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I thought it was a real attack on the senses when we were doing it. We were virtually coming out of the studio at six in the morning, coming back here and watching all these really mental films and then going to sleep and having really demented dreams and then, as soon as we woke up at four in the afternoon, we'd go virtually straight back into the studio, so, it was a bit like a mental assault course towards the end ... I mean, God, we must have watched about 600 videos at the time! [80]
As well as Barbarella, Yellow Submarine and the eponymous Blue Sunshine, films cited as having fuelled the project included The Brood , Evil Dead , The Helicopter Spies and Inferno . [80] Retrospectively, the Melody Maker's Steve Sutherland described the Glove as "a manic psychedelic pastiche". [74]
The Glove's Blue Sunshine album and its lead single "Like an Animal" were both released in August 1983, [82] followed by the Siouxsie and the Banshees' single "Dear Prudence" (a cover of the Beatles' song) in September, all on the Banshees' own label Wonderland Records. [18] [74] Smith officially became a member of the Banshees. According to the Banshees' authorised biography, "Dear Prudence" had been recorded at Smith's insistence to document his time with the group, and it became their biggest UK hit, reaching number 3 on the Singles Chart. [83]
Shortly before the group's scheduled Royal Albert Hall concerts in September and October 1983, Siouxsie and the Banshees were also invited to participate in an episode of Channel 4's television series "Play at Home", which they agreed to in order to take advantage of having the upcoming concerts filmed. Smith had previously suggested to Severin that "the Banshees shouldn't be doing tours, they should be doing something really ambitious like The Wizard of Oz on stage", and Severin decided to adapt this idea for the "Play at Home" episode, substituting the Wizard of Oz concept with Alice in Wonderland to tie the theme with the Banshees' Wonderland recording label. The result was a 45-minute television programme featuring performances from Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Glove and the Creatures, in which all four members of the Banshees appeared in a recreation of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party dressed as Alice, while each individual member scripted their own solo character performance and monologue. Musical interludes included the Glove performing "A Blues in Drag", the Creatures playing "Weathercade" and the whole band performing "Circle". The programme (which did not air on television until the following year) concluded with live footage of Siouxsie and the Banshees playing "Voodoo Dolly" and "Helter Skelter" live at the Royal Albert Hall. [84] Meanwhile, both the Glove's second single, "Punish Me with Kisses", and the Banshees' live double album and companion video, Nocturne from the Royal Albert Hall shows, appeared in November. [74] [82] In March 1984, the next Banshees single to feature Smith on guitar and keyboards, "Swimming Horses" was released; Smith co-composed the new material with them. This was followed by "Dazzle" in May, and finally the album Hyæna in June – Smith having left the Banshees the month prior to release, citing health issues due to his overloaded schedule. [74] [85] [86]
Meanwhile, in between commitments to the Cure, the Glove and the Banshees, Smith also found time to perform on Tim Pope's Syd Barrett-inspired [87] "I Want To Be A Tree" single. [74] [88] Pope at the time was the regular director of promotional videos for the Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Marc Almond, among others, but was taken aback when his fame on American MTV as a video director began to rival that of the bands he worked for. [87] [89] He described the project as "a real piss-take of what was going on in America", prompted by people referring to "Tim Pope Videos", and said that he "felt really strongly that they were not Tim Pope videos, they were Cure videos or Siouxsie videos or whatever". [90] Over the 1983 Christmas holidays, Pope and a friend, Charles Gray, recorded what Pope described as "this really stupid song" that they had co-written years earlier as teenagers. [87] [89] [90] Pope made an accompanying video for his showreel, asking several of the artists he worked with (The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Soft Cell, Talk Talk, the Style Council, Paul Young and Freur) [89] to "come along and slag me off on the showreel". [90] He then played the artists the song, while filming their reactions to it. The Old Grey Whistle Test screened the video, which Pope says resulted in several record deals being offered. The song was re-recorded with Robert Smith playing most instruments in January 1984, [90] produced by Chris Parry, and was released on Fiction Records (with a new video) in June. [89]
With the completion of the Blue Sunshine project and his departure from Siouxsie and the Banshees, by 1984 Robert Smith had returned to recording and touring with the Cure as his full-time primary band. Between 1985 and 1996, his musical outings beyond the Cure were comparatively rare, with notable exceptions including remix work for And Also the Trees and Cranes. During 1989, Smith and producer Mark Saunders remixed 7″ and 12″ versions of the song "The Pear Tree", by And Also the Trees. The "Round Mix" of the song also appeared on the band's album Farewell to the Shade in 1989, followed by a US-only release of The Pear Tree EP the following year. [91] [92] [93] In December that year while mixing the Cure's live album Entreat , he also recorded a solo cover version of Wendy Waldman's "Pirate Ships", [note 6] originally intended for Rubáiyát: Elektra's 40th Anniversary ; a compilation album celebrating the history of the Cure's US label Elektra Records. [94] Instead, however, the full band line-up of the Cure recorded "Hello, I Love You" by the Doors for Elektra, [94] and "Pirate Ships" did not see official CD release until Disintegration's "Deluxe Edition" reissue in 2010. [95] [96] [97] [note 7]
In 1992, Smith invited Cranes to support the Cure live on the Wish Tour. [98] [99] For one of the French dates of the tour (Stade Couvert Régional, Liévin, 15 November 1992), Cranes' vocalist Alison Shaw was ill and the group had to revise their entire set, with Robert Smith replacing Alison's vocal melodies on 6-string bass, and joined by the Cure's guitarist Porl Thompson. [99] [100] [note 8] Cranes wrote most of their next album (1993's Forever ) while on the Wish Tour, [101] and the album's title was partly influenced by touring with the Cure. [100] [102] In 1993, Smith and Bryan "Chuck" New remixed the extended 12" version of Cranes' single "Jewel" from the album; Smith again contributing his trademark Fender Bass VI sound and additional guitars to the remixed track. The single gave Cranes their first Top 30 single in Britain and Norway, [99] and also became their biggest commercial breakthrough in the US. [102] [103]
