Black Celebration: Robert Smith On The New Cure Album

 

December 1999 by unknown

CMJ

 

In 1979, a three-piece, post-punk outfit from Britain with the portentous moniker of The Cure released Three Imaginary Boys, an album of nervous and edgy pop tunes that marked the debut of what would become one of the most respected and influential bands in the history of alternative music. For 20 years, The Cure's music has evolved with impressive disregard for the changing fashions of popular music. The band remained a cult icon and college radio staple throughout the early-'80s, laying the foundation for the emerging goth-rock scene with Robert Smith's navel-gazing lyrics and doomy pop posturing, as well as his ghoulish appearance. In the mid to late-'80s, however, The Cure discovered its penchant for pop dementia and found commercial success as one of mainstream radio's most curious and idiosyncratic outfits. Now with his 40th birthday behind him and the release of a poignant and powerful new album, Bloodflowers, on the horizon, Smith discusses the past, present and questionable future of his monolithic modern rock creation.

 

When did you record Bloodflowers?

The [recording] session was broken up into two sections. We worked on it for about a month prior to Christmas of '98 and then for a couple of months in the spring of '99. I mixed it on and off over a long period of time. Everything was wrapped up about June of this year, so it's been finished for a long time.

 

Was it a conscious decision to delay the album's release?

Yeah. We were working for a release date of Halloween of this year, in typical Cure fashion [laughs], but as the process went along, certain people in the various record companies around the world started getting cold feet about promoting the album pre-Christmas, pre-millenium, blah, blah, blah. There's no obvious single on the album and they got kind of nervous about what they were going to do with it. I think they kind of deferred the pleasure of figuring out how they were going to sell it.

 

Did it bother you that the label decided to hold onto the record?

The problem with it actually stems back to the Galore singles album, which came out [in 1997]. The various major labels wanted it to be a greatest hits album, but I insisted that it was kept as another decade of singles, and I held out. Contractually, I have the power to insist that all records be released the way that I want them. And at the time, the label -- not so much Elektra, but Polydor in Europe -- really stiffed the record. They just wouldn't promote it. They didn't take out any [advertisements] and they only pressed the contractual minimum so it didn't chart high. That just kept a sour taste in my mouth and I didn't feel like going through that again with Bloodflowers because the record means too much to me for it to become a plaything for the record companies. From an artistic point of view, I was very disappointed, because it's kind of a nostalgic album. It's got a very wistful, looking-sort-of-back feel to it, and it was supposed to be kind of a closing of the decade for me. But, having said that, I didn't really expect people to throw it away on New Year's Eve '99 and never listen to it again. But on the positive side of it, it's given the band a few months to rehearse the songs, so we'll be very ready for next year when it's released. We're doing album launch shows, and quite a few other things around the release, which is unusual for us. Normally everything is on top of itself and we're rushing to get the artwork done and the release date is looming.

 

It must be unsettling to find that your label wouldn't properly promote your releases at this stage in your career.

Well, for the past 20 years that we've been releasing albums, every album has been more commercially successful than the one before it. But that stopped with Wild Mood Swings. Wish was the most commercially successful album and then Wild Mood Swings came out about four years later, which was kind of a long gap... and suddenly we came in at a lower level, which I totally expected. I mean, I thought everyone was pretty crazy around me thinking we'd just pick up where we left off because it doesn't really work like that. It suddenly dawned on the record companies that they had no idea why we had got more and more successful and it had nothing to do with marketing, promotion, or anything that was under their control. Since then, they've kind of been floundering really. I mean, I think Bloodflowers... is one of the best three albums The Cure has ever made, but right now [the labels] are kind of struggling to see how they can promote it. Personally, it doesn't bother me in the slightest. The advent of the Internet has been really good for the band. With the few interviews I've been doing for the album, I've been saying that it's like an archetypal Cure album. Once people start to hear it, the word will get out on the 'Net that I'm telling the truth. So I think that just word of mouth will draw the album to people's attention.

 

Why did you decide to return to the "archetypal" Cure sound with Bloodflowers?

