The Cure
Songs of a Lost World


4.6
superb

Review

by Rowan5215 EMERITUS
November 2nd, 2024 | 398 replies


Release Date: 11/01/2024 | Tracklist

Review Summary: This is the end of every song we sing.

At some point in the last decade or so, it occurred to me that The Cure were my favourite band of all time. It was no great, earth-shaking revelation, no epiphanic "Hot Hot Hot!!!"-style lightning strike (for which I thank my lucky stars). It was an almost casual shrugging realisation, the end result of an inertial buildup over years and years: snatches of music videos seen over my parents' shoulders as a child, absorbing "Just Like Heaven" and "Inbetween Days" by osmosis long before my circuits were developed enough to analyse music as anything other than pleasant noise. It was a steady, slow process over most of my life until I was fully subsumed, discovering "Jupiter Crash" and arguing how could an album with that song on it be that bad, falling in love with b-sides and demos and that fucking heater of a song on The Crow soundtrack – I distinctly remember one sleepless night just after I moved out of home, watching the sun come up over Sydney, Join the Dots in my headphones, all these unfamiliar-but-familiar-feeling songs perfectly soundtracking my uncertainty and, to tell the truth, absolute goddamn terror about what I would do with my life next. It's a journey many can roughly relate to, even if not everyone has had tears prick up in their eyes to "The Exploding Boy" standing out on a freezing balcony after a night of insomnia and anxiety, because The Cure have something for everyone. Whether you're whistling "Friday" over a top 40 station on your way to work or spending an evening staring at the bottom of the bottle with Disintegration on wax, the specifics don't really matter. We've all been there, man, and The Cure are the ultimate band, sometimes the only band when you're down there.

It's appropriate that it was a process of years for me to fall in love with this band, because it took The Cure almost as long to fall back in love with their own music, or at least that's the impression that I get from recent interviews and press. It's been sixteen years since they last graced our speakers, and since then we've had cancelled double albums, promises that fell through, health issues and god only knows what else; a tour beginning in 2022 saw the debut of new songs that had apparently been painstakingly pieced together in the intervening time, the majority of which are on Songs of a Lost World. Things had changed since 4:13 Dream came and went with little fanfare: longtime guitarist Porl Thompson was replaced by Bowie collaborator and wah-wah enthusiast Reeves Gabrels, and veterans of various Cure eras Roger O'Donnell and Perry Bamonte reunited with mainstay Simon Gallup, whose incredible basslines are the bedrock of every great Cure song and probably still the best part of the less great ones. The newly six-piece band sounded full of new energy and vitality going into their fourth decade as a touring act, the new songs penned by the inimitable Robert Smith swaying with gentle majesty and sadness.

Considering recent years have seen the death of Smith's father, mother and brother as well as a cancer diagnosis for keyboardist O'Donnell, one can be forgiven for expecting an album that tends towards the grimmer side, and an 8-song tracklist totalling nearly 50 minutes was a clear sign that we were back in introspective territory after the frivolous pop exercises on 4:13 Dream. Indeed this is the darkest Cure album since Disintegration, and it feels designed to recall that album's glacial pacing and introspective nature, but it's no one-note slog, nor is it an over-the-hill band repeating their greatest hits. Songs of a Lost World has the feel of an album patiently mapped out and painstakingly assembled, thanks to a thickly textured production job with an absolutely filthy low end which Gallup milks for all it's worth. We even seem to follow a classic three-act structure, easing in with the dulcet midtempo tones of "Alone" and the absolutely gorgeous "And Nothing Is Forever", a song which could have been recorded on the same day as "To Wish Impossible Things" with its ethereal keys and patiently unwinding string accompaniment. We follow the rising action to the only trace of The Cure's poppier side on "A Fragile Thing", through to the pummeling "Warsong" and the borderline industrial "Drone:Nodrone", punishing songs with traces of the alt-metal the band dabbled in on 2004's self-titled release. There's the gutwrenching "I Can Never Say Goodbye", written about the death of Smith's brother, and the hypnotic "Endsong", the latest in a long line of meditations on death and ageing to close a Cure album, Smith looping back to where we began the record "left alone with nothing at the end of every song", a dark cycle that captures the seemingly perpetual process of grief. The only small fly in this gothic ointment is "All I Ever Am", a rhythmically awkward song Smith seems to be struggling to find a good melody to sing to.