From 1993, Smith's primary musical engagement was the recording of The Cure's album Wild Mood Swings , released in 1996 and followed by the Swing Tour, concluding in early 1997. He was meanwhile invited to perform at David Bowie's 50th Birthday concert at Madison Square Garden (9 January 1997), where he duetted with Bowie on "The Last Thing You Should Do" and "Quicksand". [104] Here Smith met Bowie's guitarist Reeves Gabrels and co-producer Mark Plati, leading to their collaboration on the single "Wrong Number". [105] [106] Although released under the name of the Cure, "Wrong Number" was one of several "one-off" studio projects recorded during this period by Robert Smith either performing solo, or with guest musicians from outside the full-time line-up of the Cure. Earlier versions of the song had already been recorded by the band, but Plati and Smith completely reconstructed the track, built around a sampled drum loop by Cure drummer Jason Cooper. Smith and Plati added keyboards, effects and new vocals, while Gabrels laid down "a gazillion guitar tracks". [107]
In February 1998, Robert again collaborated with Reeves Gabrels in the studio, co-writing, singing and playing on the song "Yesterday's Gone" (eventually finding its way to CD release in 2000). [108] The following month, Smith was again recording solo between RAK and Outside studios, assisted this time by co-producer Paul Corkett, whose production credits included Nick Cave, Björk, Placebo, Tori Amos and Suede. These sessions produced "More Than This" (not to be confused with the Roxy Music song) for The X-Files: The Album ,[ citation needed ] and a cover of Depeche Mode's "World in My Eyes" for the tribute album For the Masses . [104] Again, both were released under the name of the Cure, but were essentially Robert Smith solo recordings. Having made a guest appearance on an episode of South Park earlier in the year, Smith again collaborated with Trey Parker under the name COGASM, featuring Reeves Gabrels and Jason Cooper, releasing the track "A Sign from God" for the film Orgazmo . [104] Smith's contribution to "Yesterday's Gone" appeared on Gabrels' solo album Ulysses (Della Notte) released in 1999 via Internet and in 2000 on CD by E-magine Music. [109]
In 2002, as Exclaim! magazine's Cam Lindsay later observed, the Cure became "the band to namedrop as a musical influence, sparking rejuvenation for their career. Artists such as Deftones, Mogwai, Tricky and Thursday praise the band and stress their influence, while others like Hot Hot Heat and the Rapture receive constant comparisons". [104] From 2003–2004 a steady succession of guest vocal performances were released with other recording artists "feat. Robert Smith". Smith wrote the words and sang "Perfect Blue Sky (feat. Robert Smith)" for Dutch electronic music producer Junkie XL's album Radio JXL: A Broadcast from the Computer Hell Cabin , released in June 2003; [110] "All of This (feat. Robert Smith)" for Blink-182's self-titled album released in November, [111] and "Believe (feat. Robert Smith)" on veteran Bowie guitarist Earl Slick's Zig Zag album, released 9 December 2003. [112] Slick meanwhile contributed guitars to the Mark Plati mix of "A Forest" featured on the Join the Dots box-set on 27 January 2004. [113] Although issued under the moniker of the Cure, the "Mark Plati mix" was in fact an entirely new recording resulting from the studio collaborations between Slick, Plati and Smith. [114] Smith had also recorded vocals for another completely new version of "A Forest" during 2003, this time billed as a cover version by the German electronic duo "Blank & Jones (feat. Robert Smith)". [115] Released in September 2003, the single reached number 14 in the German Top100 Singles charts, [116] and three separate remixes later appeared on the 2004 album Monument ; "A Forest" being described by AllMusic's Rick Anderson as "the centerpiece of the album". [117]
January 2004 also saw the single release of Junior Jack's "Da Hype (feat. Robert Smith)", [118] which also appeared on the Belgium-based Italian house music producer's album Trust It in March. [119] During the same month, an exclusive re-recording of the Cure's "Pictures of You", remixed by Australian electronic musician/producer Paul Mac and released under the banner "Robert Smith – Pictures of You (Paulmac mix)", featured in the soundtrack to the Australian "rave culture" film One Perfect Day . [120] "Truth Is (Featuring – Robert Smith)" appeared on former Nine Inch Nails drummer and co-founder Chris Vrenna's second Tweaker album 2 a.m. Wakeup Call , released 20 April 2004. [121] In 2004, on 17 September at Old Billingsgate Market in London, [122] Smith joined Blink-182 live onstage to perform "All of This" during the MTV Icon tribute to the Cure. [123] On 21 October, Robert stood in as one of three guest presenters for John Peel on BBC Radio 1, [124] just days before Peel's death. [note 9] Near the end of the year, Robert Smith made two guest appearances live at Wembley Arena; first joining Placebo on 5 November on their song "Without You I'm Nothing" and the Cure's "Boys Don't Cry", [125] followed by Blink-182 on 6 December to perform "All of This" and again, "Boys Don't Cry". [126]
In June 2005, Smith appeared on Smashing Pumpkins/Zwan front man Billy Corgan's solo debut TheFutureEmbrace , sharing vocal duties during the refrain for Corgan's cover of the Bee Gees song "To Love Somebody". [127] In November 2006, Robert appeared on UK trance and trip hop act Faithless's album To All New Arrivals , on the track "Spiders, Crocodiles & Kryptonite", featuring prominent samples of the Cure's "Lullaby", for which Smith recorded a new performance of the original vocal. [128] Another guest vocal on Paul Hartnoll of Orbital's song "Please" was released as a single [129] and appeared on The Ideal Condition in May 2007. [130] Placebo's Steve Hewitt meanwhile announced plans to launch a solo dance/drum'n'bass-influenced album under the working title of Ancient B to feature Smith singing some tracks, and bassist Jon Thorne of Lamb. [131]
