The Cure: Classic or Dud?

Anything to add, Ned?

The idea is to encourage people to be forthright in their opinion but it's not a vote or anything. It's a catchier way of saying "what do you think of this band?"

Cheers!

(PS: Dud. A couple of the singles are nice musically, even very good, but they have Smith's horrible smeared moan over the top of them. He sounds like a fourteen-year-old with a splinter in his toe: there's something wheedling about his voice which makes me want to smack him and tell him to get a grip rather than empathise with him.)

Seriously.. though it seems the norm to slag 'em off these days, it's amazing just how much good stuff they have done. 'Boy's Don't Cry'/'3 Imaginary Boys' is a great debut, whichever version you have. Scratchy wired glum-pop. In fact it's all classic up to 'The Top', their first major clunker.

'Head on the Door' is great pop. 'Kiss Me X3' is also great pop ('Just Like Heaven'), except where they try too hard to make great pop and fail ('Hot, Hot, Hot'). 'Disintegration' is their last great album. But not pop. No problem.

My last encounter with The Cure was 'Wild Mood Swings'. I swung my copy back from whence it came - Record and Tape Exchange. Still, 'Galore' sums up the later years nicely.

Anyway I like old Bob, a pop man at heart even in his gloomiest moments.

Classic. And if you disagree with me I'll shove all twenty or so CDRs of rare and odd stuff I have of theirs down your throat and kill you. *proceeds to light candles to huge _Disintegration_ poster in room*

The Cure are a band who, like Depeche Mode and a number of others of that ilk, should have just hung it up on December 31, 1989. Their glory days were in the 1980s, Disintegration should have been their last album. It would have been a perfect ending. Instead, they chose to put out three subpar releases in the 1990s. While Bloodflowers was a definite improvement over Wild Mood Swings (did *anyone* like that album?) and Wish (which came out at the peak of my Cure fandom and still disappointed me), it still wasn't close to the material they released during the 1980s.

Yeah, some of their stuff is whiny and pretentious. But I think they manage to pull it off reasonably well, and I think the whininess and the pretentiousness will make them staples of every sad-sack high school kid for the next thirty years, whether they continue to release new albums or not. (And hopefully they won't, judging from the poor quality of their most recent albums--I think that the more bad stuff they release, the less "legendary" they'll become.)

By the way, I *was* a teenage goth girl. I was also an early-20s goth girl. I own a velvet and lace cape and little pointy boots and black lipstick. Heh.

_Wild Mood Swings_ is more problematic. It's a very erratic album and contains a couple of songs that never should have seen the light of day ("Mint Car", "Return"). However, it also contains the absolutely marvelous "The 13th", "Want", "Gone!" and "Jupiter Crash". Some judicious editing (and swapping some album tracks for b-sides) would make this a much better album.

For me, _Bloodflowers_ compares very well to their 80's output. It seems that the group got back into a good songwriting groove for this album, which is particularly evident on "Out Of This World", "The Loudest Sound", "The Last Day Of Summer", "Bloodflowers", and "Watching Me Fall" (Cure cliches and all). The album has a strong sense of flow and there are no embarrassing attempts to rewrite "Friday I'm In Love". It was a good ending for them, assuming that Robert's latest pronouncements about the band's demise are actually true this time.

There are individual songs I don't like, and _Wild Mood Swings_ is easily my least- favorite of their albums, but I'd be hard-pressed to say that I actively dislike any of the Cure's albums.

They have many good tunes. However, they have many bad ones, viz "Friday I'm In Love".

Still, at their best they show an impressive ability to make both poppy goth jumpathons and total doomfests.

I had a girlfriend once who was into these boys hard and she used to play is it 'Pictures of You' (?) over and over and over (a sort of pining for a lost love I think; not me, incidentally). Anyway, it used to bore the hell out of me, not to mention what felt like a large hole in my brain.

The thing is, with the Cure, it's like the Manic Street FUCKING Preachers syndrome - people who like 'em don't just like 'em, they fucking LOVE 'em, and think they're prophets or something. No, they are miserable, half-goths with absolutely nothing to say and even less charisma.

That said, I am admit that I am hardly familiar know their canon, since I can't bear exposure to it for protracated periods.

Still; DUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUD

Hmm, having said that, I do get riled when someone fails to 'get' my favourite bands and indulges in the kind of mindless attack I have already posted against The Cure. Yet, I feel that certain bands are wont to attract a more dependent following, who hang the band's music like metaphorical rosaries. And I'm not sure that even among my most beloved artists, there are those which I could hold in such equally mindless esteem.

What say you?

DUD

Yet I do wonder how much my own nosatlgia plays a role. I still think Wish is great, despite every. review. ever. written. Maybe if I hadn't listened to it for the 1st time as a teenager travelling thru Europe with schoomates I'd think differently.

Also, I really really like the Wolfgang Press song on _Lonely is an Eyesore_, but I've heard their recordings are pretty patchy. Any recommendations there?

the "cure=suburbia" part of Michael Bracewell's England Is Mine is one of the best things ever!

Classic, BTW. Again, my mid-teens coincided with Disintegration and I was full-on obsessed for a couple of years. I bought a shedload of albums at Oxfam last year, and a friend and I drove our GF/wives insane by listening, back to back, to 17 Seconds, Faith, Pornography and the Top. Divorce was on the horizon by the end of that evening.