Even with its minor misstep, Songs of a Lost World is a singularly sombre picture of triumph, a band in their collective 60s still making music so vital and beautiful it can genuinely steal the words from your mouth and the heat from the room. Perhaps the most curious thing about it is how much it feels crafted as a farewell, the stately, elegaic cry of "Endsong" a towering final statement on par with the likes of Bowie's "I Can't Give Everything Away". But another album is allegedly in the works; whether it actually eventuates or goes the way of the mythical lost 4:14 Scream is anybody's guess. It's hard to imagine a more definitive final statement from The Cure than this, but at the same time Songs of a Lost World is testament to how much this once in a lifetime band has left to say. Smith may be "outside in the dark wondering how I got so old" in the album's twilight moments, but his seemingly ageless voice, the renewed chemistry of the band and the power of these songs could slip you back to the days when Disintegration was fresh on the shelves in a heartbeat. That's the true magic in this music, the closest you and I will ever get to time travel; slipping back and back through years and years, inbetween all those days, to a small child peeking over his parents' shoulders and seeing something beyond his comprehension, but so beautiful and already so familiar.



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4.2
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Comments:Add a Comment 
Rowan5215
Emeritus
November 2nd 2024


48028 Comments

Album Rating: 4.6

robert drop it can never be the same challenge

onionbubs
November 2nd 2024


22399 Comments

Album Rating: 4.0

lets fucking go killer stuff man



i like all i ever am but i cant get into drone so thats the tradeoff ig lol. otherwise can get behind all of this which feels good

zakalwe
November 2nd 2024


40417 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0 | Sound Off

You’ve turned 50 overnight row ❤️

insomniac15
Staff Reviewer
November 2nd 2024


6264 Comments


Lovely write-up! I really like the record after a couple of listens, it flows really nice. This is a good moment to go back and check them out, because I feel I never gave them the attention needed to truly get into them.

Rowan5215
Emeritus
November 2nd 2024


48028 Comments

Album Rating: 4.6

man I was born 50 it just took me awhile to realise it lol



bubs - seems like I'm in the minority on that one. a lotta people saying AIEA is a highlight for them, I just don't get it. chorus just feels like they're throwing stuff randomly together and I hate that corny echo on the last line lol. for a weakest song though it's still pretty decent, they've had worse forsure

zakalwe
November 2nd 2024


40417 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0 | Sound Off

Yeah I’m not bowled over by AIEA but it’s only because it has a hell of a lot to contend with.



More stunners on this single album than about a decades worth of material from elsewhere.

Sunnyvale
Staff Reviewer
November 2nd 2024


6222 Comments

Album Rating: 3.8

Damn, that last sentence hits the spot - great job Rowan!

RunOfTheMill
November 2nd 2024


4603 Comments


Been loving the album, must have listened to it 5-6 times yesterday

onionbubs
November 2nd 2024


22399 Comments

Album Rating: 4.0

fair rowan i def wouldnt consider it a highlight or anything

Scoot
November 2nd 2024


22856 Comments

Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off

drone is such a goddamn bop

zakalwe
November 2nd 2024


40417 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0 | Sound Off

Yeah I absolutely love drone. Straight off the back of Warsong as well is a spectacular one, two

DoofDoof
November 2nd 2024


16125 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0

Other than the opener/closer I think 'Warsong' is the most important song for the flow and the weight of the album as a whole.

greatrevealer
November 2nd 2024


11 Comments

Album Rating: 4.5

great album from start to finish and a grower

RadioNew03
November 2nd 2024


199 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0 | Sound Off

The ability to retain your unique sound and identity while simultaneously sounding modern relevant fresh is a tremendous achievement, What an incredible testament to timeless musicianship and songwriting.



This is the Album Of The Year period, probably the last 5 years actually..

DJD1ed
November 2nd 2024


181 Comments

Album Rating: 4.5

That dude's voice hasn't aged a day.

zakalwe
November 2nd 2024


40417 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0 | Sound Off

Being cynical you could say it’s technical jiggery pokery but I’m pretty sure it’s not.

StormChaser
November 2nd 2024


2594 Comments

Album Rating: 4.5

Beautiful review Row, glad this one got reviewed by a fan, it's such a special record

EoinCofa
November 2nd 2024


916 Comments

Album Rating: 5.0

It’s been on loop and will be all weekend. This will probably grow to a 5 and most likely be my AOTY.

Hawks
November 2nd 2024


94905 Comments


4.3 average over 100 ratings for a Cure album in 2024. Gotta hear asap.

gravityswitch
November 2nd 2024


2175 Comments

Album Rating: 4.5

same



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