THE CURE
Reviewed by Christopher J. Kelter
What the hell is a review of The Cure's latest and self-titled CD doing on Rough Edge? I sure as hell didn't want to waste time and effort talking about a band that has no place on a site like Rough Edge. And believe me, while I can say that The Cure have their place in musical history, I resisted the urge to even listen to this self-titled CD. But then I got to thinking. I remembered that quite a few of the younger metal, metalcore, and emo bands out there today have cited The Cure as an influence in their musical development. However, I would be hard pressed to actually tell you which bands have cited The Cure as an influence without doing an extensive web search.
So spending a few hours with The Cure and reviewing their latest CD didn't seem like such a bad idea after all. Additionally, when I was in college in the late '80s I would listen to anything that anybody recommended to me. A dorm mate recommended that I listen to The Cure's anthology of early singles and B-sides "Standing On A Beach." Accordingly, I spent the better part of a month sampling through The Cure's early work. And it didn't hurt that my familiarity with The Cure was pretty high as the band was a staple on MTV in its early years ("Just Like Heaven" anyone?).
To prepare for my review of "The Cure" I actually found a beat up copy of The Cure's "Wild Mood Swings" at my local library. "Wild Mood Swings" was enough of refresher to remind me of what The Cure's core sound is like although I knew that the disc was generally treated by critics as a return to the somewhat edgier sound the band exhibited in their early years.
So despite the length of this review so far the actual word count for my review of "The Cure" proper will be much smaller. "The Cure" sounds like it was recorded quickly – capturing each song in its infancy. The music has a vibrancy lacking in other material that The Cure has released over the years – but the trademark gloom and doom is still fairly intact. The fact that I have a fairly wide range of musical interests allowed me to keep "The Cure" spinning throughout its duration without ever once feeling the need to stop it. But at the same time I never got the feeling that I just had to hear a certain track either.
The two chainsaw rating is pretty much based on the fact that The Cure is not a good fit for the Rough Edge pages. But I can say that if you like some of the doomier/Goth efforts of bands like Katatonia you might surprise yourself with what you hear on any The Cure release including this self-titled effort.
"The Cure" was produced by Ross Robinson (you recognize that name, don't you?!) and Robert Smith.
The Cure: Robert Smith on vocals and guitar, Perry Bamonte on guitar, Roger O'Donnell on keyboards, Simon Gallup on bass, and Jason Cooper on drums and percussion.
For more information visit http://www.thecure.com.
Rating Guide:
A classic. This record will kick your ass.
Killer. Not a classic but it will rock your world.
So-so. You've heard better.
Pretty bad. Might make a nice coaster.
Self explanatory. Just the sight of the cover makes you wanna hurl.
Copyright © 2004 by R. Scott Bolton. All rights
reserved.
Revised: 14 Oct 2024 14:01:56 -0400.
