Stereo Warning

Apologies to everyone for the delay, but here's -- finally -- the final part of the interview with Robert Smith from the Cure. Enjoy!

Does it bother you that The Cure is still being called a goth band when it’s so much more complex than that?
I’ve given up a long time ago worrying about mainstream media calling us a goth band. It lightened up a little bit when we were called goth-pop after the Live 8 show, where we played some upbeat 3-minute pop songs. It’s so pitiful really when “goth” is still tagged onto the name The Cure...

What would you call it?
We’re not categorizable, that’s the problem. We are unique, we don’t conform to any norm. I suppose we were post punk when we came out and we’ve been since at different times, but in total it’s impossible. How can you describe a band that put out an album like “Pornography” and also has greatest hits where every single song was top 10 around the world? It just doesn’t work. So it’s easy to just pick on one aspect of what we do and say yea that’s the Cure, they’re a goth band. They called us goth when we did “Friday I’m in Love” and I thought how does this work? I kind of gave up right about then, 15 years ago, worrying about what we were going to get called. Probably when we stop they’ll look back and think of something a little bit more apt, but I just play Cure music, whatever that is.

Do you like any of the bands who profess to be influenced by you? Who will pick up your mantle when you retire?
I like a lot of them. I’ve seen Mogwai this year and they’re still top of my list. I take my nephews and nieces out to see bands all the time. I really still like Interpol a lot. I listened to their album on the drive up tonight in my car. They really have got a fantastic sound. Most of the bands that have name-checked The Cure over the last 2-3 years I tend to like anyway. I like to think that we can give hopes to young bands that we can do something we want and still be successful. I like the idea of inspiring people to do things their own way.

Reviewers almost never fail to mention that you still wear makeup on stage, some even suggesting you’re too old for it. Does it bother you?
My makeup is pretty 80s, isn’t it? (laughs) my appearance is preposterous anyway, so it doesn’t matter how old I am. I don’t think I look that different than I did 10 years a go, with or without makeup. It puzzles me why such a big deal is made about it when everyone puts make up on when they go on stage. If I didn’t wear makeup on stage it would be very hard to discern my features. I haven’t got very strong features so I do it to accentuate my eyes and my mouth. If I wanted to accentuate my nose I’d paint a big yellow stripe on it, but I don’t. It’s part of what I do when I go on stage. I wouldn’t feel in the right frame of mind if I went on stage in bare feet on no makeup. It’s part of the ritual of going on stage and performing for people which is in essence what reviewers have missed – you’re actually performing for people. It doesn’t come that naturally to me even though I’ve done it for years. I go thru this process when I go on stage, I don’t need to wear that kind of makeup to put fuel in my car. But sometimes when I go out, when I went to see the musical “Chicago” I wore makeup just in case I was asked to go on stage for the encore (laughs).

In the past you also used to drink before going on stage to work up the courage to perform. Are you past that now?
It was more to liberate me from my natural reservations. I got past it on Curiosa. For the first time in my life I went on stage straight and I found out I enjoyed it. I always knew when we were playing stadiums that I was too drunk to be good but it didn’t seem to matter that much to people. It was more the event or the occasion and I got away with it more. I am keenly aware more than anyone of how old I am I’ve always maintained that there’s something reasonably charming about seeing a 17-year old fall over after one beer too many and very far from charming seeing a 47-year old keel over after one beer too many. So that’s another reason why I don’t drink like I used to but I still have a fair go at it when I’m with friends. I acknowledge my age, but I’m not thrilled about getting older. Nobody ever is, but it’s not as crippling as it used to be for me to understand that I’m getting older.

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Tags: the cure robert smith ashlee simpson

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The release of the new Metallica album will be delayed, sources from the band's record label told Stereo Warning.

The album, which was supposed to be released in February -- as Lars Ulrich had said several times -- is running behind schedule and will not be in stores until April at the latest, sources tell us. The band's website has recently said that the boys are still doing overdubs, although it did not give a date for the album release.

Tags: photos pictures lars ulrich metallica james hetfield kirk hammett rob trujillo robert trujillo

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Here's part three of the interview with Robert Smith from the Cure. Part four -- and final -- coming tomorrow.