Thing is, there are SO many B-sides and rarities which have officially surfaced that they'd have to put out a box set. As it is, if the remasters that are surfacing next year are going to include bonus discs for each with room for other oddities, then that will partially settle the problem.

I hadn't seen that in the comments

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D7zBwC-UIAABlka.jpg

omg

Also can we talk for a second about how Robert is 60 and still sounds like he did on this album?

The "Disintegration" in this Disintegration >>> the "Disintegration" in the Trilogy Disintegration.

Haven’t listened to the album yet but what a treat to hear these b sides played. I don’t think it worked so well live but still, never thought I’d ever hear them play Fear of Ghosts. Babble otoh kicked ass live. They should add it to their regular live set rotation.

(after a short youtube link following trail) btw, I didn't know about the alternative lyrics to A Forest in 1979 + the energy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCCLhCBb1I4

the energy!

Whenever I see clips like that I just think "the drugs!"

I spent a lovely evening chatting with Reeves Gabrels' wife via Twitter DM last night and got confirmation that Robert uses a bunch of vocal technique to keep his voice intact

he sounded wonderful on that livestream

also, i may be misremembering this, but that performance of disintegration seemed v deeply felt and even slightly... energetic? compared to my old trilogy dvd

I didn't know about the alternative lyrics to A Forest in 1979

In the early years their lyrics could be in flux even from night to night as they wrote songs onstage (and even occasionally after recording: Seventeen Seconds' song Three spent years in the set after turning into Forever with improvised lyrics)

Last thing I expected was a new interview with Boris Williams but it's great. I'm not sure I've ever heard him talk at length before, he sounds lovely and very chilled:

https://t.co/e61zznKlwB

Some very interesting (YMMV) insights into his time in the band, including (too briefly) why he left and how he feels about seeing the band play without him.

https://thequietus.com/articles/26614-the-cure-beyond-the-hits-rare-b-side-album-track

What fine judgment throughout, especially that one guy. Modesty forbids.

We will be holding an exclusive advance screening of "The Cure - Anniversary 1978-2018 Live in Hyde Park London" at a secret location in London on Wednesday July 3.
This screening will also feature a special introduction from director Tim Pope. pic.twitter.com/uVrmEHOKrk

— The Cure (@thecure) June 17, 2019

tim pope thingy update.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGr3vWnOcKM

Looks like it's just a concert film though?

Oh like The Cure in Orange? Twist my arm.

No, I just thought there had been some discussion a few years ago about a documentary, with Tim sorting through all sorts of archival stuff. But nothing in the trailer seems to indicate that.

Wonder if they have a recording of the Mexico City show from 2013 where they played like 50 songs?

Dunno, not really excited about that concert film either. Setlist was pretty bland and the setting too. I don’t really see the point of this (Reflections or the Disintegration show would maybe have been more interesting)

bring the Wish deluxe edition!

maybe they did a set in the rain at Red Rocks at some point they could release

Man, this looks dull :(

I was just listening to Wish, streaming it, and noticed it was branded "explicit." I assume that means profanity, but I'm trying to remember where on the album there's any profanity.

the end of Wendy Time has a "fuck" in it

Huh, so it does! Is there much or really for that matter any profanity in the rest of the Cure catalog?

Get your fucking voice out of my head

The Kiss has a "fuck" in it, but I can't think of any others offhand. In Wendy Time he's kinda self-censoring by swallowing most of the word!

hahaha xpost

Give Me It - "My heart is black and stops every fucking night"

Us or Them - "Get your fucking world out of my head"

It's Over - "It's always fucking over"

Sleep When I'm Dead - "The whole other fucking world"

"The spiderman does poops and pees in the lavatory at night"

Shiver & Shake - "You're three sick holes that run like sores - you're a fucking waste."

Interviewed Tim Pope the other day about the forthcoming concert film -- great chat, and the film's excellent. Story should run next week.

In the meantime, enjoy yesterday's Glastonbury set:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0006t9s

Saw it last night on the telly. They're truly on form again. A delight to see Robert Smith enjoying himself as much as he did, quirky dance moves and all.

TV version:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0006h4g/glastonbury-the-cure

Might not be available in all countries?

Our man in San Francisco Ned Raggett chats with Pope about his forthcoming Cure concert film Anniversary as well as more unusual anecdotes about his many music videos for them than you can shake a stick at. Or is that a sock?

https://thequietus.com/articles/26761-tim-pope-interview-the-cure

And indeed, that is me. Fantastic chat, could have gone on for so much longer but I had to squeeze it in between several things on my schedule.

Great piece, Ned!

Thanks!

The most detailed answer on the biggest question was definitely his "Why Can't I Be You" thoughts

https://thequietus.com/articles/26761-tim-pope-interview-the-cure?page=7

^_^

I totally read that as

Our man in San Francisco Ned Raggett chats with the Pope about his forthcoming

"So Francis, you a Pornography man?"

"Who am I to judge?"

I also misread it that way and thought "the pope" was a terrible new nickname for Robert Smith.

Astounding.

Seeing the film last night in a full theater experience was pretty great.