There were a couple of things involved. One is that I was turning from 39 to 40, and I felt like I wanted to make an album that marked the transition the way I did with Disintegration when I moved from 29 to 30. So it was partly conceived that I would try to do the same kind of thing, but there was a genuine desire within me to mark the transitional period. I mean, that's why the group has always existed, for me to express myself. But I haven't written an autobiographical album since Disintegration, and I wasn't sure if I should. When I write music, I never know what I'm going to write about until I do it, and I'm writing in a lot of different styles all the time. But I decided that I would only work on the ones that fit into this particular mood. The record company was a little [dismayed] when they listened to Bloodflowers and realized that they weren't going have another radio single. I just didn't really feel like writing or performing pop songs this time around. I wanted the album to have a lot more coherency and more emotional depth... and not have the mood broken by a couple of radio-friendly singles. Remembering back to Disintegration, I didn't really care if anything was going to be commercial or not and I had to get back into that mindset. I just wanted something I could sit down and listen to for an hour where the mood wouldn't be broken, like Disintegration and Pornography. Before we even started recording, I already knew the running order of the songs, the tempos, and the keys. I had obsessed over it to the point where I knew how the album would end up before we even started making it.

 

Are you, like your label, at all concerned that there isn't an obvious radio single on the album?

When making an album like Bloodflowers, you've just got to put that all out of your mind. I don't think it's really right in this stage of The Cure's career for me to be compromising what we do musically in any way with a desire to be commercially successful. I think we've had our fair share of commercial success and it would be very greedy to start worrying about it now.

 

Is it easier to make a more conceptual album like Bloodflowers than a more pop-focused one like Wild Mood Swings?

I personally find it easier, but the others hated it. [Bassist] Simon [Gallup] and [keyboardist] Roger [O'Donnell], who were in the band for Disintegration, hated making that album, and two weeks into making Bloodflowers, they told me that they hated making this one too. In fact, the other four band members left before the mixing because they didn't like the atmosphere in the studio. Every lineup of The Cure has always said that they're the best lineup. The day before we went into the studio to begin recording Bloodflowers, I played the others Pornography and Disintegration and said, "These are two fantastic lineups. In order to have any chance at being the best Cure lineup, you have to come out with an album that's got this kind of emotional impact. It doesn't matter that Wild Mood Swings had some great songs on it. What [The Cure] is remembered for is albums like these." When we made Wild Mood Swings, the house was full of friends and family and people laughing, 26 people at dinner... that sort of vibe. With Bloodflowers, absolutely no one was allowed in the studio that wasn't actually recording. I found it easier to work when no one was talking and no one was laughing. Everyone thought I was being really horrible, and I guess I was because I just wanted everyone to really focus on the album. For those three months, the rest of the world just took a back seat and I didn't worry about anything except making the album. It's been 10 years since I've done that. It's enjoyable on a personal level because before we started making the album, I felt very unsure about the band. I felt that maybe we'd reached a natural end to things and I'd become slightly disillusioned about what I was doing in The Cure anyway. But the actual process of making the album and how it ended up has given me a newfound enthusiasm for the band because I think it's a great record. People always talk about recording music as a therapeutic process and most of the time it's bullshit, but this has been the first time in 10 years that it actually effected me on that kind of level, so it's been a great thing for me. When I invited the others to come hear the playback after I'd finished the last mix, they were astounded at how good it was. I don't think they realized what they were making while they were making it. So although they didn't enjoy the process, I think they appreciate why I was making it in that way. And we're all good friends again. They just hope that we're not going to record the next album like that.

 

The next album? Do you deny rumours it that will be, in fact, the last Cure release?

