Album Review

I have to admit that I often write The Cure off as a band from a specific time (that I, admittedly, was not a part of), that has a very specific, lodestar-steady sound. It’s a sound that I like, mind you; I like all the atmosphere, the big, burn-up melancholy and Robert Smith’s strange voice. But I never dug very deep (ie. listened to an album of their’s all the way through) because I’d typically rather listen to The Smiths or another post-punk band that was less disorienting and less predictable. I realize that disorienting and predictable are two very disparate descriptors–but this is the best way I can explain how I hear them. For me, listening to The Cure at length is kind of like being on a tilt-a-whirl at an amusement park, or actually, more like The Octopus–this ride at my local boardwalk in Jersey that would spin like a ferris wheel, had eight arms that lifted you up and down at random, while the car you were in also spun individually. It was thrilling and exciting the first minute or two you rode it, but very soon you wanted to stop, sit down, and ride on something with a track.

I wasn’t thinking about those preconceived notions when I chose to review their new album, 4:13 Dream. Despite my feeling that they have a sound I’m simultaneously bored by and drawn to, I’m really convinced that I am a fan. I didn’t have any hopes or wishes when the opening track’s (Cure-ily titled “Underneath the Stars”) guitars glimmered into my headphones; I wasn’t on a mission to like them more or less. I just suspected I’d enjoy it. Like The Octopus of my youth (which I probably rode close to 100 times), I had amnesia for the repetition and the nausea and jumped right in, heart pounding, short-breathed, unsuspecting.

But to preface the rest of my review, it should be noted that this is the band’s first album in four years, and it’s come to us with a lot of attention and devotion from Smith himself. After a disappointing outing with 1994’s The Cure, he wanted to be sure (lyrically, at least) that it represented an emotional peak reached now that he’s near fifty. Smith labored over the songwriting process to finally end up with a gargantuan collection of thirty-three tracks and a re-imagined group eager to return to the studio. But a number of production issues, postponed release dates, and legal headaches set the debut back and back and back further. 4:13 Dream was finally set free on October 28th with thirteen tracks in total, and the suggestion that it would be the sister album to a future release featuring the band’s darker efforts in this latest recording session.

This all means that the much anticipated 4:13 Dream is the brighter, more pop-y offering from the gothic rock super-group, and there’s no disputing this characterization. Many of the songs sound as though they would be right at home amongst the singles of Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me or Head on the Door, but the trouble is that they do feel like the unwieldy afterburn of these predecessors, and are more often than not limp in hooks and distinct choruses or lyrical conceits.

What is not weak here is the sound–which on 4:13 Dream is bigger and more consistently epic than Smith has ever conjured up. The opening track, “The Only One,” “The Hungry Ghost,” “Siren Song,” and “The Real Snow White” all present themselves as familiar stars in The Cure’s galaxy of gigantic pop orchestrations, but the problem is we’ve never heard them before, and after a career of twenty-plus years, we should not feel like we have. Admittedly, “Sirensong” is lovely; “The Real Snow White” takes some care to have a intriguing chorus and a bit of lyrical complexity; and all the songs individually have a good deal of beauty, but the experience of listening to the album in its entirety did to me what The Octopus did to me when I was ten years old. It made me lose my balance and my appetite. I’m sure I’ll return to each of these songs happily, some time from now, as individual samples of the sound I’ve always been fond of, but in the future, I know I’ll be careful not to overdo it. Advice that Smith and his bandmates would be wise to take.

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