From 2010 to 2012, as well as continuing to collaborate with other artists as a guest performer, many cover versions were released by Robert Smith performing solo. Unlike his previous solo covers (such as "Pirate Ships" and "World in My Eyes"), these were officially released under the name of Robert Smith, rather than the Cure. In 2010, he contributed a cover of "Very Good Advice" from the 1951 film adaptation of Alice in Wonderland to the album Almost Alice ; a companion release to Tim Burton's adaptation of Alice in Wonderland , [132] while "Pirate Ships" from 1989 also saw release on CD for the first time. [95] Further guest vocalist/lyricist collaborations "feat. Robert Smith" during 2010 included the single "J'aurai tout essayé" (a reworking of Smith and Earl Slick's "Believe") by French Canadian rock singer, guitarist and fellow Bowie/Mark Plati/Earl Slick collaborator Anik Jean [133] [134] and the single version of Crystal Castles' "Not in Love", a cover of Platinum Blonde's "song of the same name", released on Fiction Records, 6 December 2010. [135] In June 2011, electronic dance act the Japanese Popstars from Northern Ireland released their album Controlling Your Allegiance in the UK, including the track "Take Forever (Ft. Robert Smith)", [136] [note 10] and the following month, a solo cover version of "Small Hours" by British singer-songwriter and guitarist John Martyn (1948–2009) was released on the tribute album Johnny Boy Would Love This. [137] On 25 October 2011, instrumental rock band 65daysofstatic released the track "Come to Me" featuring Robert Smith as a free download, coinciding with the release of their album We Were Exploding Anyway . [138] In 2012 Robert again recorded a solo cover version for a Tim Burton project; [ clarification needed ] this time covering Frank Sinatra's 1957 hit song "Witchcraft" for Frankenweenie Unleashed! , a 14-track collection of songs "inspired by" the filmmaker's stop-motion film, Frankenweenie , released on 25 September 2012. [139]
In 2015, Smith contributed vocals to the song "Please" from the album 8:58, a project by Paul Hartnoll. The track is in fact a reworking of the track of the same name from the Ideal Condition, which he also contributed vocals for. [140] On 15 June 2015, the Twilight Sad released a single featuring Smith covering "There's a Girl in the Corner", originally from the Twilight Sad's album Nobody Wants to Be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave . [141] In 2015, Smith also contributed vocals to "In All Worlds", a single from Eat Static's album Dead Planet.
In September 2020, Smith appeared on the Gorillaz' song "Strange Timez" from their Song Machine series and also appeared in the song's animated music video. [142]
In December 2020, Smith took part in two live stream charity events, including The Cosmic Shambles Network's "Nine Lessons and Carols for Curious People" 24-hour charity live stream, 12 December 2020. [143] [144] Smith played three songs from the Seventeen Seconds album: "In Your House", "M" and "Play for Today". [145] [146] On 22 December 2020, Smith played three songs from the Faith album, "The Holy Hour", "The Funeral Party", and "The Drowning Man", for the live stream the annual Second City 24-hour improvisation charity event for "Letters to Santa" [147] [148] [149]
In June 2021, Smith appeared on the Chvrches song "How Not To Drown" from their album Screen Violence .
In October 2023, Smith appeared on the Crosses song "Girls Float † Boys Cry" off the album Goodnight, God Bless, I Love U, Delete.
Smith has credited his older siblings Richard and Margaret with exposing him to rock music such as the Beatles and the Rolling Stones when he was six years old. [14] He has said that his early songwriting "was influenced by early Beatles – the sense of a three-minute guitar-pop song", [150] and early in his career the Cure's second single "Boys Don't Cry" was compared by British music paper Record Mirror to "John Lennon at 12 or 13". [52] His parents encouraged their children's musical development, as he told French magazine Les Inrockuptibles: "My parents were lending us their stuff; my mum made me listen to a lot of classical music to enable me to have a larger vision of music." [14] When Smith was eight years old in 1967, Richard played him "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix, who became hugely influential. [151] Of this period, he went on to say, "My brother was also crazy about Captain Beefheart, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, so much so that when I was 7 or 8, to the despair of my parents, I became some kinda little devil fed on psychedelic rock." [14]
Smith was 10 years old in 1969 when he first heard Nick Drake's album Five Leaves Left : "Nick Drake's on the other side of the coin to Jimi Hendrix. He was very quiet and withdrawn ... I think also that because he had an untimely death like Jimi Hendrix, he was never able to compromise his early work. He was never able to put a foot wrong. It's a morbid romanticism, but there is something attractive about that." [151] It was not long afterwards that Robert Smith attended his first rock concert: Jimi Hendrix at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival. [14] At the age of 13 in 1972, Smith first saw David Bowie on television, performing "Starman" on Top of the Pops . He recalled, "Every person in Britain who saw that performance, it's stuck with them. It's like Kennedy being shot for another generation. You just remember that night watching David Bowie on TV. It really was a formative, seminal experience." [151] Smith said that the first LP he ever purchased with his pocket money was The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars . [14] According to Apter, Bowie also paved the way for Smith's love of glam rock bands such as Slade, the Sweet, and T. Rex, and during the same period, he also became a fan of Roxy Music. [6] His parents maintained their supportive attitude: "My mum and dad were encouraging us to talk [about] the records we liked. I remember staggering talks about Slade and Gary Glitter." [14]
Smith said that he was 15 when he first heard Alex Harvey, and that the Sensational Alex Harvey Band was the first and only group he ever really followed. He said, "[Harvey] was probably my only real idol. I travelled around the country to see them. [...] People talk about Iggy Pop as the original punk but certainly in Britain the forerunner of the punk movement was Alex Harvey. [...] I remembered the power of that live performance and I've tried to have that in my mind since I started up my own group." [151] He soon became influenced by the emergence of the UK punk scene of 1977 and has cited the Sex Pistols, the Stranglers, Elvis Costello and the Buzzcocks as important influences on his own music from this period. He described the release of "Anarchy in the UK" by the Sex Pistols as "the last time something major happened to me and changed me [...] it was the best summer of my life. I remember listening to 'Anarchy' for the very first time at a party and thinking, 'This is it!' You knew straight away, you either loved it or hated it, and it polarised an entire nation for that summer." [151] Elsewhere, Smith said that the Stranglers were his favourite punk band and that Costello "was a cut above the whole lot of them" in terms of lyrics and song crafting. [19]
