"Also, word has it that David Bowie is working on a live album that will include songs from his last two albums and maybe an older track or two. He's also in the studio working on new material with his guitarist Reeves Gabrels. Gabrels is also still working with the Cure for their next album. "

"hello, i just wanted to pass along a piece of information that i heard last night on KROQ. they said that barbara streisand was very upset with her protrayal on south park last week. that it might mean trouble for not only the creators of south park, but also robert smith. more details on this story are going to be given later on in the day, during the tami heidi show. that's all i know for now, i'll try and e-mail the rest later."

An appearance by a cartoon version of Cure frontman Robert Smith on last Thursday's episode of Comedy Central's "South Park" brought the irreverent animated series its highest rating to date.

According to Neilsen Media Research, approximately 3,208,000 U.S. households watched the "Mecha-Streisand" episode of "South Park," about 40,000 more than tuned into ABC's "Prime Time Live." This surprise ratings' victory marks the first time a cable station has beaten a Big Three broadcast network during prime time.

"Mecha-Streisand" featured a Japanese monster movie-style battle in which Smith fought pop vocalist Barbara Streisand, who tried to take over the world by using magic powers granted by an ancient amulet discovered in South Park, Colo. Film critic Leonard Maltin also appeared in the episode working with Smith to defeat Streisand's evil schemes. (Seth Hindin)

DEPECHE MODE TRIBUTE CD FOR THE MASSES TAKES SHAPE

After close to twenty years of making music for the masses, Basildon, England's Depeche Mode can lay claim to having influenced millions, and the core of the band are preparing to tour the world this year. This summer, a few dozen of those who have been touched by their music, and just happen to be musicians themselves, will be featured on a tribute album entitled For The Masses. Those confirmed to contribute are Robert Smith of The Cure ("World In My Eyes"), Smashing Pumpkins ("Never Let Me Down"), Deftones ("To Have And To Hold"), God Lives Underwater ("Fly On The Windscreen"), andDishwalla ("The Policy Of Truth"). Rumoured to have submitted a track for consideration are names like Foo Fighters, Gus Gus, Monster Magnet, Rabbit In The Moon and Apollo Four Forty. The album is due in June on 1500/A&M Records, and should go a long way to proving how influential Depeche Mode have been since their inception.

Deftones And The Cure's Smith Tackle Depeche Mode

The Deftones and the Cure's Robert Smith have recorded tracks for an upcoming Depeche Mode tribute album, titled "For The Masses."

The Deftones have already bagged a version of the moody synth-pop band's "To Have And To Hold," which originally turned up on Depeche Mode's 1987 album "Music For The Masses."

Meanwhile, Smith recently recorded a solo version of DM's "World In Your Eyes," which first appeared on the band's 1990 album "Violator."

It's rumored that the Smashing Pumpkins, Marilyn Manson, Foo Fighters, and God Lives Underwater may also be contributing to the album.

Speaking about his seemingly surprising link to Depeche Mode, Deftones frontman Chino Moreno told MTV News that DM and bands of its moody synth-pop ilk were actually a tremendous influence on him.

"The new wave influence to me, bands like the Cure and Depeche Mode, stuff that blew my mind when I was young, stuck in me and those were the people who taught me how to sing," Moreno told MTV News.

"I think all the covers we've been doing lately... we've done a Smiths cover, we've done a Duran Duran cover, a Depeche Mode cover. Luckily, it's cool because that was me growing up and everybody just went with it, you know what I'm saying, which is cool."

The Deftones' Duran Duran cover, a swirling version of the band's 1982 track "The Chauffeur," turned up on last year's aptly-titled "The Duran Duran Tribute Album," which also featured Goldfinger, Reel Big Fish and Wesley Willis among others.

Depeche Mode Tribute Album To Feature Smashing Pumpkins & The Cure

For The Masses Due This Summer

While the Smashing Pumpkins, the Cure, Dishwalla, God Lives Underwater, and Locust are the only artists 100% confirmed to appear on the long- awaited Depeche Mode tribute album, For the Masses, there's also a slew of other big-name talent who have submitted songs for the release, due tentatively in June on 1500/A&M Records.

