The Cure Interview

... Begun over middle-night, the interview finished two hours later. Simon Gallup and Lol Tolhurst were shown very gentile and solicitous, seeking whenever possible to illuminate their point of view. The final impression that they gave me was of integrity and real pleasure with the work that they accomplish. They surprised me with the transparency of their souls, with the accessibility and, mainly, with the respect that they had with the fanzine Gass, with Laurence besides discussing with me the function of the alternative press here and in Europe. It is a feather that many assumed pop brazilian stars could not hear those two experienced musicians in the top of the fame talking with so much honesty and divestment. I won't forget so early about this interview.

Gass: When and how did you meet each other? I knew that you, Michael Dempsey and Robert Smith had played before in a group called Malice.
Lol: That was our first name, we frequented the school together , we were on the same room. We had gotten a show in the school and not even we had a name. Then showed up that name in our mind, that was just for that show. Nobody would see us if we had maintained that name...

Gass: How did the name The Cure appear and which were the initial members of the band?
Lol: When we opted for that name, the band was already known as The Easy Cure, in a reference to a verse of a music that I had written. We thought that was a good name. In that time were me, Robert, Michael Dempsey and Porl Thompson. But Porl decided to leave, this way we decided to rebaptize the group removing The Easy... That was in 76 or 77, it was in the beginning.

Gass: The first disc, Three Imaginary Boys, would just come in 79...
Lol: Yes, I think so.

Gass: But in 17 Seconds Michael would be substituted by Matthieu Hartley. Which was the reason of his exit?
Lol: We had finished doing the first LP and already existed some ideas appearing for the second disc, which didn't seem to interest Michael a lot. I still met him sometimes, he seems to be happy... I believe that what really happened it was a collision of personalities between Robert and Michael. They didn't have very in common, his participation in Cure was simply for him to be there in the right moment and also because it was the only guy that we knew that was interested in doing something with us. Anything of resentments or animosities, but just because he didn't want more to be in that group.

Gass: Your discs of the beginning of the eighties have an gloomy atmosphere, a ghastly climate. What do you felt, what tried to express in the Faith and Pornography lyrics...
Lol: For occasion of the recording of those discs, we were not going by very good situations , for example, when we began Faith, we had decided that it would be more up, pop, equal to first LP, but a lot of things conspired against us. My mother died on that time... we began to compose the musics, everybody began cheerful but in the end they were in the same way as we were feeling, they became sad musics. But I think some of the Pornography tracks sound more furious than properly sad, they are not depressed necessaryly, but we say that are more painful. Whenever we make a disc, the music and the lyris in the end become small newspapers of our lives, we always wrote with our feelings, our emotions. We avoided to surpass that circle because I believe that, if this way we made it, we would be acting as political.

Gass: When reading the lyris of those discs, that pain sensation is patent and I am satisfied in knowing that was not something premeditated...
Lol: No, definitively! Everything happened naturally and it is that to the final of the Pornography tour we even thought of giving a pause in the band. Pornography is really a representation of that private moment, of ourselves while individuals. As the time passed, we went the conclusion that the best would be to leave it arriving as it was - the most chaotic possible. In that period, the recording executives at least appeared in the studio, it was a total madness! We rarely saw the day light, we were days integers recording, recording... With Faith it was of that way for the loss sensation to our circuit, for the death sensation. Two music composed on that time were at least included in the disc simply because they sounded optimists too much and we didn't feel like this way none! The recording sessions happened in a total insanity climate. Nor we slept, we didn't talk with anybody. It was obvious that would become of that way.

Gass: After Pornography, the group saw itself reduced to Robert and you, and Cure began to do a more accessible work, more pop, as attest "The Walk", "Lovecats "... How and why such changes happen?
Lol: We decided that Cure would not be more such a rigid group after Pornography. In our mind, did we ask ourselves - what is we like? During a lifetime we were hearing to pop things, and we ended that that was the right moment to change the image that the people did on us. That because the things were arriving to the point that you could just like Cure case you are a tormented person, or if have gloomy ideas. We wanted to see if the people would be capable to accept us as human beings. The people and many critical tried to label us and it was for that that we moved.

Gass: Did that also happen how personal entertainment?
Lol: Yes, we wanted to give a pause for ourselves. If you don't like what you do, if you do not feel good with what you do, you don't have reasons to do it. A lot of bands pass years playing without never arrive to the point of like what they are doing. Until they can think: "Yeah, we make that well", but don't have courage, or better, they don't want to change the people's point of view on them. We always tried to have fun and there is not as having a fun if you do the same thing the whole day, the whole year, and I believe that that is the same for all the people. That was other reason to the changes, we wanted to end with that Cure image.

