The Cure: Pornography

The Cure: Pornography

1982

Fiction Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. One Hundred Years  2. A Short Term Effect  3. The Hanging Garden  4. Siamese Twins  5. The Figurehead  6. A Strange Day  7. Cold  8. Pornography 

Happy Friday Everyone!

Ugh...Sorry I haven't really had the chance to post much this week...Everything was going so well...My In-Laws came out to visit and I was having so much fun...

(See! I even went to a Ballgame and drank an 8 dollar beer! It must be fancy stuff at that price!)

But then suddenly (and without warning),  I got sick as hell Tuesday night...Running a horrible fever and I've seriously done nothing but sleep almost 24 hours a day for the last three days...It's now Thursday night (actually, this would be Friday Morning) at 2:04 am and my fever's broke and I'm finally starting to feel a bit human again...Problem is, I didn't get a chance to write my post for "The Cure II: Pornograffiti" so I'm really doing this on the fly...So forgive me if this particular post isn't as in-depth or as insightful as my usual posts where I just post funny pictures and youtube videos...

And boy, let me tell you...There's no album more comforting to listen to when you're running a 105 degree temperature than The Cure's feverish nightmare "Pornography"....


This literally kept happening....

So as grueling as this particular listening was, "Pornography" is definitely one of my personal favorite Cure albums, and as far as "Goth" (I think I promised not to use that word again, in relation to the Cure, but at least I put it in quotation marks, so...) Cure albums go, this is hands down the best (Sorry,  "Disintegration" fans...)...

Actually, "Disintegration" fans needn't worry too much...I have a lot of lapses in taste...Here's a list of things I honestly enjoy from the bottom of my heart...

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace...



Sugar Ray (but only the early stuff)...



...ah, who am I kidding?! I like the later stuff too!

The film oeuvre of Michael Bay...Here's hoping for a Criterion edition of "The Island." When I look at that above picture this is what I imagine him saying, "...But Wait! There's more! This time it'll be in...(pregnant Pause becomes unbearable)...3-D!!!!!!!" (A couple of well-paid "Yes-Men" start clapping wildly and whistling..."Bravo!" they exclaim..."The cinematic genius strikes again!!")



The entire Phil Collins discography (minus that horrible "I Can't Dance" Genesis album...Y'know what? In my fevered state, the mere thought of "I Can't Dance" makes me feel nauseous...Strike Phil Collins from this list for now)...

So, there you have it...You can't be too outraged that I like "Pornography" more than "Disintegration"...And you know why? Because this is the album that has "One Hundred Years" on it, which is my jam...Let me give you some back-story...(audience groans)...I was watching TV back in the 90's (which is a discipline I practice to this very day) and I heard this song and I tell you what! My socks shot off both me feet and did a happy jig right there in the middle of the room for all of God's creatures to see!  I think it was the cumulative effect of that industrial-strength drum machine beat, the lead guitar line that sounds like a deadly cobra uncoiling and that glorious opening line, where Robert sobs "It doesn't matter if we all die!"

Oh my God, it was the greatest single thing I'd ever heard in my entire life...I had to know what that song was! But waitaminute! It's the 90's, remember? No internet then...So you kind of just had to walk around with unanswered questions for years until you just so happened to blindly stumble upon the answer one day...By "blindly stumble into the answer" I mean "buying every damn Cure album in the hopes that it'd contain the song I was looking for"...

And let me tell you, back in those days the stores weren't exactly overflowing with copies of "Pornography"...Lots of "Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me," "Mixed Up," and "Standing on a Beach" sure, but no "Pornography"...



 But eventually I stumbled upon a copy and as soon as I pushed play and heard that stumbling drum machine beat that had haunted my dreams for lo, those many years, I knew I had found what I was looking for (run-on sentence)...

What I found most interesting about listening to all the Cure albums in a row, is that there's a very visceral sense of the heavy, oppressive fog that enveloped "Seventeen Seconds" and "Faith" finally lifting and what's been lurking in the shadows is much more horrible than you could have imagined...On "Faith" you get the feeling that Robert's overwhelmed by the sense of death from a barely-comfortable distance (the Grandparent's funeral for example),  but on "Pornography" it sounds like the shit just got personal...Like he's finally face to face with the reaper himself, cornered and snarling...