Smith was influenced by Siouxsie and the Banshees' "wall of noise" and the Buzzcocks' melodies, and aspired to combine the two. [152] He said, "The two groups that I aspired to be like were [Siouxsie and] the Banshees and the Buzzcocks. I really liked the Buzzcocks' melodies, while the great thing about the Banshees was that they had this great wall of noise, which I'd never heard before. My ambition was to marry the two." [152] Ian Birch of Melody Maker recognised the Banshees' influence on Smith's band early on, comparing the Cure's 1978 debut single "Killing An Arab" favourably to Siouxsie's "Hong Kong Garden" (released a few months earlier). [153] Speaking of his stint of playing guitar with Siouxsie and the Banshees in 1979, Smith said, "It allowed me to experiment. I inherited an approach from John [McKay] which was just to have everything full up. [...] It was phased/flanged distortion noise." [154] From that time, Siouxsie and the Banshees "were a massive influence on me". He said, "They were the group who led me towards doing Pornography. They drew something out of me." [155]
Along with the Banshees, early Cure gigs from 1978–1979 supporting other post-punk bands such as Wire and Joy Division also influenced Smith's shift in musical direction from the Cure's 1979 album Three Imaginary Boys to 1980's second album Seventeen Seconds. [150] Playing support for Wire (at Kent University in October 1978) gave Smith the idea "to follow a different course, to hold out against the punk wave [...] Wire pointed out another direction to me". [19] When asked what were his five favorite guitar tracks, Smith listed "Purple Haze" by Hendrix, "Hanging Around" by Hugh Cornwell of the Stranglers, "Head Cut" by John McGeoch of Siouxsie and the Banshees, "White Riot" by Mick Jones/Joe Strummer of the Clash and "White Light/White Heat" by Lou Reed of the Velvet Underground. [156]
In an interview in 2000, Smith said that "there is one particular kind of music, an atmospheric type of music, that I enjoy making with the Cure. I enjoy it a lot more than any other kind of sound". [157] When Smith was asked about the 'sound' of his songwriting, Smith said that he did not "think there is such a thing as a typical Cure sound. I think there are various Cure sounds from different periods and different line-ups." [157]
Smith is considered to be one of the most influential and underrated guitarists of the 20th century. [158] [159] [160] [161] In 2022, Andrew Daly of Guitar World ranked him at number four in the "22 guitar heroes who shaped the sound of '80s indie and alternative rock", saying he "set the gold standard for post-punk, goth rock, new wave, and art rock" and praising his "skillful blending of melody and a never-ending desire to genre hop." [162]
In a 1992 interview with Guitar Player , Smith shared insights from his first guitar lessons—undertaken at the age of nine years—and his guitar-playing style, such as alternative tunings as well as his habit of purposely detuning the high "E" (first) string on his guitars. Of his first lessons, Smith stated:
I started on classical guitar, actually. I had lessons from age nine with a student of John Williams, a really excellent guitarist. [...] I learned a lot, but got to the point where I was losing the sense of fun. I wish I'd stuck with it. I still read music, but it takes me too long to work through a piece. [163]
Smith also described his detuning process: "I don't know what it adds, but the guitar just doesn't sound quite right to me normally. In the studio, I often defy the tuners, particularly with keyboard overdubs. I even change the speed of the tape to detune some parts. I think a lot of players presented with the same guitar and told to tune it themselves would come up with something drastically different. And the way you play [the guitar] affects the perceived tuning. If Porl [Thompson] and I tune together and play the same thing, but he plays hard and I play soft, it will sound completely off." [163]
Speaking about Wish in 1992, Smith also offered the following input on how detuned instruments played a significant role in the album, and the challenges of capturing the sound live. "A lot of things on our record Wish that sound like heavy chorusing are actually just detuned instruments. The only drawback to that is onstage it's very confusing sometimes, especially with lots of phasing effects going on. It turns into this overwhelming pulsing sound, and you can't hear anything." [163]
While recording the Cure's debut album, Three Imaginary Boys, in 1978, Smith was using a Woolworth's Top 20 electric guitar, and he was advised by Chris Parry to use a better instrument. Smith bought a Fender Jazzmaster, having recently seen Elvis Costello playing one on Top of the Pops . [164] He then decided to have the Top 20 pickup installed in the Jazzmaster, giving it a third pickup. Smith explained this guitar customization in 1992: "The third pickup [in the Fender Jazzmaster] is from a Woolworth's Top 20 guitar, my very first electric. I took it in to record our first album, along with a little WEM combo amp. [Manager/producer] Chris Parry, who was paying for the record, said," you can't use that!" We went out and bought a Fender Jazzmaster, and I immediately had the Top 20 pickup installed in it, which really upset Chris. I played the entire Three Imaginary Boys album through a Top 20 pickup. It's a brilliant guitar, though I actually bought it because of how it looked." [163]
Smith's guitar work was first heard on the first Cure single "Killing An Arab", which was released in December 1978, where Smith performed an intricate Middle Eastern sounding descending and ascending guitar riff to accompany the song, as well as the B-side "10:15 Saturday Night", where Smith played a heavily-distorted 'tremolo bar' solo. Smith would soon expand on his guitar style further with the Cure's second album, Seventeen Seconds, notably on the single "A Forest", where Smith played an extended solo-outro on his Jazzmaster, as well as the single "Play For Today", where Smith demonstrated an intricate use of harmonics.