The album has such a sense of finality. Well, I think it's apparent in the lyrics that when I wrote it, I intended it to be the last Cure album. I think that in everyone's mind, there was this sense that this could be the last thing that we do, at least with this lineup, which is another reason I think they didn't enjoy it. It was an uncomfortable feeling, because no one really wanted it to end, but I thought that maybe it should. I felt that the drive that's behind the band, which essentially comes from me, was gone and I wanted one big swan song. But the weird thing was that since we've done it, I feel totally different about it. I feel really good about the group. I really look forward to playing these songs in front of people. I think there are going to be some fantastically emotional concerts next year. Whether we do anything after that is, as usual, very vague. The difference is that I would like to. If you asked me this time last year, I would have said there was no way in the world that I was doing anything more with The Cure after this album. And I really meant it. But if we're still good friends by this time next year, there's every possibility that we'll make another album. But I wouldn't bet on it. If Wild Mood Swings turned out to be the last Cure album, I would be kind of unhappy about it, because it doesn't sound right as a last Cure album. But Bloodflowers sounds the way the last Cure album should sound.

 

Since you mention The Cure's infamously frequent lineup changes, just how much have the other band members effected, and contributed to, the band's overall sound and artistic direction?

I think the original lineup -- the three-piece of me, Simon and [drummer/keyboardist] Lol [Tolhurst] -- had a very distinctive sound. And in a way, Lol's inability as a drummer, the fact that he was constrained by some lack of rhythmic nonce, meant that The Cure sound was very unique and very individual. It only reached a point of frustration during the making of the Pornography album. Simon and I took a drumstick each and stood on either side of Lol and drummed with him because he was physically too weak to do it and we wanted a big booming sound. Once that band fell apart, Lol was kind of sidelined and never really again contributed to what the band did on an artistic level. I think the core of the band that did The Head On The Door, which was in place from '84 through '92, and underpinned the Kiss Me..., Disintegration and Wish albums, was great. Particularly, it was a sensational live band. Making this album, I think this lineup has really come of age. I think Jason [Cooper] in particular has proven himself to be the drummer I always thought he could be. Boris [Williams] has always been the definitive Cure drummer, but I was astounded how much Jason has improved over the last couple of years. It was a great moment realizing that what I heard in my head was actually going to translate to tape. I think to the general public, The Cure is Robert Smith and a bunch of blokes. But I think what most people don't realize is that the most important thing to me is who is actually in the band. Although it doesn't really change how I write, it does translate into how we make the record.

 

What do you think has allowed The Cure to maintain such an import role in alternative music culture?

It's a very weird combination of things and obviously, there are things in the mix that I don't really know about. But overall, I think at the heart of it is the songs. Without the music, the rest of what I would say has no meaning at all. I mean, there are a million and one people who set out with good intentions, but without the songs you really haven't got a chance. We've simply come up with songs that people enjoy listening to, even if it's on a superficial level. Beyond that, we've managed to retain a certain part of our audience, which is the key to the audience growing. The longer we've been going, the more people empathize not just with me as a singer, but also with what the band represents, which is success on its own terms without any overtly commercial overtones. For example, we've never allowed our music to be used in advertisements, which is a very simple thing but it's unusual. And I think a certain type of person responds to that. It's the sensibility within the band. What we do, we do on our own terms. If we fail on our own terms, that's fine. But we don't want to succeed on anyone else's. It sounds almost kind of twee, because we have been successful and it's easy to say that. But there are several times when we've been offered an easier route to commercial success and I've decided not to take it. The thing that's always driven The Cure is not the desire to be successful. It's always been an end in and of itself. The fact that other people have kind of enjoyed it has just been a bonus. I've enjoyed the success the band has had, but it hasn't been the motivating force behind the band existing.

 

Was it difficult, then, to accept the fact that the band was successful?

Not really, because it happened very slowly. In the very early days, when we were just a three-piece, I wanted to be like Wire or the Banshees. These were the people I emulated on a very immediate level. They were the generation immediately preceding me, literally by a year. They had a certain kind of power to them that transcended punk. I wanted the Cure to be that, but we never were. We actually sounded like the Buzzcocks in the early days, but I think that's because my songwriting was still in its very early stages. I think it was influenced by early Beatles -- the sense of a three-minute guitar-pop song. But when we developed our own kind of voice in the early '80s, The Cure developed into something I hadn't really thought it could be. It was actually more difficult for me to become the leader of this sort of weird cult than it was actually to make the transition from that into the late-'80s when the band became commercially successful with their singles, particularly in America. It was actually the early period of the band that was more intense for me. The reason I took a break from it all after the Pornography album was because I couldn't really cope with what was going on. After that, the band got really demented on the pop side of things, with "Lovecats" and "Let's Go To Bed" and all that stuff.... I wasn't really dealing with the band becoming successful because there was a whole other [slew] of things going on. So by the time that we ended up with quite a high degree of success in the late-'80s, I had gone through so many transitions and phases, it didn't really seem weird because that's how my life was going. I mean, looking back, it was actually quite bizarre. But the only time I feel like it really changed my personality was when we did an American tour with the Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me album in 1987. I remember halfway through the tour, thinking to myself that I was growing a bit mad, because everywhere I went I was being stared at and that was the first time I was aware of that happening. I wasn't prepared for the level of success we had achieved. But I just adjusted to it and it became a part of my existence within The Cure.

