Curious Case Of The Cure

If any rock millionaire other than Robert Smith claimed not to know the
chart position of his latest single,it would be impossible to believe.The
record in question, "Lullaby", is at number five,the highest position ever
achieved by his group,The Cure,yet he says,"We only knew it was out because
the local record shop has it on sale." Surrounded by standard fodder about
love and dancing,Smith's allegory of being eaten alive by a spider-man looks
like an open wound in a kindergarten.

Over 13 years his hypnotic chord progressions,his distressed voice,his lyric
obsessions (religion,bleak dreams,lost love,fading memories) and not least
his electrified crow's nest hairstyle have lifted The Cure from cult
obscurity to the point where their last album, Kiss Me,Kiss Me,Kiss Me
(1987),quietly sold two million copies around the world.So quietly that taxi
drivers still have no idea who he is,even after he tells them the name of
his group. "I sit in the back thinking 'This is perfect'."

Smith,30 this week,has long been unconventional.At 11 he turned up at
school in Crawley wearing his mother's black velvet dress."I really don't
know why.I thought I looked good.My teachers were so liberal they tried
hard not to notice,but on the way home I was beaten up."

Three years later he was expelled from another school."They said I was
disruptive,but it was a personal thing.I hated the headmaster and he hated
me." He is not so very far from rock-and-roll orthodoxy.

Smith spent some time on the dole,then formed The Cure in 1976.The group was
loved by the critics and ignored by the public.Album cover artwork never
featured the faces of the group a policy record companies still consider
foolhardy,despite its having been employed by such notable successes as Yes,
Led Zeppelin and The Smiths.If fans can't see the group,how can they
identify with them? "I've never been comfortable with the way we look,"
Smith offers in explanation. "Our records were exactly what I wanted them to
be.It would have spoiled them to put us on the front."

This deliberate absence of image was maintained until the video era made it
impossible.Cure videos,however,are hardly tailor-made for Top of the Pops.
The "Lullaby" video is three minutes of surreal nightmare,an exquisitely
frightening homage to the film Poltergeist,unlikely to be suitable for
early evening viewing.

"We didn't want to release 'Lullaby'.I actually want to get rid of some of
the people who bought the last album," Smith insists,but he conceded to
Polydor Records that a single be released to promote the new album,
Disintegration (out next Tuesday). "'Lullaby' is my least favourite track,
but I suppose it's a sensible choice because it sounds very Cure-like."
Radio One evidently shared Smith's dislike of "Lullaby", because it wasn't
playlisted in its week of release,despite which it entered the charts at
number 11,the group's highest new entry.

"If I'd tried to be successful,if I'd listened to the advice the record
company had given me over the years,I'm sure we wouldn't be making music
now.The way I behave only seems strange if you assume success has been my
prime motivation."

He still drives the same ageing Lada,lives in a spartan Maida Vale flat,and
supports the same charities (Greenpeace,CND,Mencap) but mentions them only
when asked. "It goes back to things like Morrissey not eating meat.I was a
vegetarian for three years,but I didn't feel a need to champion it as a
cause.If people despise us as much as I despise Morrissey,and I say
Greenpeace is wonderful,they're likely to firebomb the Rainbow Warrior."

Smith's logic may not make sense out here in the real world but,within the
microcosm of The Cure,he has remained faithful to his ideals.He professes
to have little idea of why he is successful,but,when pressed,it becomes
clear that he understands the phenomenon very well."I suppose our music
fulfils a need some people feel.It communicates,but nothing specific,just
the desire not to feel isolated."

This sort of communication takes longer to establish than a dance craze,but
Smith knows that once a fan is hooked,he (and it is usually he) tends to
stay hooked.Given the group's success,Smith is justified in thinking he
must be doing something right.Disintegration features his most intense and
agonized work for several years,but it looks set to double the sales of
Kiss Me.

"It has to stop," he says quietly. "After Kiss Me it all got so big,I felt
it was happening to some other band,but here I am doing it again.In some
weird way,I suppose I must have become," and he pronounces the word with
evident dismay, "a performer."