New album shows us the same old Cure

The album relies on old sounds and new ideas.

By Kristin Torres

Published Oct. 20, 2008

Correction appended

Let's be honest for a minute here. Most bands of the '70s and '80s that are still somehow managing to walk, let alone swagger in some cases, have lost it completely. Take AC/DC: The legendary band's latest, Black Ice, came out Monday and most of us probably haven't jumped at the chance to listen to it just yet. But it probably sucks. And it's not even AC/DC's fault, necessarily. It's sometimes a slow, but natural, devolution to irrelevance that many a seemingly immortal act has suffered. In the words of Jack Black's "High Fidelity" character, "Is it in fact unfair to criticize a formerly great artist for his latter day sins? Is it better to burn out or fade away?"

Unlike AC/DC, The Cure never has to answer that question.

While they never stopped making music, they're still models of maintaining significance years after peaking long before most of us were born (looking at you, Rolling Stones).

The Cure's newest, 4:13 Dream, could have gone wrong twice. First and fatal would have been to desperately try to recreate the '80s: rag-doll thumps, gleaming guitars and poppy melodies burdened with lovelorn lyrics.

Second, it could have tried to catch up with the times. It's 2008, after all, and with a 32-year run, it'd be easy to reach out to the kids. Their sound could have gotten more dense and bleak or, God forbid, more electronic and synthesized.

But the album commits none of these sins. Instead, it's a springy, twirling effort that recalls the sounds of 1992's Wish, the band's most commercially successful record to date ("Friday I'm in Love," anybody?). It's a fabric that weaves all of these elements in a way that respects the '80s' heyday, updates for more than 20 years later and remains, simply put, The Cure.

The six-minute "Underneath the Stars" starts off the album and sets the foundation for what's to come: a tangle of featherweight acoustics, crawling vocals and some of the heaviest guitars the band has ever had. It's a dreary introduction that's no stranger to what the band has represented all these years. It, along with melancholy "The Reasons Why" and heavy, howling closer "It's Over," split the record in two.

On the opposite end, "Sirensong" is so reminiscent of 1985's The Head on the Door that it could have been "In Between Days" part two, or at least nixed and left on the cutting room floor. A breezy pop waltz with a classic Cure trick stuffed in every nook and cranny, it employs a familiar light, shaky percussion and the band's prototypal package of buoyant piano and gloomy lyrics. "Tell me you love me and beg me to stay/tell me you love me before it's too late," frontman Robert Smith sings.

Released in May, "The Only One" was the first in a string of singles issued on the 13th of every month up until the album's debut. It garnered positive reviews, most taking note of something that happens almost as often as Smith combs his iconic birds nest: upbeat lyrics to match an upbeat sound. Deviating from tales of broken hearts and brooding spirits, Smith swoons as he sings, "It gets better every day I play with you/It's such a scream."

The album is a brilliant schizophrenic ride of high and lows, like 1996's Wild Mood Swings, without the critical panning. And for once in his career with The Cure, Smith seems to have finally found requited love (which is a good thing, considering he's married).