So far, here's what we can announce: the Smashing Pumpkins, "Never Let Me Down Again"; God Lives Underwater, "Fly on the Windscreen"; Dishwalla, "Policy of Truth"; Locust, "Master and Servant"; and the Cure, "World in My Eyes." Also said to have contributed tracks are the Deftones, Failure, Monster Magnet, Hooverphonic, Meat Beat Manifesto, Gus Gus, Rabbit in the Moon, Apollo Four Forty, Self, Corrosion of Conformity, and Rammstein.

However, the final track listing has not been confirmed. The label is also hoping that Marilyn Manson will cover the very fitting "Personal Jesus." "David Gahan suggested Marilyn Manson," says Philip Blaine, co-president of 1500. "There's dialogue there, but they're recording their next record now with the Dust Brothers producing and Billy Corgan as executive producer, so we don't know yet."

Blaine says it's been taking a while to put For the Masses together because of the approval processes with the record labels of the various bands on the album, and because they're trying their hardest to put out the best tribute record they can. "Overall, we'll end up having 20-30 tracks sitting on a rack, while only 15 or so will make it on there, because of time limitation," he says. "There's a few bands that may be more obscure, but they did great covers, and there's a ton of bands that we're sure people will want to hear cover Depeche Mode."

Blaine also tells us that he's sent Depeche Mode two tapes with some of the material and the band is quite enthusiastic about it. As for God Lives Underwater's cover of "Fly on the Windscreen," the song will also be issued on the 12-inch and sampler cassettes of "From Your Mouth," which is the first single from their next album, Life in the So-Called Space Age, due March 24 on 1500/A&M. "When David [Reilly] and I first got together when we were 16, [Depeche Mode] was one thing we really had in common," says GLU's Jeff Turzo. "They got us into writing songs. Martin Gore is our favorite songwriter." The band had actually been playing Depeche Mode's "Stripped" live for years. "At first I felt like I was treading on someone's property," adds Reilly, "but it's just out of respect."

"Just wanted to let you know that the episode of South Park with Robert Smith will be airing in Canada on Friday, February 20th at midnight on the Global Television Network."

Sunday Morning: Growing Up With The Cure

What happens when you outgrow the soundtrack?

Addicted To Noise Editor-in-Chief Michael Goldberg writes : Director Michael Leigh's "Career Girls," released last year, is a film about two young women -- Annie (Lynda Steadman) and Hannah (Katrin Cartlidge) -- who shared a flat when they were punky girls going to college and who, six years later, meet up for a weekend of hangin' out, catching up and reminiscing.

I saw "Career Girls" for the first time last night. It's an insightful film that, I would imagine, could scare quite a few alternakids. Or maybe not, depending on whether one sees "growing up" as a positive thing, or a one-way trip to hell.

One thing the two career girls share is a love of the Cure. A Cure poster is up in their college years flat. When the girls first meet they talk about digging the Cure. The Cure's music plays repeatedly during the film.

Rock 'n' roll was the soundtrack, the backdrop for these girls when they juggled college and guys. Now, years later, with establishment jobs, their leather jackets replaced by the kind of professional women's wear appropriate for the office, rock 'n' roll has, mostly, been left behind.

At one point, toward the end of the film, standing on a London street corner, they notice a poster for a new Cure album. Hannah says she hasn't listened to the Cure in years; Annie responds, slightly embarrassed that she still listens to the Cure on occasion. You get the idea, though, that even for Annie, the Cure don't mean what they once meant.

Growing up with the Cure. What a funny concept! And yet its not really so funny. Some bands -- the Cure, Sonic Youth, the Rolling Stones, the Who, U2 -- have careers that span ten, fifteen, even 30 years. Attend a Stones or U2 or Who concert and you will certainly find lawyers and doctors and corporate execs who smoked their first joint while grooving to one of those band's music when they were freshmen in college.

But if rock, when you are 15 or 18 or 20, is a way of rebelling against the status quo, against ones parents, school and whatever else seems constricting in your life, then what happens when you grow up, when you join the middle class, when you realize that, no, you're not going to be the next Thurston Moore or Andy Warhol. Or Michael Leigh.