Gass: In some way this would also be a way to recover the sanity.
Lol: Yes, because on that time we took the risk of we consider ourselves too serious. A lot of people placed us in a pedestal and if you don't season that with some humanity, you nape can make something true. Honesty is a word an amount as nebula. But it is what we always tried to be: honest to us, this way could also be sincere with the other ones. I think that is why the people like Cure, they know that we didn't underestimate them. A lot of bands seem to underestimate the people, as the fact of you do part in a group it turned you different from the other ones. Don't turn. Everything is as if you was the several people's voice that feel the same way as you. It is that, simply.

Gass: You were practically in the band since the beginning, but in 1982 you left. I remember to have read a comment in The Face in that occasion, where you described your exit as underhand...
Simon: Yes, I was dismissed of the band. It was really a underhand way. But ever since Robert, Lol and I have been analyzing what was happening... Today I recognize that I was not a person easy to live together. It was a time of a lot of sorrow and I didn't also was in my best psychic conditions... The long tours also collaborated with that, everything was very intense. I played the music of that phase really believing in them and that affected me. Today, looking back, I was a hateful person. If today I could find the person that I went in the past, I would despise me. I was a shit.
Lol: That happens when it is maturing and what matters is that we be here today, together, as good friends. Simon: Rarely somebody leaves a group to return later.

Gass: During the time that you were out of The Cure, you went attend some show of the band?
Simon: Before to join for the first time, I go see them to play every night sunday. It was the best band of the area in that we lived. Even so when I was out, it happened of me to see Cure at Hammersmith Odeon. I felt really a lot of not being at the stage. I saw that they were really good. That was the first time in that the group played in such a big place. In some way, it was good to be in the middle of the public. There was another person in my place that, in spite of good musician, didn't resemble to do the Cure gender well, he was more a Duran Duran type...

Gass: On that occasion, Robert Smith began to play also with Siouxsie And The Banshees and with Steven Severin on The Glove. Did that make you to feel the band future threatened?
Lol: That never worried me. The fact is that since the beginning we never had the success as objective. It began more to help to ourselves, to help our feelings, that more than any other thing. The music was the only expression form within our reach. We grew in a London satellite city that is very rigid, very apathetic. The youths that live there complain of everything but they never make anything to change the situation. In the beginning, we began Cure to escape fom that syndrome. This way, in the period in that Robert was with Banshees, I always knew that we would still make more things, I knew that he still wanted to have his own band, because Banshees was not exactly his group, they had an existence, a previous history. In the same way, I was devoted to the disc production to some other groups. In a lot of ways, all this was good for Cures, because in the way as the things were before, we would never have new ideas, we were very tired, in a edge without exit.
In the final of that period, we thought: "Ok, let's will resume, we will observe Cure". And to resume it was brilliant, we stayed with a smile in the lips, it was something new, refreshing and it is that that should be preserved in The Cure, otherwise doesn't compensate to play. We could still have more success than we have now, but we preferred to do the things to our way.

Gass: You mentioned to have worked as producer. During that period, 82/83, I remember the production of a group in particular, And Also The Trees. Does that work kind draw you?
Lol: Yes, sometimes.

Gass: Would you have interest in producing new groups?
Lol: It was good to have made the And Also The Trees LP, my help was more for the technical knowledge of how the things work in the studio, because I didn't want to give them a lot of suggestions to modify their original ideas. I said in some music, I played some instruments, I made several things but always worried in not altering their work a lot. Everything that I wanted to be was a catalyst, that they could say: "Ah, now I understood". I can imagine making productions in the future, but I don't have a long free time, also don't now exist many groups that I like.

Gass: What do you think about that african things that it is in vogue actually, that work of Stewart Copeland, Paul Simon...
Simon: It is all just a scene. the African music always existed, all the countries always had their ethnic music. In England, there are five years ago, it was too 'cool' to like of that thing type... The african music exists since the times of the Ireland folkloric music, of England one or even well before them.

Gass: That return to the african music would not a form of the european artists look for something more creative?
Simon: I don't really know. It can be the subject with Paul Simon, as him says. But there are people that work with ethnic music in a very interesting way, it is the case of Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush. That is not a scene, they are really interested in that sound, but Paul Simon, frankly, I find horrible.

Gass: The Top is being released now in Brazil to coincide with your tour. Having been recorded three years ago , how you analyze it now?
Lol: The Top was a lot unrelated. It was our first LP after Pornography and we didn't still have the band united as now. Everybody was already there, with Boris' exception, that entered for the group two years ago. He adapted completely, he has the same ideas, same personality and plays well - what helps - but if didn't was for the ideas and personality, he would not be playing with us. Well, everybody was already there, but in the occasion in that recorded The Top unit didn't still exist. Andy was still with us, he was a cool guy, but his personality was not exactly similar to ours, and when he left, I think he was quite alleviated. I believe that all this reveals in The Top conception, it doesn't sound very uniform. It is not a faithfull picture of the band as well as the last album, where everybody had contributed, everybody increased ideas, what ended up resulting in a more varied, more complete work. Sometimes, like at that time of The Top, it is difficult to see the light at the end of the tunnel and to notice that several forms of doing a disc exist.

