“The best thing about the band”: Robert Smith’s honest critique of The Cure
There are a lot of things to love about The Cure. As a band, they’re considered one of the most beloved outfits in British music history and the alternative scene worldwide. Whether it be their gripping bass lines, anthemic lyrics, or their singer’s distinctive vocals that sound just as good today, there’s a lot of good. However, for Robert Smith, his favourite thing about the group is specific details.
In 1985, The Hit decided to let The Cure’s frontman do their job for a day. For one article, Smith played the critic as he offered up his, albeit biased, critiques and comments on his own talent. He went through meticulously, reviewing himself as a singer, songwriter, guitar player and beyond, providing a fascinating insight into how he sees himself.
Despite being one of the most well-known figures in music, Smith said, “I’ve never really seen myself as a singer.” Clearly, with some kind of career blindness or lack of self-awareness, he doubled down on it by adding, “I honestly don’t class myself as a songwriter.” Instead, he seems to see his life as a kind of extended accident or joke he’s stumbled into as he said, “I’ve got ‘musician’ written on my passport: that’s even funnier.”
In Smith’s view, his lengthy music career is a wondrous thing that seemed to just happen, rather than believing himself to be supremely talented or deserving. “I never cared about giving a performance, I’d just work myself up into the state of mind needed for the song and that’d be it,” he said of his singing abilities, “Some of the things I sang were pretty good, but a lot of it was out of tune.”
Of his songwriting, the same balanced attitude prevails as he said, “I think I’ve written some completely brilliant songs in my time – and some completely awful ones.” As a guitar player too, Smith sees himself as a kind of middling figure as he declares, “I’m not technically a good player, but at least I don’t sound like anyone else,” before admitting, “I’ve never really bothered to apply myself totally.”
But to the musician, creating a legacy like his or songs like The Cure’s doesn’t come from skill; it comes from feel or energy. “For me, the idea of being a musician has nothing to do with technical ability,” he said. The importance of the right atmosphere is perhaps why he considers the band’s greatest strength to be a matter of personality, not music.
“The best thing about the band is that everyone is really funny, there’s all this sharp humour and you never know whether they’re being serious or not,” he said, declaring that the thing he likes most about the group has nothing to do with the songs they make or the shows they play, but the friendships behind the scenes.
Really, it all seems to come down to that. Throughout his evaluation of his position as a musician, Smith seems utterly uninterested in typical modes of success or fame. “As a band The Cure don’t perpetuate the rock ‘n’ roll myth that everything is fab, etc. Being in a band is good fun if you’re doing it for the right reasons,” he said, prioritising that above all. “If I found myself in the Top Ten I’d stop doing interviews and disappear for a while. I’d never allow us to be a `big group’ – I’d break us up if that ever happened,” he continued, making his commitment to enjoyment over fame known.
But actually, the band have managed both. The Cure are undeniably huge and have achieved major success, but they’ve done it in a way that never felt stifling. “At that time we didn’t want to be successful because we’d only be remembered as the group that did such and such,” he admitted of their earliest days, but as different fans have floated in and out with each record or hit, they’ve found a happy position amidst the success. While other acts might be desperate to keep hold of their fans and squash their musical evolution to do that, The Cure have let them come and go. “I always wanted the audience to change: I can’t imagine anything worse than growing old with the same audience,” Smith said.
So with no real interest in fame in the typical form it’s associated with, a middling view of his own abilities and a willingness to shake off their fans time and time again as long as it means they can happily keep moving on, the core of The Cure comes down to one thing for Robert Smith; the friends on stage with him and the jokes they crack off-stage.