I mean, if you're 45, working at an ad agency, and put on your old Sonic Youth CD so you can listen to "Teen Age Riot," what's going on? Is that a nostalgic act done with the intention of bringing to mind the good old days? Has that song now become entertainment, and nothing more? For that ad guy, is listening to Sonic Youth's old music no different than his parents listening to old Frank Sinatra records?

I don't know the answers to those questions. Some would argue that rock 'n' roll is merely entertainment. Tell that to an 11 year old with a Spice Girls poster tacked to the wall.

In Leigh's film, discarding the trappings of youth as one grows up is natural, inevitable. Cure music, no matter how much it meant to Hannah when she was in her 20s, means nothing now.

That certainly says something about Hannah and those like her. Perhaps it says nothing about the Cure, or their music. I'd like to think so. [Sun., Feb. 15, 1998, 9 a.m. PST]

The Cure's Robert Smith Saves "South Park" From Mecha-Streisand

The little town of South Park sure gets a lot of action.

First it was the battle between longtime foes, Jesus and Satan.

Now in the tradition of Godzilla Vs. Rodan battling it out over Tokyo, the February 18 episode of "South Park" on Comedy Central, will be witness to the battle between two people who have probably never met, The Cure's Robert Smith and diva, Barbra Streisand.

As we reported last month (see Robert Smith Shares A Smile With "South Park" in the MTV News Gallery), Smith recorded his voiceover for his appearance during The Cure's Christmas Radio Tour last December.

Details of the episode are out. Smith takes on "Mecha-Streisand," the evil robotic monster who is loosely based on Rosie O'Donnell's hero, Babs. Hijinx, no doubt, ensues. Rest assured, the construction paper kids are saved by the notoriously melancholic Cure frontman.

The Cure are currently in the studio working on new material planned for an early summer release.

THE CURE'S ROBERT SMITH TAKES ON BARBRA STREISAND ON SOUTH PARK

The plot thickens on the Cure's South Park appearance we told you about last month. The episode, which airs Feb. 18 on Comedy Central, pits the band's Robert Smith up against songstress Barbra Streisand in what is described as an "apocalypic battle" to determine the future of South Park.

Titled "Mecha- Streisand," a robot version of Streisand represents the forces of evil and threatens to destroy the town and its natives, while Smith, strangely, leads the forces of good and annihilates "Mecha- Streisand" after a big battle in the style of a Japanese Sci-Fi monster B-movie.

"TV producers seem to like 'Wrong Number' a lot. Today (02/09/98) it was played for a longtime on the soap-opera 'Verbotene Liebe' (Forbidden love) during a party scene on ARD channel Yesterday (02/08/98) it was used as trailer on German channel RTL 2, when they announced the upcoming films!"

(Note: This interview was done during last year's Christmas tour)

With a new album in the works, a tour making it's way across America, and Galore, an album of singles chronicling the last ten years of their career on the shelves, The Cure's main mope Robert Smith tells Spin Online's Donna Moran about the making of their new single, what's in store for the next Cure album, and just what the advantages of being maniacal are.

"Wrong Number" is the only new song on Galore, and sounds a bit different than Cure songs of the past. How did it come together in the studio?

We came up with "Wrong Number" about two months ago in a different form. We had Adrian Show do a mix for us and it was a very different thing with backing vocals and a brass section. The words I really liked and I thought they worked but I could kind of hear a different song in there. Instead of the traditional thing where the group does the song and some one else does the remix, I thought I would do the remix. So, I contacted Mark Pratty, and it just happened in an instant. We had an idea for a song and four hours latter it was finished.

You have garnered quite a reputation for being almost counter-fashion.

I'm not even sure it's counter-fashion. I think it's more of a total disregard for what is conferred to be fashion. I honestly do laugh at people who determine what is and what isn't in because when I meet these people, they haven't got a clue. They look dreadful, they can't string two words together. I think people are in these positions by strange quirks of fate. They are all self-elected and I just don't buy into any of it.

But there's hardly ever an interview or article on the band that doesn't mention what you're wearing. You're always being lumped into some fashion statement.

