music you can imagine.

Peak of the night for me was probably "A Forest," the performance of which was pretty much the embodiment of everything a good rock song should be. The Cure are the not-so-secret masters of the repetitive, hypnotic hook. And "Charlotte Sometimes" did make me freak, yes!!

65daysofstatic def sound better live than on record, and their light show was impressive too!

It hit me how much they are really one of the biggest influences in the sound & style of modern rock.

There's something gratifying in realizing that, I've found. Very few of the open borrowers of the sound/style have made things their own but damn if they aren't an increasingly broad touchstone for a lot of things.

otm

"Holy Hour" in Charlotte, NC...

oh shit

wish I could go to all of these shows

1st encore: The Holy Hour, Other Voices, Drowning Man, Faith

!!!!!!!!!!!

for Ned: The Cure * Underneath the Stars * Hollywood Bowl May 31 2008

Uh, yeah, I'll take that encore there.