The first band I plan on Spotlighting is one of my personal favorites: The Cure.
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The Cure was formed in 1973, but at the time the band was known as The Obelisk. At the Time the band members consisted of Robert Smith on lead vocals and piano, Michael "Mick" Dempsey on guitar, Laurence "Lol" Tolhurst on drums, Marc Ceccagno on lead guitar and Alan Hill on bass.
As the years progressed the band went through several lineup changes with the only constant member being Robert Smith. The band also went through several name changes from the Obelisk to Easy Cure
Easy Cure auditioned several vocalists before Smith finally assumed the role of Easy Cure's front-man in September 1977. That same year, Easy Cure won a talent competition to work and record with Hansa Records but the contract later dissolved as some members left the band. Thompson was dropped from the band in May, and the remaining trio (Smith/Tolhurst/Dempsey) were soon renamed The Cure by Smith.
Despite hardships, The Cure realesed its first Album "The Imaginary Boys" in May 1979. Because of the band's inexperience in the studio, Parry and engineer Mike Hedges took control of the recording. However, most of the band members were unhappy with their debut album; particularly Smith who felt it was a bit too superficial. The band later released their second single "Boys Don't Cry" in June
The Cure them became the front -runner for Siouxie and the Banshees but being part of the Banshees really changed Smith's outlook on what he wanted to do with his music career.
The Cure's third single "Jumping Someone Else's Train" was released in early October 1979. Soon afterwards, Dempsey was dropped from the band because of his cold reception to material Smith had written for the upcoming album.
After the lack of creative control on the first album, Smith exerted a greater influence on the recording of The Cure's second album "Seventeen Seconds", which he co-produced with Mike Hedge. The album was released in 1980 and reached number 20 on the UK charts. A single from the album, "A Forest", became the band's first UK hit single, reaching number 31 on the singles chart. To improve sales of the album after re-releasing "Three Imaginary Boys" to America, the band went on it's first world tour. At the Conclusion of the tour however, Matthieu Hartley left the band. Hartley said, "I realized that the group was heading towards suicidal, sombre music—the sort of thing that didn't interest me at all."
The Cure recorded and released "Pornography", the third and final album of an "oppressively dispirited" trio that cemented the Cure's stature as purveyors of the emerging gothic rock genre in 1982. The release of Pornography was followed by the Fourteen Explicit Moments tour, where the band finally dropped the anti-image angle and first adopted their signature look of big, towering hair and smeared lipstick on their faces.
The tour also saw a series of small incidents that eventually led Simon Gallup to leave The Cure at the tour's conclusion. Gallup and Smith did not talk to each other for eighteen months following his departure.
With only one album left in their record contract and with commercial response to "Wild Mood Swings" and the "Galore" compilation lacking in enthusiasm, Smith once again considered that the end of The Cure might be drawing near and wanted to make an album that reflected the more serious side of the band. The Grammy-nominated album "Bloodflowers" was released in 2000 after being delayed since 1998.
The band also embarked on the nine-month Dream Tour, attended by over one million people worldwide. In 2001, The Cure left Fiction and released their "Greatest Hits" album and DVD, which featured the music videos for a number of classic Cure songs.
Tthe band headlined twelve major summer music festivals in 2002, and played three extended concerts in Berlin and Brussels in which they performed the albums "Pornography", "Disintegration" and "Bloodflowers" in their respective order each night. The Berlin performances were released on DVD as "The Cure: Trilogy" in 2003.
In 2011, the band played their first three studio albums in their entirety during two shows in Sydney, Australia. These "Reflections" shows notably featured Roger O'Donnell and Laurence Tolhurst, both in a keyboard and percussion role. Porl Thompson was absent from the performances. The shows are due to be released on DVD in 2012.
March 2012, The Cure announced that they would be headlining a series of summer music festivals across Europe, including the Leeds/Reading Festival. Smith said that the band were currently without a recording contract and that he had no idea when they would put together another record or release new singles
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Finally finished it. research stinks. hope y'all like this one.
Bats and Kisses,
Lady Zendra
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