CHECKING IN WITH THE CURE'S ROBERT SMITH

by Brad Kava

The most shocking thing about the Cure's Robert Smith offstage is how normal he seems. And how nervous.

I caught up with Smith by phone the day before he left England and again backstage at Live 105's BFD show at
Shoreline Amphitheatre, before his band went on to a blazing 90-minute set laced with rarely played oldies. "This
seemed like such a good idea two days ago," he said backstage,"but now I'd rather be anywhere else. My hands
are clammy. I'm a fish out of water here. I'd rather be out there," he added, pointing to the audience.

The guy who wears thick Edward Scissor hands makeup on stage with his hair moussed straight up, is almost
unrecognizable in his civvies. He is no more the character he plays (on record and in concert) than Johnny Depp
is the man with shears for fingers.

Facing an audience "doesn't come very naturally to me," he says. "It's a strange paradox. I get very
self-conscious when I walk out on stage. As soon as I start playing and singing, I can't believe what I've just
done. There's a sense of ego there I haven't really got in normal life. I'm not a loud person at all. I don't care if
people pay attention to me or not."

Smith 38, describes himself as "split down the middle" and says he has been since high school. "I was a strange
mix. I was into football (soccer). I was on the football team. Off the field, my friends were into music. They thought
I was weird because I played football. My footballer friends thought I was weird for hanging out with my music
friends. I guess it's the same today.

Smith has been married for nine years. He spent the last six months off the road, and speaks of that time in a
way that reminds me of the song "Friday I'm in Love" with its recounting of life by days.

"In January I went over (to New York) and did (David) Bowie's 50th birthday show. That was unusual, full stop,
for me. I spent February on a walking holiday in the north of England. March, I was in the studio mixing live
stuff.

In April I did a lot of visiting, house calls, re-establishing links with family and friends. May, I was writing all
last month. We're going to do a singles album. We haven't done one since 'Standing on the Beach.' I was going
over all this archival stuff. I want to get a book finished of the last 10 years.

This month I've spent trying to write words and doing gardening. My garden is mostly weeds. I pull them out."

Smith says his dark image is an exaggeration. "Most of the time I lead a normal life. A relatively normal life.
I've not worn black as often as I've have, but everyone latches onto the other side, which is more visually
striking. I will be arriving in California in shorts. I think I've performed in shorts."

Smith played in hockey shirts on much of last year's U.S tour. (Not that he's a fan-they're just comfortable, he
says.) The San Jose Sharks provided shirts for the whole band, which they still wear.

He says he once met members of the Pittsburg Penguins in a bar and was unimpressed. "It was a surreal
experience. Ever since then, I've thought of hockey as that: big dangerous blokes who have had one beer too
many."

Once he warms up on stage, Smith takes great pride in what the Cure gives its fans. He plays for three hours or
more and varies the sets night to night, knowing that his fans often follow the band from city to city. Last tour,
the band played 170 over the course of 18 months, completely changing the set from the beginning to the end
of the run.

On the tour before that, the "Wish" tour, it had to be the same night to night, to be in sync with the sound and
light crew and their computers. Smith said it got boring quickly. This time, he made everyone work manually
each night, leaving room for spontaneity. "It was a victory over technology."

He did only two shows this tour, for Live 105 and KROQ, because the stations were loyal to the band in the
early years. "I have no good, sound, commercial reason for doing it. I only told the others in the band that we
were going last week. I thought it would be a good, strange holiday to spend a few days in America. That's why
you are in a group, really."

Smith says he was deeply moved by the thousands of fans who turned out for a 3-hour-long autograph session
at Tower Records in Campbell before his show last August. "I try to remind myself before each show of what
people have done to come and see us. A lot have traveled a long way and each of them made the effort to buy
tickets. At that signing the strength and emotion really rubbed off."