And it's that lucidity and LOL Tolhurst's big, pounding tribal beats that puts this above the pack for me...

 
I mean, listen to "The Hanging Garden"...Those jungle drums give it a real sense of dread, but it's not the diffuse dread of "Faith"...And besides, I can't drive past an Olive Garden restaurant without singing, "Cover my face as the animals die! In the Olive Garden..."

God, I hate myself for actually typing that out...I'm sure you guy's have nothing better to do than read my gut-busing filks...

Here's another one:

"The only thing I knew how to do
Was to keep on Klingin' On,
 like a Bird of Prey that fleewwww...
naDevvo' peghoS!"

Yeeks...It's getting late...I should probably go to bed someday...I guess I'll cut this short...I do have one more thing to say, though...I've always kind of wished that "A Strange Day" closed this album...It gives off such a disorienting, yet beautiful "the day-after vibe"...Instead we get the title track which is just a bunch of screamin' noise, naked women and loud rappin' as far as I'm concerned...

Man, I've got to pull the plug...I'm realllly starting to lose it...

Anyway...I'm hoping I feel better tomorrow, but if not, make sure the Friday Night Record Party goes on without me...Make sure you drink plenty of cold beers, eat lots of cheap pizza and go to bed no earlier than 3:30 am...

Here's "One Hundred Years" by the Almighty Cure...Enjoy...

The Cure: Faith

The Cure: Faith

1981

Fiction Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl & Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. The Holy Hour  2. Primary  3. Other Voices  4. All Cats Are Grey  5. The Funeral Party  6. Doubt  7. The Drowning Man  8. Faith




Whenever I look at this album cover, I see a big grey thumb...

In reality, I have no idea what's being depicted on the album cover...I'll look it up real quick...

♪ "Hmmm, hmmmm...Dumpty Dummm..." ♪

 Apparently, it's a photo of Bolton Abbey, which is a church owned by soft-rock mogul Michael Bolton...I think it's supposed to be one of those cool churches where they let you play electric guitar...♪ Deedle dee dee ♪...

Anyway, "Faith" is the third album by the Cure...It's possibly even greyer than "Seventeen Seconds," but most of the post-punk spikiness is gone, replaced by a funereal sense of calm...

 Again, all the songs blend together to form a singular bleak mood-piece, with very little standing out, outside of the rocking "Primary" (which sports a catchy chant chorus) and "The Funeral Party,"which you can tell by the title, is a barrel of laughs:

"Two pale figures
Ache in silence
Timeless
In the quiet ground
Side by side
In age and sadness..."

"About the death of my grandparents, and ultimately, I suppose, of the death of my parents, and then me... "

-Robert Smith

I like this song, even though it creeps me out...It kind of sparkles in its bleakness, if that makes sense...Oh, I actually noticed a factual error on this album..Robert Smith claims "All Cats Are Grey," and while it's true that my cat Yoda, is in fact Grey...

 My cat, Corde is irrefutably brown-ish and tiger-striped...

...and my cat Iggy is orange and white...

So, hopefully on the next reissue, Robert Smith and company will be mindful to update the song title to "All Cats Are Grey (except Corde, who is tiger-striped and Iggy, who is orange and white)...

I've always been a bit torn about the album closing title-track, "Faith." I can't tell if Robert's turning his back on society once and for all to go die somewhere or if it finally offers a faint glimmer of hope...Personally, I get the "Fuck your world, I'm going to start my own" vibe...

"No one lifts their hands
No one lifts their eyes
Justified with empty words
The party just gets better and better

I went away alone
With nothing left
But faith..."

Maybe, it's the word "Faith." Come to think of it, it's odd to call such a hopeless album, "Faith"...It could be irony, I don't know... If not, the title casts a whole new light on the album, suddenly...Come to think of it, even the narrator of "the Funeral Party" appears to have a type of naive faith...Watching the ghosts dancing, when in reality, there's really just a couple of cold bodies lying in the ground...Maybe carrying on in a world devoid of hope, is an act of faith...To be ridiculously blunt about it, life really is a long, lonely walk to the grave...So why do we bother anyway? Because, my party's gonna be different....The despairing girl who drowns at the end of "The Drowning Man" doesn't make it out alive, but Robert does in the album's closing lines...
 
