The Cure Lives

Rumors about a possible seperation end and the recording of a new album is announced. They promise to come to
Mexico City next year.

Alberto Castillo Torres

El Universal.

Sunday, July 13th, 2003

Sound explorer of the contradictions and darkness of the human mind as the creative force in The Cure since 27
years ago, Robert Smith states that, although the speculation about the band's breakup has ended because they will
record a new album after three years, and a new and different chapter in the band's history opens, "reinvention" is
not the word that defines the phase that the British rock band is living.

Smith answers the phone at his home in London and comments that, despite the band's next album producer, Ross
Robinson, is a nü metal guru, it's unlikely that the band is going to wear a disguise which doesn't fit, neither that
they are going to deny its past.

"I'm not interested in reinventing The Cure, deny my past, or pretend that I have become an adult, although I know
I'm 44".

"Many artists do that, because they want to change their audience and sell more records, but it seems ridiculous to
me that The Cure would do it".

It's one o'clock in the morning at the British capital, and the musician has just woke up, because he sleeps in the
evening and, like a vampire from the horror films that he enjoys, lives at night.

For the guitarist, his return to the studio and the premiere of the Trilogy DVD, (that documents the live
performance of three of his best albums in Berlin in 2002) mark "a final point" in his career, but not regarding his
gloomy and passionate vision of life.

"People say that, as you get old, you get more wisdom and you find the answers to the questions you had when you
were young, but that's a myth".

"As time goes by, the main purpose in life for most of the people is to raise children, and those questions are not
important anymore. I don't have children, I still have the same dilemmas about the sense of my life I had when I
was 15 and these feelings are still found in The Cure's music… and they will always be there", he says.

Melancholic and depressive chronicler that appeared as an artist with the help of punk and gothic rock, Smith
details that, after releasing Bloodflowers in 2000, finishing the relation with his previous record label and
announcing a band break to make an attempt on his own making a solo album, they met Robinson in 2002 and
signed with his record label IAM.

"I felt that making a record with Ross would be a chance that I shouldn't let go. We're going to make a record in
September and if we are satisfied with the results and we want to work with Ross again, then we'll make a second
and maybe a third, but for now, we're focused only in one".

"Ross is a very well known person in the nü metal scene, but we are his favorite band, and I like what he did with
Korn and At The Drive-In, though I didn't like so much what he did with Slipknot. He is a perfectionist that wants
you to give your best and there are nervous people who thinks that he is going to turn us into a metal band, but we'll
just sound different, because we'll keep saying what songs will be on the record".

Trilogy - Live in Berlin consummates Smith's dream of playing the songs of Pornography, Disintegration and
Bloodflowers in only one night, commemorating in that way 25 years of The Cure.

"I always wanted to link these three records, cause I felt they had things in common, and I wanted to do it with this
lineup, which is the one that has been together for almost 10 years and has been the best".

The only performance in Mexico was that of 1992 in Monterrey, and Smith assures that he never understood the
reason why they didn't go on to Mexico City, but promises that they will come back in 2004.

"I never understood why we didn't continue to Mexico City and it seems really strange to me now that I think about
it, but it's 100 percent sure that we'll travel to Mexico next year".

The musician denies the rumor that indicated they didn't play in Mexico City because of his fear to fly in a plane."

Smith: I will never be untouchable

The Cure's leader talks about groups that don't accept criticism

Alberto Castillo Torres

El Universal. Sunday, July 13th, 2003

He's almost three decades in the music business and it's the forger of an esthetic that has influenced more than a
generation, but for Robert Smith it is not simple to give his point of view about the British rock groups that today
mark a music trend. However, in an interview from London, The Cure's leader considered that at least the members
of Radiohead have become untouchables, and mistakenly, they think that they can't be criticized.

"The Bends is a fantastic album, but I didn't like OK Computer, nor Kid A, and sinceI haven't heard their new
album, I don't know if I'm going to like it".

"There are many groups that are untouchables and, after several years, Radiohead has taken that posture, and no
one can make any criticism of them. If people like their records as much as they say, I think that they are achieving
something that for everybody else is unusual", replied Smith, sarcastically. The good thing about the band
commanded by Thom Yorke (and that more than one critic has pointed out as the best rock band in the world, and
even as the successor of The Beatles) is, in music words, that "opposite to others, they believe in their work, and
that's good, though I don't like what they do".

Resistant to be compared with other British rock icons such as David Bowie, because "like him I just aspire to
make music in which I truly believe", the author of "Killing an Arab" showed interest after being questioned about
the so called fight against terrorism that the government of his country has supported.

"It's a war that can't be won, it's like the war against drugs and the governments have a totally wrong approach
about this problem".

"Terrorism is terrible, to kill innocent people just for the cause that you believe in doesn't justify it morally, but it
happens because there is a lot of inequality in the world. The money that is spent on missiles should be used to fight
the AIDS problem, or to bring third-world countries to the first-world, but since it doesn't happen, this will create an
extreme social dissatisfaction situation that will only generate more terrorism".

A decisive factor is religion, according to Smith.

"Humans have this damn obsession with it. If religion were made illegal for a year, it would be a very happy year,
but these mind differences have provoked 5 percent of humanity to consume 85 percent of what is produced in the
world, which it seems to me demential".

With faith that the next generation will change for good the world's conditions, the artist indicated that he never has
reflected explicitly his politic ideas in The Cure's songs, neither will he in the next record.

"The Cure has lived very aside from what happens in the world. I want our songs to be aside from any time, and I
don't feel that The Cure can comment on the happenings in the world or the social problems".

"It's inevitable that the world's situation have an influence on me, but I'd hate to produce a record that only was
about the world that we live in today, cause in five years from now, it's going to be completely different", he says.

(Thanks to Roberto Zúñiga Torres for translating and typing all of this up!)