 

So you're at peace with your fame now?

When the band goes out and does something, I expect that there are going to be a certain number of people who turn around and come up to me. It's become part of my life and I don't resent it. I hate people that moan about being recognized and stuff. I mean, the plus side of it and the freedom that it brought me is huge. Outside of the band, I've always lived in the same way, in the same community with the same friends. I've kind of had a very solid background to return to, so it hasn't effected me so much. People around town know what I do, but they're not really interested. I still shop in the same shops and the [checkout girls] stopped looking up from the till a long time ago.

 

When did you become aware of the band's impact on college radio?

We were aware of it from very early on, actually. We came over to the West Coast of America with the Seventeen Seconds tour, and that was entirely based on our success on college radio. Back then, we weren't being played anywhere else. Even in the mid-'80s we became more popular, but we never became a mainstream band. It's kind of like we've bridged two worlds, or fallen between two stools, between alternative and mainstream. To a lot of mainstream programmers, The Cure is still a bit too weird. To an alternative programmer, sometimes we're a bit too mainstream. Sometimes we've benefited from that and sometimes we've kind of suffered. I actually enjoy that kind of position because I think it reflects what the band does. I would hate to be forced into the position where everything we do has to be "alternative." At the same time, I would hate to think that we're trying to fit into whatever the mainstream is at that time. I think we've been accommodated by the mainstream when it has suited the mainstream. So even though we've become successful, I feel that we represent an alternative, just not the alternative.

 

How did you react to the dissention of some of your hardcore fans when singles like "Just Like Heaven" and "Love Song" started getting heavy airplay on commercial radio and MTV?

I think that what saved us, and what those Cure fans soon realized, was that we were able to pull off some hits like "Just Like Heaven" but retain our integrity at the same time. That's the trick that I think a lot of people don't manage to pull off. I'm not really sure how we managed it, but I really did enjoy both sides of what we were doing. I really liked making videos and developing that kind of self-mocking, idiot image. At the same time, I enjoyed going out on stage and playing in front of a vast number of people for two-and-a-half hours and coming offstage crying because what we had done had been so emotional. I think that when people grasped that the two weren't incompatible or mutually exclusive, some of the initial feelings early fans had that we had sold them out relented a little bit and gave us a bit more leeway, which benefited us really because we managed to retain a lot of that hardcore audience.

 

And it was in your favour that Disintegration, which was definitely in that classic Cure vein you spoke of, was also one of your most successful releases.

We had a record company listening party for Disintegration as a work in progress about a month before it was finished and I remember the silence in the room after I played it because [the record executives] were expecting Kiss Me... Part Two. There was just this look of absolute dismay on people's faces. I was informed about a week later that I was committing commercial suicide. They wanted to push the release date back and they thought I was being "willfully obscure," which was an actual quote from the letter. I actually kept the letter and I cherish it because Disintegration actually went on to sell millions. Ever since then I realized that the record companies don't have a fucking clue what The Cure does and what The Cure means. So I'm waiting for someone to tell me that I'm committing commercial suicide with Bloodflowers as well.

 

So the Cure's relationship with the music industry hasn't always been smooth. Do you think labels are even less likely to now to give new bands a chance to grow and develop at their own speed?

