ideas by J.Baker, L.Fiedler and J.Gluckman
written by J. Gluckman
After disappointing sales of
their final album, Happy the Album (from which their cover of Sunshine,
Lollipops, and Rainbows was released), the Cure split up permanently.
Left with nothing else (and a marred reputation due to his marriage to a
seventeen-year-old whose knowledge of the Cure begins with Friday, I'm in
Love), Robert Smith accepted an offer to do endorsements for Mrs.
Smith's pies.
Having been paid in pies, Smith
gained weight. Over Eaters' Anonymous and a two-month stay at the Jenny Craig
clinic proved futile. At three-hundred-plus pounds, however, Smith admitted in
an interview for People magazine, he had never been happier and planned
to profess his obsessive love for food musically.
The first Robert Smith solo
album, Pienography, was criticized as being nothing more than Pornography
with different lyrics, which in fact it was. The album did not sell well at
first, but sales improved slowly after the Pienography tour. Sponsored
by Mrs. Smith's, the tour did fairly well. With his new back-up band (which
included former members of the b-52s), Robert danced about in colorful muumuus,
but the highlight of every show was when Smith changed the opening lyrics of A
Hundred Meals from It would be great if we all had pie to I'm
going to give all of my fans pie, at which point a hundred roadies dressed
like chefs would emerge distributing slices of pie to the audience.
In an interview with US
magazine, Smith stated that Pienography, recorded in a Marie Callendar's
was more rewarding than anything he had ever done with the Cure. Due the
extremely high catering bills rung up during its recording however, it was not
his most rewarding effort financially.
Meanwhile, several former
members of the Cure decided to regroup and continue. Smith protested and
attempted to stop them, but it was proven that Michael Dempsey had a legal
right to the Cure. Eager to exact revenge upon Robert Smith, Lol Tolhurst
joined Michael Dempsey in his fight to gain control of the Cure.
It was during his legal battles
that Smith recorded his second solo album, Cake. Once again, critics
lambasted Smith for his lack of originality, pointing out that Cake was simply Faith
with new lyrics.
Smith defended himself in a YM
interview, explaining that, the album Cake was influenced strongly by Faith,
but it is ludicrous to suggest one is merely a facsimile of the other. For
example, the song 'Faith' goes 'nothing left but faith,' whereas the song
'Cake...' that's 'nothing left but cake.' True, they are somewhat similar but
the similarities are very subtle.
The Cake tour, sponsored by
Sara Lee, was quite similar to the Pienography tour, except his team of
roadie chefs (reduced to sixty) dealt slices of cake to the audience.
Cake
proved to be a flop and Smith was shortly the butt of many industry jokes. Smith's
musical failure was compounded by the death of band member Fred Schneider and
the loss of his legal right to the Cure.
The reformed Cure released its
"debut" album shortly after smith wrapped up the Cake tour.
The album, Re-Integration, featured Andy Anderson, Boris Williams, and
Jason Cooper on percussion, Simon Gallup and Michael Dempsey on bass, and Lol
Tolhurst playing "other instruments" (as was stated in the liner
notes). Though musically awkward, the album sold well among Cure fans who had
always really liked Simon Gallup the best and those who believed Tolhurst was
unfairly ousted from the band earlier. Shortly after the release of the album,
Tolhurst was kicked out of the band.
In a drunken stupor, Tolhurst
turned to Robert Smith and begged to take the place of the late Fred Schneider
in Smith's back-up band. According to Smith's interview with the Pennysaver,
It was a difficult choice - whether to work with Lol again. So I ate a
couple cheesecakes, took a nap, and when I woke up, I figured it was worth a
try.
The reunion produced the album
that picked Smith up out of the gutter, Seventeen Slices. Compared to Cake,
Seventeen Slices sold successfully, though cynical critics linked
Smith's climb in popularity to the tragic murder of "Weird Al" Yankovic,
suggesting distraught fans merely flocked to another artist who sang
excessively about food.
Smith's own explanation, as
presented in USA Today, was, I think Cake did so poorly
because we focused more on cake instead of pie. The new album has more references
to pie than the last one. The theory was illustrated with a pie graph.
While critics did not resist
the temptation to compare Seventeen Slices to the Cure's Seventeen
Seconds, some did note Smith's ingenuity, particularly on A Frosting,
in which Smith eats several pieces of pie during the intro.
The Seventeen Slices
tour drew larger crowds than even the Pienography tour years back and
Smith did not disappoint. Not only was pie once again distributed, but every
show ended with Smith, draped in a sequined muumuus, eating an entire pie in
seventeen seconds.
Despite the fact that Lol
Tolhurst was intoxicated during the entire tour, Smith kept him with the band,
explaining on the Gilbert Gottfried Show, How sober do you need to be to play
the woodblock, anyhow?