Red = Interviewer
White = Robert
 

Guess who is on the phone? Hello.

Hello.

Hello, Robert?

Hello, yes it is, hello.

Thank you for calling.

That's ok.

I'm here with Hugo for the translation.

Yeah, alright.

Well first question, how are you, where are you, and what are you drinking?

I'm at home at the moment and...(phone line breaks up)...lager.

Robert, we're obviously just going through "Join The Dots" box set that is coming out next week...

Oui.

So was it a pleasant or painful journey, 25 years of Cure's history?

Actually it's still ongoing, because the box set was really just the start of it, because I'm going through the entire
studio albums..remastering them, and every one has got an accompanying extra cd, so a lot of people haven't quite
understood that this "Join The Dots" set is just the b-sides, although it says rarities, the real kind of obscure stuff
is coming out on the extra cds.

Ah, well that would answer all of the fans saying "well I've got all of that already". Does that mean that you're
just entirely in a kind of, certainly not a nostalgia trip, but you know, looking backwards, or is this giving you a
lot of inspiration for what comes next?

Well, it kind of took up most of the middle of last year, so in fact we were supposed to be going in to the studio
and recording a new record in last August, but I had to postpone it, because I wanted to get this all finished the
way...because I realized there isn't really anyone else who could do this, because there isn't anyone else that's
been around for the whole time. But I mean all in all it's quite...it has two sides to it really. I mean I like
most of...I'm pleased with most of what we've done. There's obviously some really terrible things, but in the main,
it's quite nice looking back...I haven't really taken the opportunity in the last 25 years to seriously kind of look
back at what we've done, so I suppose it's quite a nice nostalgic trip really.

And even going through, you've always said not only can you not remember recording Disintegration, no not Disintegration, sorry, Pornography, but I mean did you find anything even weirder than you ever imagined?

There's a lot...I mean specifically in the very early years, there's a whole set of demos for the Pornography
album, which again I have no recollection...I know it's just me on my own, and no one remembers me doing
them. A lot of the early stuff, like pre-Three Imaginary Boys on the first....I think probably the most interesting,
and the most varied, and the most observed extras disc is the one accompanying the first album, because that's
got stuff going right back to like 1975 I think, on there. It's pretty bizarre...some of it.

Do you know when all of this will start to be released?

Say again?

When will they start to come out?

The first 4 are scheduled to come out in April.

Bernard has a question about, and I had one too, have you mellowed? You're being very kind to young bands
now, more than you used to be. Is it because they all, you know, revere you and think that you're their kind of...

In what way am I being kinder now than I was?

No, no, I'm saying kinder, you've said very kind words about The Rapture, Interpol of course, but even..you did
that duet with Blink 182 and stuff.

Yeah. Well I mean I suppose...had The Rapture had been around we we were around, I probably would have
seen them as competition, so I suppose in some ways the length I've time I've been doing this and the age that
I'm at, allows me...I mean I don't feel threatened in anyway by younger bands like I probably used to. I kind
of feel that what I do with The Cure is kind of apart from that. I don't feel the sort of pressure to sell records
anymore, if I ever did in fact. I think the thing with Blink as an example...(phone line breaks up) ...then I would
15 years ago.

So no band to bitch about today?

Umm no, I kind of decided around about the time of Bloodflowers, like 3 or 4 years ago, that I would stop criticizing
other people.

And even if I tell you, did you know that Indochine have become bigger, have come back and become bigger
than they've ever been?

(laughs) Good.

You just said you were at Disneyland, do you have any regrets or is it quite good that your still as popular, we
can see it tonight, but there's actually...you're not quite...you don't have that mass adulation that was in the late
80's, that maybe was a bit suffocating at times?

Yeah. Well I mean it still surprises me...we'll be playing shows this coming summer and the scale of everything is
pretty much...I mean it's remained constant for the last sort of 15 years, which is...it is genuinely surprising,
because we don't really kind of do that much, I certainly don't do that much to encourage it. I think it's just...the only belief I have really in The Cure is that whatever we do, we do it for the best reasons, and we do it as well as
we can, and I suppose that...to me that's more important...if it all died down, I would still be making music with
people that I liked, I mean if the fact that the audience can get as big or as small as it is, and this is honestly true,
because thinking about the first 4 albums that are coming out soon, you know, that have been remastered, I never
made those with the intention of commercial success, and I still have the same kind of intentions really.

One of the things you just said, is also playing with people you like being with and stuff, I think that with Simon,
Perry, Jason and Roger now, it's the longest you've ever been the same lineup, isn't it?

Yeah, I mean there's always been this deception I think that's hung around The Cure, that it's a revolving door
sort of scenario and it's really unjustified, because the fact that we had quite a high turnover in personnel in a
brief period, statistically looks bad, but in fact...I mean Simon been around for every record but 2. And he's been
around for 23 of the 25 years,. And Jason's been the drummer now for longer than Boris was, it's 10 years this
year. And Perry's been around since the mid-80's in some form or another. There's been a real stability to
the band, which I think this kind of idea that I'm always changing the lineup is ludicrous. I mean I'm sure there was
a time when I was difficult to be around, and people tended to rub me up the wrong way.

Yeah, but people still think of Ron Wood as the newcomer in the Stones, don't they?

(laughs) Yeah, I know. We do suffer a little bit from that with Jason.

Two last questions, first obviously you mention this band who are still happy together, when will we be seeing
you next, I think this summer is it?

We're starting on monday actually in the studio to record a new record, we've given ourselves six weeks to
do it, which is the shortest time we've ever given ourselves since the Faith album. But we've done a lot of
pre-production, we've got all the songs ready, and everyone knows what they're supposed to be doing, I even
know what I'm going to be singing, which is the first time in 20 or more years. On the back of that we're looking
to do...we're still not sure in Europe whether we're going to do our own shows or whether we're going to do
festivals. We can't quite decide. So, we've already got some offers for festivals and a couple in France.
But I'm torn, because festivals are good in one way, but the thing that I miss most at festivals, in regard to Cure
shows, we don't have the time to sort of build up an atmosphere and we don't have the time to connect properly,
so I'm drawn more to the idea of Cure shows rather than festivals this summer.

Ok, one last question. What should we ask our listeners to win...for them to really be worthy of getting a free
copy of Join The Dots?

Well a question that no one would know the answer to but me. Is that an unfair kind of question? If we had not
recorded one song in our history, which song would it have been? But no one knows the answer but me. Is that
a fair question? No one will know if their right and I have to tell you.

Well you have to tell us, but you know, after. Yeah ok, should we do that?

Yeah.

That's quite good, because anyone could win and anyone could lose.

Yep.

Not some nerd who's got all the books.

(Everyone laughs)

Listen Robert, well thanks a lot. You can finish your lager now.

I took up some valuable time when you could have been playing the music, which is always the most important
thing.

Well we'll be playing it and there are other days for us. But well thanks and best of luck for everything, monday
onwards.

And I hope we'll see you in the summer.

I do too. Thank you again. Bye bye.

Thank you. Bye.