Maybe "Faith" is a feel-good album when viewed from the edge of the abyss...I must certainly get something from it...I listen to it often and have bought it on vinyl and compact disc at this point...And I bet when the holo-crystal comes out, I'll buy that too...

 So here's "Primary" by the Cure...

The Cure:Seventeen Seconds

The Cure:Seventeen Seconds

1980

Fiction Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. A Reflection  2. Play for Today  3. Secrets  4. In Your House  5. Three  6. The Final Sound  7. A Forest  8. M  9. At Night  10. Seventeen Seconds

 "Welcome to the McGothlin Group, where we discuss pressing issues within the Goth community...I'm your host Count Unemployable, and with me are today's panelists...Let me start with Worst-Selling dark poetess, Raven Writingdesk..."

"Thanks for having me, Count...Allow me to read my latest work...ahem...

"Peresphone Rex: An 18th Century Gothic Opera in 82 Parts:

Book One:

O, river of crimson,
of whom the raven doth caw, 
So pale, so dead...
Phantoms summon with icy fingers,
will she succumb to their call? 
Father, O Father,
Which drunken fit of rage?
Which heavy hands?
Which heavy, heavy hands?
I see the mute Savior,
Bleeding eyes and mouth,
Reaching for the last crumb,
cruelly pushed away...
O, Father doth the ovens call ye?
Will you sacrifice another daughter?
To the Gods and Sons of Hollow Hopes?
Did I disappoint thee? 
Am I not all that you hoped?
Eagle-Eyed like a hawk,
The Incredible Hulk,
For to ravens doth thee die..."

 "Stunning! A bold, bracing work! Where can the audience buy the book?"

"Oh, uhhh....There isn't a book...But you can come to Denny's at 3 am...I'm usually there all night taking advantage of a bottomless cup of coffee from 12:00pm-5:00am..."

"Excellent, Excellent. Our other panelist dresses head-to-toe in black, smokes the occasional clove cigarette, and owns albums by Bauhaus and the Cure, but isn't a Goth... Allow me to introduce Jamin 80, writer of the Friday Night Record Party blog, which won the 2013 Bloggie Award for 'Least Viewed Blog'...Is it true you only get 2 hits a day?"

"Yup...Me hitting you and the ambulance hitting 60! Har Har! But no seriously, I'm hoping my hits go up when I do my post on The Cure's "Pornography" in a couple days...Words like 'pornography' tend to get me a lot of views...As do words like "big boobs"...Well, technically that's two words, but I think you get my point...I'm hoping someday a band called "2 Hot College Girls Making Out" will release an album called "Big, Bouncy, Naked Boobs" and that review alone would ensure I have a good year..."

 "Good luck with that. Today's topic is the album "Seventeen Seconds" by the Cure...Goth Classic or Transitional Post-Punk effort? We'll start with you, Raven...

"It's not 'Pornography' or 'Disintegration' so I have to go with Minor Goth classic...I've spent many a night listening to this on my ipod while slitting my ivory wrists while whispering curses on my Father's soul...You won't be able to ignore me anymore, Daddy! I'm going to haunt you for a loooooooong time..."

"Now, let me ask you a question, Jamin. Why do you hate Goths so much?"

"I don't hate goths!"

"Then why do you write Raven like some sort of cheap caricature of a self-absorbed moron with Daddy issues, constantly threatening suicide just to get attention? And why would you name me 'Count Unemployable'? Not exactly a term of endearment...Us Goths are people just like you...

...we have jobs...

...Families...

 Why, I wouldn't be surprised if one day there was a Goth President!"

"I am a man chastised!"

"It's so pitiful when 'goth' is still tagged onto the name The Cure. We're not categorisable."

"There. You have it from the man, himself...Not Goth...Mystery Enigma music..."

 "Boner-Killing Rainy Life Music."

 "Boo!"

..................................................................................................................................

Alright...Enough of the horse-shit... (throws chair across the room) It's time for some straight-talk...I like the "Seventeen Seconds" album...It's somewhere in-between the post-punk influence of the first album and the atmospheric, doom rock of "Faith" and "Pornography"...For this reason, I tend to like it a bit more than "Faith" but not as much as "Pornography" (where they finally nailed this style)...