I kind of take it with a pinch of salt. It's generally people who haven't got anything else to write about. Usually in an interview, [if] people start following that tack, I stop the interview because I realize that this there is nothing of interest to be said n that area. I've said it all so many times before that it's actually quite dull.

Let's not be dull, then... let's talk more about "Wrong Number." The song seems almost to have several parts. Was it written as one song, or as different pieces that melded together?

The lyrics were all written and I had sung it to a completely different song but the emphasis on "Wrong Number" was the thing that changed because on the original version, which was called "Lime Green," the "wrong Number" part wasn't really pulled out that much. It sort of mutated. There have been three remixes done as well. The problem is, I don't think it's going to be commercially available in America. It's a shame, because the CD single that is coming out throughout Europe has some really good mixes. In fact they are like five different songs called "Wrong Number." [The Cure's record company, Elektra] have this thing that they don't commercially release singles unless they are guaranteed, unless it's a proven band, which apparently we are not anymore. How fickle life is.

What did you think about before shooting the video for "Wrong Number?" You used Tim Pope, whom you haven't worked with since "Friday I'm In Love."

I hadn't sat down with [him] since we did the "Friday I'm In Love Video" in 1992, so it was another chance meeting. We just picked up from where we had left off. I just knew straight away that when we did a new single this year, I would like Tim to do the video. [The video is] pretty manic. I don't know how people are going to react to it. We've already had to make several changes to it because it contains "disturbing" imagery apparently, though I see more disturbing imagery on children's television. They must have got a bunch of strange people sitting in judgment at various music television station around the world who see things I can't even see.

Galore has been carefully positioned as a singles collection, and not a greatest-hits package. Was it easier for you to just select singles, in the same way you did for Standing on the Beach?

Not really because the whole project has been really hard for me to push through. The record companies haven't really wanted the singles collection. I didn't want a double album and I didn't want a greatest hits because it's kind of capitalizing on the group's history and possibly putting a full stop to it. So the singles [collection] is just a logical record to release. It follows on from Standing on a Beach, it's ten more years. It's chronologically sequenced and you know what it is and people who buy the record will want it or not.

The Cure's lineup has changed over the years. Does that influence your songwriting, or how the songs end up sounding when they're finished?

It does to a degree depending on me really. There have been times when I have totally ignored who's been in the group and been totally obnoxious really. The weird thing being that I've discovered in the last few months that the group, or at least the people in it presently, actually prefer me being like that. They like me to have a singularity of vision so they can just sort of follow along with me. Over the last few years I've tried to be a little more democratic and listen more and it hasn't really worked in certain respects. In retrospect I should of stuck to my guns a little bit more.

So now you're sticking to your guns?

On this record I'm following my instinct and ignoring everything and everyone else. It's a different way of working than I have been used to in the last five or six years. But it's back to the way it used to be. I know what exactly I want and I follow it out till it's done. I can imagine it's quite difficult on the one level for the other guys but like I've said they really enjoy me having this sense of purpose. They like it when I get a bit maniacal. I suppose it's easy than for us to just start fighting each other.

Any ideas for a title for the next album?

I have a working title but I'm not going to tell you what it is. It's bad luck. I only did that once and I never finished the album.

How far along are you?

I set up a studio at home, so instead of making demos for the rest of the band to hear and then going into the studio to record, I'm actually recording every time I sit down. So I'm completing songs on my own at home, which I've never done before. We've done about 40 songs as a group of which about seven are complete and I'm happy with. I'm hoping that when we get to twelve we'll be done. But we're doing two or three songs at a time.

So if you have 40 songs, how do you go about whittling them down?

The problem is that I don't know which ones to discard because the ones I'm keeping now and working on for the album are really emotional ones. But there is a whole wealth of crass dance stuff that I suspect we might release under a different name [at the] end of next year. In fact that one will probably do very well and our Cure album will fail miserably. Such is life.

"I got the following information today from Xfm. It may be of interest for your site.

Dear Andrew,

Yes, your 'rumour' sources are quite correct - Xfm will broadcast the Cure concert, which was recorded at the Shepherd's Bush Empire 16 December, on Sunday 15 February at 10pm."