The 1984 Cure album that was almost Robert Smith’s first solo record
At the tail end of 2024, The Cure released their critically acclaimed 14th studio album, Songs of a Lost World, marking their first release of new material in 16 years, and almost two years later, they are still charging ahead, capitalising expertly on the momentum drummed up from the evocative project.
In many ways, the last two years have proved that the illustrious Robert Smith has some fire in his belly to grab at the world of solo music beyond his legendary fixture as frontman of The Cure, the most obvious example being at Glastonbury Festival 2025, when Olivia Rodrigo hit the headlines after inviting her unlikely friend and collaborator, Smith, out on the stage.
The pair would soon perform live together again, at Rodrigo’s surprise set at Barcelona’s Primavera Sound Festival, debuting their new duet, ‘What’s Wrong With Me?’, where Smith looked liberated as he stepped out without his band. This proved the long-known fan theory that the lipstick-wearing, pallid-faced performer has always fought the urge to peek beyond the curtains of The Cure, showing his true colours after he briefly served as a guitarist for Siouxsie and the Banshees.
He appeared on their 1983 live album Nocturne, and also formed the British invasion-inspired side project, The Glove, with Banshees bassist Steve Severin, releasing their only album, Blue Sunshine, also in 1983. Thus, when all this was said and done, and Smith returned to the studio full of new ideas, half of him wanted to leave The Cure behind, but that was not to be.
“I was kind of cajoled back into making a Cure album by Fiction, who had me under contract and could have stopped me from playing with the Banshees,” Smith revealed to Rolling Stone in 2004 while looking back at the tumultuous time. Many cogs were whirring, and Smith had hopped aboard, hoping the ride would take him in a different direction. Fiction Records exerted its control over Smith with the keen knowledge that The Cure were the biggest band, by far, in their roster; in fact, when they transitioned to Geffen in 2001, Fiction Records went on hiatus. No way were they letting the star ditch the name that was worth a hefty sum.
“The Top was the closest I’ve ever come to making a solo album,” Smith went on, “I didn’t really have a very coherent idea of what the album was, and I think it shows. It’s probably the patchiest Cure album“.
Smith had over-extended himself to the point where he’d siphoned off his best musical ideas elsewhere. Fiction Records were demanding another album and, finding himself without a band on his lonesome, Smith set out to do just that, regardless of the creative bandwidth he possessed.
It was a pretty barren affair, as he recalled, “I played all the instruments, except drums. When I listen back to the album, I have a strange image of me sitting in the middle of the studio floor surrounded by little bongos and spoons and things. I would just sit there and make things up with an acoustic guitar.”
Thank God it wasn’t his first (and only) solo album, as the reviews for The Top weren’t particularly good, as Smith noted: “It was a bit sad, because it was very badly reviewed and it dented my confidence in that way of working, and I put a stop to it”. One step ahead at all times, that guy.
