The Cure have been a salve for a large chunk of the radio-ready population. Their legacy is a binding aural relationship with outcasts, creeps and the misunderstood for most of their career. It was like listening to your thoughts, no matter how dark and brutal, all wrapped up in the prettiest melodies that you could render. The moment they hit the 25-year mark, it was evident that The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame needed them. Whether it was Robert Smith’s raggedy doll do or the numerous line-up changes to give the kind of sounds the band had, everything had to be in the right place. And it was. Now, the line-up explores their latest album, Songs of A Lost World.
Simon Gallup, Jason Cooper, Roger O’Donnell & Reeves Gabrels are the freshest line-up with Robert Smith. Let’s not mince words, this has been his brainchild for most of the 42 years together. In his exploration of sound, his whims have led to some of the most innovative sound layerings that we have seen. Spatially, this album aims to capture the lost generation, all of us scraping and scrounging around in the dark. The Cure come around to make this evident, through the kind of tones and ambiences that they want to put forth.
When a band has this much history, and that is particular to one entity, it becomes a journey of an individual’s sound revelations. When Three Imaginary Boys released in 1979, a lot of people growing up felt heard through the isolation of the times. As much as it was commentary on the twisted world we were divulging ourselves in, it was an experiment in and through sound. In a year, we got Seventeen Seconds & Faith in another.
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Through themes and dreams
These were the golden years of technology, themes and members getting a groove that felt like a state of flow. By the time we got to 1987s Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me, we were in a whole new realm of sound. Where would they go from there?
Fast-forward to 2024. Robert Smith touches upon a sound that was his, but has been remixed by so many artists that it might sound like a parody of his own music. Not his fault, that’s how much music is out there. So what do The Cure do? More importantly, what does Robert Smith do? He goes full cinema, with his signature voice becoming the narrator we all missed. The strings and massive percussion parts are like the intro of a movie. Is this The Cure we missed for so long? Is this the trailer for their long awaited excursion. The piano opening of Nothing is Forever might remind you of the 80s version of the band, however polished and contextually different they might sound.
We have no actual sign of the band members, almost to observe Robert Smith’s skin shed. When he does sing, you have two ways to go. Either, like me, your eyes fill up with tears listening to him after so very long. Or you wonder what version of the band you’re listening to now. However, experimentation is not something he shies away from, does he?
For the new, new world
Unless you’re an ardent fan of the band, you’re in no position to differentiate between the decades of the outfit. Through the time, they have always somehow managed to stay quite far ahead of the pulse. The erudite Robert Smith has created a persona like Bowie’s Ziggy, someone you can revere for being all parts of the alter ego.
Then you learn about the healing process. You can hear it in every part of the band’s work here-Smith & Co. are on a journey that is as evocative, yet texturally so layered that you might not be able to absorb it in one sitting. Good music doesn’t align itself to any genre. In many glances, this doesn’t sound like The Cure you would have waited 16 years for. Yet, in those 16 years, catastrophic changes have occurred in the world, and Robert Smith’s way of looking at things was missing.
Priority takes charge, and Smith chooses to heal through music. Something he did before as well, just that it took a different direction tonally. Listening to songs like I Can Never Say Goodbye is the fragment of grief which doesn’t allow people to let go. In a gentle, mysterious exposition, The Cure are able to voice thoughts through music, a rare superpower in a time when AI could probably do it in a prompt. The human process has no prompt, and this is where a band like The Cure reign supreme. They are in resounding correlation with what has happened to them, and us-as a collective. This is music for that collective, delivered straight from the hearts of individuals who could voice the angst of generations that grew up with them.
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