With every Cure album release onward, Smith would incorporate a number of different guitars and sounds into the Cure's repertoire with stylistic versatility and craftsmanship over the course of 30 years. Notably, starting with The Top, in 1984, Smith started incorporating Spanish acoustic guitars (notably on the songs "Birdmad Girl", and "The Caterpillar"), and from the mid-80s onward Smith included more acoustic guitar instrumentation on later Cure songs such as "The Blood", as well as notable singles such as "In Between Days", "Just Like Heaven", and "Friday I'm In Love". On the 1987 release Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Smith showcased a diverse style of guitar playing across the 17-track album. Notably on the opening track "The Kiss" where Smith played an extended Wah-wah pedal introductory solo that opened the LP, as well as the single "Hot Hot Hot!!!" where Smith included an intricate funk playing style that intersected with Porl Thompson's guitar lines. Another ingredient of Smith's guitar sound is the Fender VI. It proved to be a staple of the Cure's sound during the early 1980s on albums such as Faith, was used as the main instrument on the Carnage Visors instrumental soundtrack that the band recorded that same year, and was later played by Smith extensively on the 1989 release Disintegration. Smith shared the following input of his use of the Fender VI:
I added the six-string bass on the Faith album. I think [producer] Mike Hedges stole it. I'm not sure from whom, but he said they'd never miss it. He worked with a lot of big-name artists and he felt it was his duty as a socialist to relieve them of some of their worldly possessions. So he gave me that at the end of Seventeen Seconds. I actually wrote "Primary" on it and incorporated it into a few other things. [154]
Smith wrote several songs on bass. He commented during an interview for the British magazine Making Music in 1987: "A lot of the songs that we've done over the years I've written on the bass. I think I've been influenced by listening to [Steven] Severin play really, strumming bass chords. I was given the six-string bass... and as soon as I got that I thought — ah, unusual sound, and I translated that back on to guitar". [165]
Smith started incorporating more distortion and feedback sounds and textures on albums such as Wish where Smith predominantly played a Gibson Chet Atkins as well. [154]
Speaking to The Hit, Smith gave a frank assessment of his approach to guitar playing, and musicianship in general. "I'm not technically a good player but at least I don't sound like anyone else. For me the idea of being a musician has nothing to do with technical ability, but I suppose you have to have a certain amount to be able to put ideas into music. I think it's important to get past the stage of being comfortable with an instrument. You need the capacity to learn – most people tend to stay at the same level, which [I think] is boring to listen to." [166]
Smith started to backcomb his short hair in 1980-1983.[ citation needed ] He adopted his aesthetic of a pale complexion, smeared red lipstick, black eye-liner, dishevelled nest of wiry long black hair, all-black clothes, and brothel creeper shoes or trainers in 1984, after being the guitarist of Siouxsie and the Banshees for 18 months and borrowing Siouxsie's lipstick. [167] Around the same time the goth subculture took off. He denies any credit for this trend and says it is a coincidence that the styles are similar, stating that he wore makeup since he was young and stating that "it's so pitiful when 'goth' is still tagged onto the name the Cure". [168] The sombre mood of early albums, combined with Smith's on-stage persona, cemented the band's gothic image. Although considered a goth icon, [169] Smith said he never connected with the label, [168] stating that his aesthetic was a "theatrical" custom. [167]
In 1986, Smith altered his image by appearing on-stage and in press photos sporting short spiky hair and bright polo shirts, which can be seen in The Cure in Orange . His new look made the headlines. [170] He soon returned to his usual style.
An early "pop culture" reference to the Cure is found in the eleventh episode of BBC2's anarchic alternative comedy series The Young Ones , from 1984. The series featured regular cameo performances from British rock and pop groups of the period, such as Motörhead, the Damned, and Madness. As the episode's title "Sick" suggests, all four of the main characters (Vyvyan, Rick, Neil and Mike) are ill, prompting Vyvyan to send Mike to the pharmacy for medicine. Neil remarks: "I hope Mike hurries back with the cure!" to which Vyvyan replies, "No Neil, Neil, it's madness this week." [171] The band Madness then performs a musical cameo. Rock biographers Bowler and Dray note that increasing popular interest in the Cure in America during the mid-late 1980s became "a pat shorthand for TV and film writers to indicate mixed up children – the Steve Martin film Parenthood uses a bedroom poster of Robert to underline the point that 'this adolescent is confused and miserable'". [172]
In 1988, a Spin magazine interview with Smith reported that "the director of Pee-wee's Big Adventure " (i.e. Tim Burton) had asked Smith to make an appearance in a film. [173] The Cure's keyboardist Roger O'Donnell has since said that during recording of the Disintegration album (1988–89), Burton approached the group about providing the soundtrack to the 1990 film Edward Scissorhands , and even sent them the script. [174]
In a 1991 article discussing inspirations behind the look of the film's title character, Entertainment Weekly (citing Burton and costume designer Colleen Atwood) reported that "the character's retro hair and penchant for leather clearly draw on punks like the Cure's Robert Smith". [175] Burton is a self-proclaimed fan of the Cure [176] and his sartorial style has been likened to that of Smith. [177] [178] [179] In 1996, Smith confirmed to French magazine Télérama that Burton had approached the Cure about a number of collaborations, and regularly kept in touch with the group about each of his latest film projects, but that they had thus far always been too busy either touring or recording to contribute. [180] Burton asked Smith to score the soundtrack for Sleepy Hollow (1999), but Smith said that "they were postponing it so much that I got involved with [the Cure's album] Bloodflowers and let it aside". [181] In 2009 Burton presented Smith with the Shockwaves NME Godlike Genius Award, saying that when he was "chained to a desk" and "fucking depressed" during his time as a young animator for Disney, "this music was the only thing that saved me. I just want to thank you for inspiring me." [182] Shortly after the award ceremony, Burton again reiterated to BBC 6 Music his long-standing admiration for the Cure, and his desire to collaborate with them. [176] Smith said that Burton presenting the Godlike Genius award "makes it all that more special". [182] Smith has since contributed music to Burton's Almost Alice and Frankenweenie Unleashed! album projects (See → guest vocals + solo cover versions ).