You don’t have a keyboards player for the first time in decades. Why did you not replace Roger?
There’s no need to when you got someone like Porl playing guitar. He can pretty much create any sounds that you want. There are only two songs out of the 33 that have any keys on them at the moment and that’s me playing so I don’t really miss the keyboards. It’s nice every once in a while to totally limit the palette of sounds that we have. We did that on Disintegration to only allow certain sounds to happen so that that holds the whole album together so if you’re playing a very slow Eastern sounding song and put it against a really upbeat driving song, the fact that you’re using the same instrumentation and the same palette of sound tends to hold the whole thing together. On a lot of the albums, the keyboards you hear aren’t played by the keyboards player in the band. An awful lot of keyboards on Cure albums are played by me. If I say it needs to sound like this and just play it, there’s no need to teach the player how to play it if it’s already been played. If there’s no keyboard player, there’s no sense of “well, what am I going to play.” It sounds great without a keyboard player, so why bother putting one in? If we had five people, you’re snubbing the person if you don’t want their instrument in. So you almost have to have keyboards when you have a keyboard player. Live, you might miss the keyboards on some of the songs a little bit, but if you’re a Cure fan you sing along and fill in the gaps. On others it’s not that important to play it live. It’s all about the energy and the performance and the words.

What is your approach to your next tour?
We’re going as a band everywhere around the world. The idea of being a four piece is getting back to that stripped down stage look and sound. The fact that we can turn out anywhere with very little equipment and play a concert is going back to the old idea of The Cure. It’s less grand than things we’ve done in the past, but we’re still planning to play for three hours.

I read somewhere that Ashley Simpson said she might collaborate with you on some music. Is that true?
(laughs) I happened to meet her a couple of times. I don’t normally hang out in places where I bump into artist like Ashley Simpson, but I took some of my nephews and nieces to see her in (the musical) “Chicago.” Musicals aren’t really my form of entertainment I have to confess, but I was pleasantly surprised by it actually. As to working with Ashley, I’m not so sure how that’s going to happen. I’ve been tempted to work with a couple of people that I’m not normally associated with and I suppose I won’t rule anything out. I’m a lot more easy-going than I used to be.

You already retired once, how much longer are you going to be doing this?
I’m genuinely surprised at the people’s reaction when we play shows, it’s hard to ignore it. It’s gratifying to know that people still want The Cure to exist. The best thing about playing live is that we’re an old band playing to a young audience. As long as I still enjoy it I should keep doing it. I personally find it slightly upsetting to see seriously old people performing contemporary music. I haven’t quite reached that very old person stage but I’m aware that time is moving on. Once I won’t be able to sing for three hours and also mentally wanting to do it, that’s when I’ll stop. I don’t want The Cure to fizzle out doing 45 minute shows of greatest hits, I think it would be an awful way to end the legacy of The Cure.

The last time we talked you said you were thinking about growing a beard and starting to write film music.
I’m not so sure about the beard part, I look like Father Christmas when I have a beard, which is entertaining for this time of year but not really for the other 11 months. Film music is definitely still my goal. But I had to choose between to continue on with The Cure and make an album with Porl or become a film music writer, and I opted for The Cure. Hopefully another opportunity will arise for me to be involved in a film. If it doesn’t I still think I made the right choice. I’m still able to stand up and sing for 3 hours so as long as I can do that I should probably take advantage of it. The day will come when I can’t then it’s probably the time to sit down and start making film music.

Check back tomorrow for part 4 of this interview.

(c) Stereo Warning 2007. All Rights Reserved. Be nice and don't reproduce this content without prior written approval.

Tags: the cure robert smith ashlee simpson

Posted by lusson at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Here's part two of the Robert Smith interview. Stay tuned for part three tomorrow, this thing is loooong!

How’s the recording going?
As usual I’m holding it up, because I can’t get the words how I want them. I find myself stopping short and thinking I’ve done this before better, so it’s hard to find subject matter that really matters to me, things that I really want to sing. I just don’t want to make a record because we’re in a group. That flies in the face of what I’ve always wanted The Cure to be. It frustrates the others a lot I think but there’s not much anyone can do about it. The last four Cure albums have really stalled on my lyric writing. I think it’s worthwhile because they end up better than they otherwise would have been. I never worry about writer’s block, I figure if I don’t have anything to write about I shouldn’t be writing.

