“A delayed state of shock”: The hidden trilogy inside The Cure’s discography
As a songwriter, Robert Smith has rarely stayed in the same place for very long. When The Cure first formed back in 1976, their primitive sound was fairly in keeping with the underground punk scene of the period, but as they progressed, the group repeatedly adapted to new sounds and styles. From the post-punk mastery of Three Imaginary Boys to the gothic melancholy of Pornography, Smith’s penchant for sonic diversity has given rise to a few secrets and easter eggs within the band’s discography.
You could ask 100 different Cure fans for their favourite album, and you would receive many different responses. Given the band’s innate ability to embrace various sounds and genres, the group has a broad appeal that few other artists can boast. Of their 14 studio albums to date, very few have sounded the same, but there have been those which have certainly stood out among the rest of The Cure’s discography.
The 1980s was a particularly productive time for Smith and The Cure, with the decade giving rise to some of the band’s all-time greatest efforts. For instance, 1982 saw the release of Pornography, a goth-rock triumph which cemented Smith among Britain’s finest songwriters, and helped to define and influence virtually every subsequent goth artist or album. The album also contributed to the band’s melancholy image, offering an alternative to the brightly coloured consumerism of much of 1980s pop music.
Seven years after the release of Pornography, Smith returned to these dark, gothic influences on Disintegration, arguably The Cure’s defining record. A stunning album featuring many of Smith’s finest songs, Disintegration is often cited as a favourite among dedicated fans of The Cure, and it is easy to see why. After all, the record was unlike anything that music fans had heard before, even within the goth subculture. Even if Smith’s dedication to development soon took the band in a different direction, that album always seemed to stand out among the rest.
In the years and decades that followed the release of those two incredible albums, The Cure explored everything from pop-rock to shoegaze, but the dark songwriting of Disintegration always stuck firmly in the mind of Robert Smith. Of course, the situation was not helped by those consistently citing the band’s goth-rock triumphs as being their creative peak. So, when the new millennia began to approach, the songwriter chose to revisit the inspiration of those 1980s albums.
The resulting record was Bloodflowers, a record which marked a stunning return to form for Smith’s songwriting. Created without any aims of commercial success, the record saw The Cure revert back to their goth-rock roots once again, with Smith envisioning the album as something of a sequel to his previous efforts.
“Pornography and Disintegration are always the fans’ top two albums, and mine as well,” he later recalled to The Guardian. “I wanted Bloodflowers to be the third part of a trilogy.”
Explaining this holy trinity of goth, the songwriter shared, “The first two records had something that was there by virtue of the intensity we put into the studio, and they both resulted in putting me into a delayed state of shock.”
He then added, “With Bloodflowers, because of my age, I can’t recreate that intensity, but I think it has a lyricism that makes it compare favourably to the other two.”
The 2000 album certainly seems to fit with the previous two records, both in terms of atmosphere and songwriting quality. Smith’s ability to take inspiration from his previous work, developing and adapting those ideas from decades prior into something inventive and new is a good indicator of just how gifted a songwriter and artist he is, which is perhaps why The Cure are still able to craft groundbreaking albums after all these years.