Neil Gaiman, author and creator of Vertigo Comics' The Sandman (1989–1996), based the appearance of his lead character partly on that of Smith. [183] Other illustrators of the character over the course of the series' run have also drawn influence from other popular musicians; Sam Kieth, for instance, describes his rendering of the Sandman character as the "David Bowie/guy-from-the-Cure" version, and said that the Robert Smith look of the character was "really heavily championed" by Gaiman and DC Comics editor Karen Berger. [184] Mike Dringenberg, on the other hand, compared Kieth's Sandman to Ron Wood and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, and asserts "my version ... was more like Peter Murphy or Robert Smith." [185] Conversely, Kelley Jones, who illustrated the Dream Country and Season of Mists (volumes 3 & 4 in the series), said he "just hated the Cure" and thus based his own version of the character on the angular gestures and facial features of Bauhaus front-man Peter Murphy instead. [186] Gaiman said that early conceptual sketches for the character by Leigh Baulch and Dave McKean drew influence from Bowie's Aladdin Sane persona, and Bono from U2. [187] Cure posters were also "known to creep into the background of some of the sandman stories" and Smith told fans that he was flattered by Gaiman's reference, and thought The Sandman was "a brilliant series". [91]
Smith's lyrics, as well as those of Joy Division's Ian Curtis, were quoted and referenced extensively throughout James O'Barr's comic book series The Crow , which, like Gaiman's Sandman, also first appeared on shelves in 1989. One issue of The Crow dedicated an entire page to reprinting the lyrics from the Cure song "The Hanging Garden", and O'Barr said that he was listening a lot to the Cure's early albums such as Seventeen Seconds and Faith while he was writing the story. O'Barr has downplayed the influence of Robert Smith on the main character Eric Draven's physical appearance, saying that "the idea that the look has been inspired by him has really been overblown" and that the visual aspect of the character owed more to Peter Murphy and Iggy Pop. [188] Smith said that the song "Burn", the Cure's contribution to the 1994 film adaptation's soundtrack, was deliberately written and performed in the style of "The Hanging Garden". [189]
Garth Ennis's Muzak Killer stories for 2000 AD Comics from 1991 also contain visual references in the form of characters resembling Robert Smith, [190] [191] and again, Smith himself is a self-professed fan of 2000 AD. Revolutionary Comics produced a biographical comic book on the Cure in 1991 as Issue No. 30 of Rock n Roll Comics series, and the following year Personality Comics produced their own Cure biography in the form of Music Comics 4: The Cure. Ian Shirley, author of Can Rock & Roll Save the World?: An Illustrated History of Music and Comics, considers the fact "that the Cure have spawned two biographical comics ... just shows the impact that Robert Smith and his Goth chic had upon America in the 1990s". [192] In the 1980s, the Japanese music magazine 8-beat Gag published a series of caricatures of western artists by manga artist Atsuko Shima; Robert Smith had his own edition, and figured on the cover. [193] Gothic horror and fantasy writer Poppy Z. Brite, in his vampire novel Lost Souls (1992), uses a poster of Robert Smith on a bedroom wall as a sexual prop during a homoerotic encounter between two of his characters, Laine and Nothing. Colin Raff of the New York Press described "Poppy Z. Brite's enthusiastic appraisal of Robert Smith's mouth in her (sic) depiction of a fictional blowjob" as "an example of the unfortunate habit of many fiction writers (especially since the 1980s) to invoke pop stars and their lyrics with un-ironic [sic] reverence, resulting in prose about as reflective as voyeuristic journalism, bad porn and bumperstickers". [194]
In television comedy programs during the early 1990s, Smith was sometimes the subject of lampooning. MTV's Half Hour of Comedy Hour (1990–1991), featured a mock episode of This Old House in which a parody of Smith's Disintegration-era persona is seen asking building contractors to leave his house in a semi-demolished state to retain the sense of "urban decay". [195] The Mary Whitehouse Experience (1992) poked fun at Smith's attempts to use lighter pop music to "show his happier side", by presenting a series of sketches in which Smith (played by Rob Newman) performs comedic novelty songs "The Laughing Policeman", "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport", "Ernie", "Crash Bang Wallop", the theme to the children's programme Play Away , and the WWI soldiers' "Chinese crackers in your arsehole" parody version of the patriotic anthem "Rule, Britannia!". Newman portrayed Smith dolefully wailing the lyrics over a backdrop of gloomy Cure-styled mope-rock. Another of the series' regular characters, Edward Colanderhands, appears in one episode as a member of the Cure's audience. [196]
Another sketch on The Mary Whitehouse Experience revolved around "Ray: a man afflicted with a sarcastic tone of voice", also portrayed by Newman, and presented in the style of a medical case history. Ray's catchphrase was "oh no, what a personal disaster". In the series' final episode, Ray is given a copy of the Cure's Disintegration LP as a present, and is so overwhelmed that he can no longer speak in a sarcastic tone, and spontaneously begins speaking Flemish. In the closing scene, Ray has a chance meeting with the real Robert Smith in a cameo appearance, who punches Ray in the face and declares "oh no, what a personal disaster". [197] Rob Newman and David Baddiel's live comedy video, History Today (1992), also features Newman's Robert Smith character, singing the children's songs "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" and "I'm a Little Teapot". [198] Smith later made another cameo in the comedy duo's spin-off series Newman and Baddiel in Pieces (1993). In a scene where David Baddiel fantasizes about his own funeral, Smith appears graveside, saying: "I've never been this miserable. I always preferred him to the other one" before leading a conga of mourners in party-hats around the graveyard. [199]
Mike Leigh's 1997 film Career Girls depicts the reunion of two women who formerly shared both a flat and a love of the Cure as teenagers in the 1980s, featuring the band's music and imagery throughout. Smith was invited by Leigh to the premiere, which Smith described as "one of the weirdest afternoons of my life ... There's one bit in the film when they see a poster for 'The 13th', the first single from the last album, and she says to her friend, 'Are they still releasing records?' And I thought that was really unfair -'The unchanging man in the changing world.'" [200]
In 1998, Smith voiced an animated version of himself in "Mecha-Streisand", an episode of South Park , in which he battles "Mecha Barbra Streisand" in "a battle of Godzilla vs. Mothra scale" [201] that completely destroys the town of South Park. Streisand is portrayed as a "calculating, self-centered, egotistical bitch" who wants to conquer the world with an ancient artifact accidentally discovered by Eric Cartman, known as the "Diamond of Pantheos". After film critic Leonard Maltin and actor Sidney Poitier transform into kaiju creatures (based on Ultraman and Gamera, respectively) to battle Mecha-Streisand, yet ultimately fail to defeat the beast, Robert Smith enters, confident he can defeat Mecha-Streisand, with the help of the boys. To battle Mecha-Streisand, the boys help Smith transform into "Smithra", who has the ability of "robot punch", and ultimately defeats the monster by taking it by the tail and hurling it into space. He offers to "roshambo" Cartman to get his Walkie-Talkie back, and immediately kicks Cartman in the groin, causing him to drop the walkie-talkie. At the end of the episode, as Smith walks off into the sunset, Kyle Broflovski calls out, " Disintegration is the best album ever!" and Cartman adds, "Robert Smith kicks ass!" [202] To date, he is one of only a few celebrities to be portrayed in a universally positive way on the show.