I'm happy that we were developing in the period of time that we were, because things are much more instant now. I found it very easy to hold back because I was just saying no to everything that was offered to us that would take us to the next level. I was happy to just be selling enough albums to allow us to pay for the next album. That's how I maintained control of The Cure in the early years. A lot of people pay lip service to the fact that they're going to do it on their own terms, but very few people actually do because they think that if the opportunity's there, it's only going to be there once and they have to seize it. That's part of our culture now -- grasp it, because you might not get a second chance. But when The Cure was developing that wasn't really the idea. We'd pass up opportunities because the amount of self belief we had meant we could afford to be left alone until we had developed this culture around the band, whereby the record company wouldn't even bother trying to interfere. We developed ourselves apart from the music business. I'm not sure if you would be left alone to do that now.

 

What's the difference between then and now?

I think it would be much more difficult because there's so much more competition. There's so much more fighting for space and the turnover's so fast. People are much less willing to take a risk on developing a band because they have to justify spending the money. Accountants run it all now. Lawyers and accountants ran things in the old days as well, but there was some leeway for creative people to make decisions. I think it's harder now for decisions to be made on a purely artistic premise. It used to be instinct, but now it has entirely to do with the marketplace and demographics. It's a science now. The marketing and promotion side has always been there, but now it's reached such a fever pitch that it would be very difficult for a record company to nurture a band. At the end of the day, a record company expects a band to sell a lot of records and I don't think there's anything else behind it. We stayed with an independent label [Fiction] that was one removed from the majors... and I think it was a very good thing [for us]. We haven't had the benefit of having the major marketing clout behind us, but we kind of took that as one of the downsides of what was otherwise a very good way of working. We kept all decisions within the Fiction/ Cure world, and then it was presented as a fait accompli to [Polydor and Elektra]. So it was a choice that we made very early on, to allow ourselves the space to develop. If we thought that we missed one opportunity, then we could regret it at our leisure. But we would have failed on our own terms.

 

How were you able to wield your relatively autonomous control over the course of the band's career?

It has as much to do with my character as it has to do with anything else. I've been very headstrong over the years and I've always reacted very badly to the notion that the artist cannot understand what goes on in the commercial world. That's so much bollocks. To retain control over your own destiny, your own career, you have to understand the idiots that you're dealing with. Otherwise, you'll get caught up in them and you'll be trapped and you'll get fucked basically. I understand every facet of what The Cure is involved in. I don't deal with it on a daily basis, but I have to understand why decisions are being made and what the repercussions are, otherwise I would have lost control over the whole thing years ago.

 

So do you feel an affinity for bands such as U2 and R.E.M., who also developed over a long period of time rather than taking easier roads to success?

Well, I certainly don't feel any affinity towards U2. I never have. I think there's a touch more with R.E.M. because I think the sensibility within the band is slightly more in tune with what The Cure does. I feel the most affinity for people like Billy [Corgan] from the Smashing Pumpkins, or with a band like Mogwai, who are infinitely younger than The Cure but have that indefinable something. I just sense there's something about an artist or a band that I instinctively like what they do and I understand why they do it. I hope they reciprocate.

 

Do you have any advice to offer to up-and-coming musicians?

I think it's difficult offering advice. If you have the kind of character where you would genuinely prefer to create art, if it's so immersed in what you do and you figure that success will either come along or it won't, then you don't need any advice. If you become successful, then you'll love it. If you don't you'll still love it. If you're doing something that means something to you on any kind of personal level, there are bound to be other people who are going to be into it as well. I think anyone that's not of that mindset I can't offer advice to anyway because I can't understand how doing it any other way could really make any sense.

 

And finally, what in the world possessed you to guest on South Park last year?

I just thought it was an extremely funny program. They sent me a couple of episodes when I was in New York. I just cried with laughter and I had to go back into makeup because my makeup had run. [Laughs] I just thought they wanted me to do a George Clooney and make gay dog noises, or something. But I thought it was really good that they asked me to be me. In fact, South Park has really taken off in the U.K. and to the younger generation of my extended family over here, everything else I have done has paled in significance compared to appearing in South Park. It's like I'm now a cartoon uncle to my younger nephews and nieces and I've become cool for the first time in 10 years.

 

 

 

back to articles index