Gass: It can be noticed in The Top a growing movement in the direction to the psychodelic, as it is verified even in the picture sleeve. Where does that come from?
Lol: Directly, the psychodelic doesn't represent a lot for me, and I think that is the same for Robert and Simon. We had access to that type of music through our older brothers. They lived in that time, for us the influence happened ina way subliminal. I don't believe that the rock is necessarily plagiaristic, let say that is derivative, because a lot of thing that you hear today enters in your mind and just leaves ten years later...

Gass: Groups as Siouxsie And The Banshees, Echo And The Bunnymen and others record or to present covers on their shows. Did you already think about doing covers?
Simon: We made one, it was Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady", on the first disc... but I believe that we didn't need covers. I believe that most of the time in that a group makes covers, that happens because it is not capable to compose a good own material. This perhaps sounds very arrogant, but it is what I think actually.

Gass: The Top was the first LP that Dave Allen produced for The Cure. What do you tell me about his work?
Lol: We were knowing Dave through our manager, that told us that he had the same work rhythm as us. Dave Allen worked in a very similar way to Tim Pope's form to direct the videos. As well as Pope, he is a quite irreverent person, he doesn't take the rock very seriously. If he was not now working as producer, he could usually be playing with us, because we occur good while people. In fact, that is our work approach. The people that came with us to Brazil, are already with us for a long time, not so much for their abilities, but because they occur good with us. I don't want to say that Tim Pope and Dave are not talented on what they do, but in case of us didn't occur good while people nothing would have happened.

Gass: Starting from "In Between Days", Cure began to reach a larger public, here in Brasil, Standing On The Beach already reached the mark of 200.000 copies, what is a very significant sale here. How do you react to the success?
Lol: It is difficult to live together with that success situation because in fact we are the last ones to know about those things. It is difficult to imagine that we make success here, but it was good for us to travel for here, because after the last ten years to have passed playing for different publics, in the final I know that the people here like us. When you are in London or New York you can still imagine as the things in the other parts of the world are, but to know how really they are, you have to go up to there to see with your eyes. It is difficult to measure the success for figures, but you can measure it going to the places and sells the public's reaction. And I should say that, for the concert that we did up to now, the people of here like us and that is great.

Gass: A lot of people didn't understand well the picture sleeve of Standing On The Beach. I faced it as a type of provocation...
Lol: Well, it was not very well on that way. The sir who appears in the sleeve died some weeks after that photo. The title of the disk come from a "Killing An Arab" verse, then, just to confuse the things a little more, we had the idea of placing the sir in a beach but that lookalike a typical english. Before LP to be released, the music "Killing An Arab" was already having problems in USA, the people interpreted the song sense badly. Then we thought of playing more with a little of malice - placing an old man in the sleeve, but we insisted that he was a typical english. It was a kind of joke.

Gass: How is the discs elaboration process?
Simon: He moves from disc to disc. The last one, Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me, was recorded in more or less three months. One day, after each one to have developed your ideas, we met to play all the music. Then we voted in the best ones. And to the step in that they went being played in the studio, many suffered new transformations and changes.

Gass: Who generally begin the songs? How do they appear?
Simon: That varies. Some appear starting from a drumm beat, many of the Faith songs began in that way, with the other instruments entering in the compasses of the beat. Another began with bass riffs, another in the classic way - somebody catches a guitar and removes three or four chords, but that process is always different... Sometimes, it is the lyric that suggests how the melody will be, like in "A Forest".

Gass: Will you felt already of playing bass without junk?
Simon: We used a bass without junk in the new album. It was in "Catch". Actually, it is played with two bass, one with and another without junk, that later were together mixed.

Gass: As a bassist, do you appreciate some especial musician?
Simon: Well, as a bassist I don't think the bass is a good instrument to play, unless you are in The Cure... I was never considered really a bassist because if some day I had to play for another group, I would not know what to do, I just know how to play bass in Cure. I admit that I admire other musicians, like Keith Richards, but any bassist one especially.
Lol: Jean-Jacques Burnel...
Simon: Yeah, Jean-Jacques was the first bassist to stand out in a group, because until then all the bassists were more or less like Bill Wyman - they don't move, stay stopped in a corner, playing bum bum bum, When I saw and I heard Stranglers, Jean-Jacques impressed me instantly. He is a very good musician, has presence on the stage and for me he is the best of the band. Sometimes, he is even funny, but most of the time he is really very good.

Gass: Which are the band future plans?
Lol: Well, for this year we have many plans. A film will be released, I don't know what will be the most of the people reaction, if they will liked or not, because it is a very direct work. It is just a concert, and for you to watch to it you really have to like The Cure. Are two projection hours and reminds a little Pink Floyd's Live At Pompeii, several likeness exist, not obviously on the technical point of view, once is separate for more than 15 years, but on the conception point of view.
The new disc is also being released, and it features many pop things and many things of our old style too. Perhaps it still could be comparated to a fruteir.