At the time, the episode brought South Park its highest ratings to date, with approximately 3,208,000 viewers; about 40,000 more than tuned into ABC's Prime Time Live . Comedy Central's debut screening in February 1998 marked the first time a cable station had beaten one of the Big Three television networks during prime time viewing, [203] and "Robert Smith Kicks Ass" T-shirts were reportedly "doing a healthy trade among Cure fans" soon afterwards. [201] Smith later described the impact of the episode on his nieces and nephews to Q magazine: "Being in South Park has made a huge impact on their lives. Now that I'm a cartoon character I'm fully accepted into their world." [204] He told Belgian magazine Humo:
When my nephews had seen that, they worshipped me, but [kept] asking: What is a disintegration, uncle Bob? I simply answered it was something I had made a long time ago. Still funny how everything I do – travel, experiencing so many things, having interesting meetings, making good-selling records – means nothing to them while since my appearance in South Park I'm immortal and famous to them .... Bastards. [205]
Interviewed by Placebo's Brian Molko for Les Inrockuptibles magazine, Smith said that South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone sent him the script, but deliberately left some portions blank "to keep the surprise". He said, "They didn't want anybody to know, they wanted to shock. When I saw myself, I found it surrealistic." [206] In another interview set up by Entertainment Weekly , Smith told Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz that the "Disintegration is the best album ever!" scene was one of his "greatest moments in life" [207] and described the process:
I stayed up all night and went into this radio station and recorded my words down a phone line. I had no idea what it was all about. I had one of them on the other end of the line directing me, saying, "Please sound more like Robert Smith. Come on!" About six months later I saw it and I was completely thrown by what they had done with it. [207]
In 2004, in an episode of the BBC surreal comedy series The Mighty Boosh , "Nanageddon" (Series 2, episode 11), the character Vince Noir offers Howard Moon the opportunity to spend the evening with two goth girls, on the condition that he dresses like a goth. Vince produces a can of "Goth Juice", described as "the most powerful hairspray known to man, made from the tears of Robert Smith". In the same episode, the Moon sings "The Love Cats" over the credits. On the same night that Smith was presented with the Godlike Genius Award by Tim Burton at the Shockwaves NME Awards, The Mighty Boosh also won "Best TV Comedy". Asked by NME.com backstage after the ceremony if there were any plans for more pop-star cameos in The Mighty Boosh, series co-creator and co-star Noel Fielding replied, "We're trying to get hold of Robert Smith for the film – I want him to be my uncle. That would be great!" [208]
The look of Cheyenne (played by Sean Penn), the main character in director Paolo Sorrentino's 2011 film This Must Be the Place , is inspired by Smith's appearance. [209]
Smith met Mary Theresa Poole in drama class at St Wilfrid's when they were both around 14 years old, [12] [210] and they were married at Worth Abbey on 13 August 1988. [211] They have 25 nieces and nephews [212] but have remained voluntarily childless, [213] with Smith espousing the antinatalist view that he not only objects to having been born himself but refuses to impose life on another. [212] [214] He also "does not feel responsible enough to bring a child into the world". [212]
Smith has said that Mary did not always share his confidence and vision for the Cure's future early in his musical career, which he used as significant motivation to ensure the band was successful. [215] It has been reported by the Daily Express that she used to be a model and worked as a nurse with intellectually disabled children, but gave up her job so that the couple would not have to spend so much time apart as the Cure became more financially successful during the mid-1980s. [215] [216] [217] He told The Face in 1985 that he had once accidentally left a video camera running in their home: "After a couple of hours you forget that it's on and I was quite horrified at the amount of rubbish we say to each other. It's like listening to mental people [...] I feel more natural in the company of people who are mentally unbalanced because you're always more alert, wondering what they're going to do next." He added that Mary used to dress as a witch to scare children, that she sometimes dressed up as him, and that he could never take people home as he did not know "who [would] answer the door". [218]
While the Cure was recording Wish at Shipton Manor between 1991 and 1992, among the objects pinned to the wall was "Mary's Manor Mad Chart", listing 17 members of the Manor's staff and residents (including the Cure and their entourage) "in order of instability". Mary was ranked in second place after a kitchen worker named Louise. Smith said of this time, "We all voted and we had an award night. It was very moving." [219]
Smith has an older brother named Richard, an older sister named Margaret, and a younger sister named Janet. He has said that he is significantly younger than Richard and Margaret because his mother "wasn't supposed to have" him: "And once [my parents] got me, they didn't like the idea of having an only child, so they had my sister. Which is good, because I would have hated not having a younger sister." [10] He has described Janet as a "piano prodigy" [11] and "the family's musical genius" who was too shy to become a performer herself. [10] As well as participating in the Crawley Goat Band since around 1973, Janet played keyboards for Cult Hero in 1979, to which Margaret contributed backing vocals. [220] [221] Janet, together with Simon Gallup's then-girlfriend Carol (both dressed as schoolgirls) with real-life schoolboy band the Obtainers, sang backing vocals for Cult Hero at the Marquee Club as the opening act for the Passions in March 1980. [222]