As is often the case with Cure albums, the singles are the clear highlights (even the most minor of Cure albums have killer singles)...And "A Forest" is a pivotal moment in the Cure discography...If the terms "droning bass" and "drab, repetitive structures" don't sound too exciting on paper, they sure sound nice in your headphones...A kaleidoscope of radiant grays...The Cure is good at this moody, stuff...I'm usually not the type of person that's into "atmosphere" really, but for some reason the Cure has always appeared to me...I think it's because they never seem to be trying to bore me...Again, I think it comes down to Robert Smith being a great songwriter...He knows how to subtly build the drones (when the tape doesn't run out (see: "The Final Sound")) and when to bust out the catchiness ("Play for Today").

By gum, today does seem like the kind of Friday where it's totally appropriate to listen to some Cure...And I'm not talking "Friday I'm in Love"...Let's spin "A Forest" and crack open a bottle of "La Fin du Monde"

(Sorry to keep forcing these Goth stereotypes on you Robert Smith...I'm going to make a concerted effort to never bring up the "G" word again in these Cure posts...)

“It’s is pitiful when goth is still tagged onto the name The Cure.
“We’re not categorizable. I suppose we were post punk when we came out, but in total it’s impossible.

Read more at http://www.gigwise.com/news/25662/the-cures-robert-smith-im-not-a-goth#2KH6c3fvm40yVpqq.

“It’s is pitiful when goth is still tagged onto the name The Cure.
“We’re not categorizable. I suppose we were post punk when we came out, but in total it’s impossible.

Read more at http://www.gigwise.com/news/25662/the-cures-robert-smith-im-not-a-goth#2KH6c3fvm40yVpqq.99

He said: “It’s is pitiful when goth is still tagged onto the name The Cure.
“We’re not categorizable. I suppose we were post punk when we came out, but in total it’s impossible.

Read more at http://www.gigwise.com/news/25662/the-cures-robert-smith-im-not-a-goth#2KH6c3fvm40yVp

The Cure: Three Imaginary Boys/Boys Don't Cry

The Cure: Three Imaginary Boys

1979

Fiction Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. 10:15 Saturday Night  2. Accuracy  3. Grinding Halt  4. Another Day  5. Object  6. Subway Song  7. Foxy Lady  8. Meathook  9. So What  10. Fire in Cairo  11. It's Not You  12. Three Imaginary Boys  13. The Weedy Burton




 Wow, it just struck me I'm probably going to be listening to nothing but the Cure for about a month straight...If you see me losing interest in things I used to care about or start giving away all of my possessions, maybe have someone check up on me...

 Alright, pretend Tom Hanks or Alec Baldwin or James Earl Jones is narrating this, and it'll make it sound a bit more important...

ahem...Somewhereshire, England...1978...The murky, dub-influenced sounds of post-punk had infiltrated the music scene and Robert James Smith, Michael Dempsey, and Laugh Out Loud Tolhurst entered Morgan Studios to record what would become their landmark debut album, "Three Imaginary Boys"...

They actually start out sounding surprisingly peppy...Sort of in the spiky vein of "Pink Flag"-era Wire, or maybe a more theatrical Gang of Four or something...I'm probably going to squander what's left of my credibility by naming this one of my favorite Cure albums...But I can't help it! It's so lively and catchy! I wish they would have done another record or two in this style before surrendering to the void...



Alright, here's my love pile: Album opener "10:15 Saturday Night" is hushed and atmospheric but in a way they didn't really do after this...Instead of using the technique to luxuriate in gloominess, it's used to make the rock sections rock a bit more...I tend to point to this song and "Killing an Arab" (not included on this album, but we'll get to that below) when I refer to Robert as being a quintessential post-punk guitarist...Lots of stabs, screams, and brooding lines...He has a way of using the guitar as a way to accentuate the lyrics as well as interacting with the rhythm section, which helps sell the imagery (taps drip...drip...drip...drip...dripping for example) It's much clearer here than on the more keyboard heavy later albums (which I used to strain to hear the guitar, as a teenager)....