What does the record sound like? Does it resemble any of your past work?
It’s incredibly varied at the moment. Everyone’s contributed so there are some very different styles. It could be a mix of all the different styles or it could focus much more on a down beat or it could be incredibly energetic and upbeat. I tend to favor the first option, I like the idea of kind of starting and traveling and ending up somewhere else rather than being a mood piece like “Bloodflowers.” I like the idea of it being more in the style of the “Kiss Me” album with different things happening. But the art of that is to get it to all hang together which is quite difficult as well.

We didn’t demo this album. It’s the first time we hadn’t done band demos since the early 80s. It’s a bit of a leap in the dark but I wanted to capture the band just playing. I loved the way Russ Robinson recorded us for the last album, the demos for that were sensational, but we lost something when we worked out the songs went back in and rerecorded it based on what I’ve written. I wanted to let the band play and then write to what we played, which is why I’m finding it a little bit hard. I used to steer the band into a direction based on what I wanted the song to say. This time I’m giving the band a couple of vocal pointers and some titles and some words and then we’re playing and then I try to fit the song to that. It’s more enjoyable because it’s a way around of doing it. It doesn’t sound like “Pornography” though, it doesn’t have that relentlessness that some of those early albums had. It has more color, a lot more style.

The album will be what would normally be demos, but it sounds fantastic. We spent one day per song. We’d learn the song in the afternoon. When we’re comfortable, we take a break then we come back and we run through it until we think we’ve got a take. Exactly like last album, the difference this time around being that we’re not going to go back and rerecord it. The reason why demos often sound good and exciting is because it kind of teeters on the edge. Everyone’s concentrating and trying very hard to get it right. Often when you come back and rerecord there’s a bit of a comfort zone, there are no mistakes or glitches, they always get rid of them in the end. This time around we’re not gonna get rid of those. Listening to the live stuff from last year with Porl playing drew me to this idea because I thought we played 60+ songs and there was no way we could’ve rehearsed that many songs to get them all perfect and we just went with how we felt on stage about that particular performance. Some of them have what one might call mistakes in them but they sound great and that pushed me to this idea of not trying to refine everything all the time. That’s something I do a bit too much I think.

Check back tomorrow for part 3 of this interview.

(c) Stereo Warning 2007. All Rights Reserved. Be nice and don't reproduce this content without prior written approval.

Tags: the cure robert smith

Posted by lusson at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This is the first part of a long conversation we had with The Cure's Robert Smith while he was working on his band's latest album, due in stores next spring. A very candid Robert talked about everything from his relationship with Porl to the trials and tribulations of writing the new record to his approach to the live show. He even talked about drinking, getting old and (maybe) working with Ashlee Simpson. Enjoy!

Once again, you made big personnel changes in your band. What happened?
At the turn of the year 2005 it was time for a change. Roger O’Donnell and Perry Bamonte left and Porl Thompson returned for his third time in the band. It’s very hard to leave a successful group. Sometimes it takes a little cajoling and a little nod to make people realize they’re not happy in what they’re doing and holding everyone else back. I’m always the driving force of the band and if everyone’s happy with what I want to do it’s a happy band, if they’re not it’s not. I’m not very good at compromising when it comes to music and art. I just find it ridiculous that I should have to do something I don’t want to do, so it leaves everyone only one option, to leave. That’s what happened to Roger and Perry.

Is that what happened to Porl the other two times that he left?
Porl actually had a little bit more courage. The first time Porl was squeezed out early on, before the first record. He was a part of the live band that came out of school and led up to “Three Imaginary Boys.” He was the fourth imaginary boy that never made it onto the record. But the second time he left in 1993 because he wanted to play with other people and follow a different musical path. I like that. I wish that everyone that left the band had that kind of courage to their convictions but unfortunately there’s the lure of a safe job and all that goes with it. Sometimes I like to shake things up because I’ve never seen The Cure as a job, it’s a vehicle of expression and that’s all it should be.

How’s your relationship with Porl now?
Porl is my brother in law, he married my younger sister a long time ago. He’s part of the family. It's strange, when he was in the band we had a difficult relationship, and as soon as he left our relationship got a lot better. This time around that he’s back into the band we’re all older and wiser and we know each other a lot better obviously. I think we want the same things now as a band, which is why he’s back. He’s brought back a sense of urgency, we’ve got a rock edge again. He’s such a fantastic guitarist -- the new record that we’ve been making is showcasing what Porl does.

Check back tomorrow for part II of this interview.

(c) Stereo Warning 2007. All Rights Reserved. Be nice and don't reproduce this content without prior written approval.

Tags: the cure robert smith

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