The 1983 song that almost killed The Cure: “We must resist”
British music was revolutionised in the mid-1970s, with punk truly taking hold in the form of bands like the Sex Pistols and The Clash. By the latter years of the decade, other genres were emerging from the rubble of the first wave of punk, such as post-punk and gothic rock, and The Cure found themselves right at home.
Emerging from the fertile post-punk landscape gave The Cure a unique advantage. While many of their contemporaries were busy defining the boundaries of new genres, Robert Smith and company seemed content to blur them, borrowing freely from punk, pop and experimental music alike.
The band, formed in 1978, have always been associated with gothic imagery, aided by frontman Robert Smith’s dark hair and clothing, alongside his tendency to write gloomy, melancholic lyrics. With albums like Seventeen Seconds and Pornography, the band bathed in dark soundscapes, capturing the plight of living in Thatcher’s Britain.
Those darker records helped establish the mythology that continues to surround the band today. However, they also risk obscuring just how versatile The Cure were, particularly when it came to crafting infectious melodies and accessible pop songs.
However, The Cure also experimented with cheerier sounding cuts, with many of their earlier songs featuring more classic fast-paced post-punk numbers, such as ‘10:15 Saturday Night’ or ‘Boys Don’t Cry’. While these songs weren’t always lyrically upbeat, The Cure showed from the very beginning that they knew how to get people on the dancefloor.
It wasn’t until the band had made Pornography, arguably the bleakest record they’ve created to date, that they started to head into more electronic, upbeat territory. They demonstrated a step towards this with albums like The Top and The Head on the Door, which featured songs like ‘Close To Me’, ‘Inbetween Days’, and ‘The Caterpillar’. Again, many of these songs dealt with complex lyrical themes, but The Cure wanted people to dance away their sorrows this time.
Before putting out these albums, the members faced some difficulties between themselves, with Simon Gallup quitting the band after fighting with Smith. He left just after their Pornography tour, and subsequently, Smith became a member of Siouxsie and the Banshees, having played with them back in 1979 on a temporary basis. Fans were confused. Were The Cure still a band?
At the time, the group’s future genuinely seemed uncertain. Internal tensions, shifting line-ups and Smith’s growing involvement in outside projects created the impression that The Cure might simply fade away before reaching their full potential.
After some time away, Smith and Lol Tolhurst started creating some new songs, and in 1983, ‘The Walk’ was released, teasing a more electronic direction for the band. A certified indie floorfiller, as soon as it dropped, the song became rather successful, hitting number 12 in the UK Singles chart. Yet, this pressure became a lot for the band to handle.
All of a sudden, more people wanted new music from the band that kept in line with this energetic direction. “There was so much pressure around ‘The Walk’ because it went in the charts and now everyone wants another single. We must resist this temptation, I’m tired of being bound to the same group of people, the same music area,” Smith told Rockerilla.
He continued: “People don’t understand why we split up, since this would be the ideal moment to take advantage of three years of incessant touring. Everyone was saying that our next album would be the definitive one, but we decided to call it quits without reaching our initial goals.”
Smith knew the band couldn’t work under pressure. The decision not to give into this stress of making more hits and working at a pace that suited them proved to be the right decision. After releasing The Top, Gallup rejoined the band, and The Cure was back on top form, releasing The Head on the Door to significant success.
In retrospect, the uncertainty surrounding this period proved essential to The Cure’s development. By resisting expectations and refusing to chase chart success on anyone else’s terms, the band created the space needed to evolve. The result was a body of work that successfully bridged the gap between post-punk experimentation and mainstream appeal, securing their place as one of Britain’s most enduring alternative acts.