The title track is another favorite of mine...A nice, plodding drone, that manages to pull off catchy...Again, I can't help but think of "Pink Flag" Wire...Compare and contrast the song to "Reuters," for example....

Oh yea, "Fire in Cairo"! One of my all-time favorite Cure songs...I don't know if this song was ever a single, but it seems like it should be...Catchy, poppy punk...I'm telling you..Pick this album up and you're going to walk away with the chant F-I-R-E-I-N-C-A-I-R-O!! rattling around in your head non-stop...With such clear highlights, it took a few of the songs ("Meathook," "Accuracy,") some time to burrow their way into my brain, but eventually it all grew on me... Nowadays I really only skip the snoozey bass-mumble "Subway Song" and the the Hendrix song "Foxy Lady," which they cover in the exact same way that XTC covers "All Along the Watchtower," if that makes sense...

I think this album gets dismissed too often as a formative effort...They hadn't established their voice, sound, sad clown make-up, blah, blah, blah... I think even if they disbanded after this album, it'd be remembered a snappy '78 post-punk gem...If'n you don't believe me, here's "Fire in Cairo" by the Cure..Enjoy...

  




The Cure: Boys Don't Cry

1980

Fiction Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl

Track Listing: 1. Jumping Someone Else's Train  2. Boys Don't Cry  3. Plastic Passion  4. 10:15 Saturday Night  5. Accuracy  6. Object  7. Subway Song  8. Killing an Arab  9. Fire in Cairo  10. Another Day  11. Grinding Halt  12. World War  13. Three Imaginary Boys




This is the  US/Australia version of "Three Imaginary Boys...It swaps out "So What," "Foxy Lady," "Meathook," and "It's Not You" for "Jumping Someone Else's Train," "Boys Don't Cry," "Plastic Passion," "Killing an Arab," and "World War."  So, that's a prety good trade, in my opinion...Although I might trade back "So What" for  "World War"...



Y' know how I talked about how I squandered the last of my credibility by saying "Three Imaginary Boys" is one of my favorite Cure albums? Well, I just found a hidden shred in my pants pocket, so this is it...The very last of my credibility....I like this popped-up Frankenstein version even better... I can't help it! I love poppy shit, and the minute the first guitar rings out on the title track...That is some poppy shit! Robert Smith is a world-class writer of pop songs! Something he'd prove again and again throughout his work...Sure, I love the gloom and doom too, but not better than flippin' "Boys Don't Cry." 



This is also where you can find the "Killing an Arab" single...Which has gotten a bit of a bad reputation...Hell, even Robert Smith won't sing the original lyrics anymore...

 "I'm the Stranger! Eating some CAROB!!"

If you're wondering what carob is, they're giant pieces of poop that grow on trees...

Anyway, Robert's always seemed like a pretty cool guy...Not the racist type...The song's actually about the novel "The Stranger" by Big Al Camus...

My friend Josh had this exact copy of the book...I read it once without really intending to...Y'know where you pick up a book and kind of read the last page, and then you find yourself  turning to the previous page to find out what's going on and then pretty soon you realize you've read the entire book backwards?  That was one of those books...I haven't re-read it since the 90's, but I haven't forgotten a single thing about it...It really sticks with you for some reason...I can see how someone would feel compelled to write a song about it...Maybe I should write a song about reading it backwards!!!

"I've been executed and then I come back to life,
and then I kill an arab but he gets back up,
and he follows me for awhile then he goes back home,
and then some guy bones his ex,
and then I go to my mom's funeral,
and suddenly Jamin's looking at the front cover and can't believe that new books used to only cost a $1.25 (only a $1.25),
I'm dead,  (Sprooooooinnnng) I'm alive...
I'm the Stranger, I killed an Arab but he got back up and went home..."

I'm not big on songs that rhyme...I'm more of  a bongo-playing,  free-verse/free-love guy...

It feels like I've been writing this post for a long time, so I'm going to end it willy-nilly...I love the "Boys Don't Cry" record, even more than the "Three Imaginary Boys" album, although I'll admit it's impact is blunted a bit by so much overlap with the "Standing on a Beach/Staring at the Sea" singles collection...But pick it up for the fantastic "Plastic Passion" and the alright-ish "World War." 

Here's "Boys Don't Cry" by the Cure...Enjoy...