The Cure's in-house design company Parched Art created the album cover for the Cure's The Head on the Door using a manipulated photograph of Janet taken by the band's guitarist and album cover artist Pearl Thompson. [223] [224] Janet had known Thompson since they were children, [225] and the pair began dating during his early tenure as lead guitarist for Malice and the Easy Cure. [226] During the mid-1980s, Janet gave up a professional career as a pianist to spend more time with Thompson and the Cure, [216] and the couple were married in March 1988, making Smith and Thompson brothers-in-law until the couple divorced in 2000. [227] Janet is also credited with having taught Smith's guitar technician Perry Bamonte to play piano while the band were recording Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me , prior to Bamonte joining the group as keyboardist in 1990. [228] According to Bamonte, "With the patience of a saint, she spent a month teaching me the rudiments of playing piano. Before this, I knew nothing." [229]
During a concert at Tauron Arena Kraków on 20 October 2022, the Cure dedicated their song "I Can Never Say Goodbye" to Richard, who had recently died. [230]
Smith is uncomfortable giving interviews and talking to strangers, expressing a desire to avoid both where possible. [214] He has multiple social media profiles, which he uses solely to share news about his work and prevent people from following accounts pretending to be him. [214]
In 2011, Smith described himself as a "liberal kind of guy" who is "uncomfortable with politicised musicians". [214] He told Rolling Stone in 2019, "I've always held what could be considered a socialist viewpoint on the world. I think right of centre is always wrong, and that's as political as I get in public." [231] He has openly expressed disdain for the British royal family, lamenting how musicians he respects have accepted British honours while stating that he would rather "cut off [his] own hands", [232] as well as sporting a "citizens, not subjects" slogan on his guitar during a tour in 2012 and 2013. [233]
Collaborations
Release | Year | Collaborator | Comment |
---|---|---|---|
The Affectionate Punch | 1980 | The Associates | Backing vocals on "The Affectionate Punch" and "Even Dogs in the Wild" |
"Yeh Yeh Yeh" and "Lifeblood" (split single) | The Magspies/The Obtainers | Producer | |
"Frame One" (single) | 1982 | Animation | Producer |
From Under the Hill | 1982 | And Also the Trees | Co-producer |
Torment and Toreros | 1983 | Marc and the Mambas | Smith co-wrote the song "Torment" with Marc Almond and Steve Severin |
"I Want to Be a Tree" single | 1984 | Tim Pope | |
The Pear Tree EP | 1989 | And Also the Trees | Smith and Mark Saunders co-produced the remixes; one of which also appears on some CD editions of the Farewell to the Shade album |
"Jewel" single | 1993 | The Cranes | Smith remixed and played on the single versions |
The Stranglers and Friends – Live in Concert | 1995 | The Stranglers | Guitar on "Get a Grip" and "Hanging Around". Recorded 1979 |
"A Sign From God" single | 1998 | COGASM | From the Orgazmo soundtrack |
Ulysses (Della Notte) | 2000 | Reeves Gabrels | Vocals and other instruments on the track "Yesterday's Gone" |
Radio JXL: A Broadcast from the Computer Hell Cabin | 2003 | Junkie XL | Vocals on the track "Perfect Blue Sky" |
Blink-182 | Blink-182 | Vocals on the track "All of This" | |
Zig Zag | Earl Slick | Vocals on the track "Believe" | |
Monument | 2004 | Blank & Jones | Vocals on the cover version of "A Forest", previously releases as a single in 2003. |
Trust It | Junior Jack | Vocals on the track "Da Hype", previously releases as a single in 2003. | |
2 a.m. Wakeup Call | Tweaker | Vocals on the track "Truth Is" | |
TheFutureEmbrace | 2005 | Billy Corgan | Backing vocals on the cover version of "To Love Somebody" |
To All New Arrivals | 2006 | Faithless | Vocals on the track "Spiders, Crocodiles & Kryptonite" |
The Ideal Condition | 2007 | Paul Hartnoll | Vocals on the track "Please", previously releases as a single. |
MTV Unplugged: Korn | KoRn | Vocals on the track "Make Me Bad/In Between Days" | |
We Were Exploding Anyway | 2010 | 65daysofstatic | Vocals on the track "Come To Me" |
"J'aurai tout essayé" single | Anik Jean | Vocal duet | |
"Not in Love" single | Crystal Castles | Vocals | |
Controlling Your Allegiance | 2011 | The Japanese Popstars | Vocals on the track "Take Forever" |
"It Never Was the Same" single | 2015 | The Twilight Sad | Vocals on the cover version of There's a Girl in the Corner |
Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez | 2020 | Gorillaz | Featured vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass guitar, and music box on the track "Strange Timez", previously released as a single. |
Screen Violence | 2021 | Chvrches | Vocal duet on "How Not to Drown" |
Goodnight, God Bless, I Love U, Delete. | 2023 | Crosses | Featured vocals on "Girls Float † Boys Cry" |
...Smith told one reporter, "I don't believe in God. I wish I did." In The Face (1989), Smith said, "I used to lay myself open to visions of God, but I never had any. I come from a religious family, and there have been moments when I've felt the oneness of things, but they never last, they fade away, leaving me with the belief that it's only fear that drives people to religion. And I don't think I'm ever going to wake up and know that I was wrong."
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ignored (help)[Robert Smith:] 1) Jimi Hendrix "Purple Haze" Jimi Hendrix Experience (1967): "There's a quality about it that nobody else has ever quite achieved. It sounds so effortless and everything sounds as it should be." 2) Hugh Cornwell "Hanging Around" The Stranglers (1977): "This has got a really good understated solo bit in it. I like unusual guitar playing... original sounds and interesting ideas." 3) John McGeoch "Headcut" Siouxsie And The Banshees (1981): "This is really harsh funk in a weird way – clever choppy chords." 4) Joe Strummer/Mick Jones "White Riot" The Clash (1977): "It had a complete disregard for technical merit, but sounded extremely vibrant, very exciting." 5 Lou Reed "White Light/White Heat" Velvet Underground (1967): "Hypnotic... a kind of drone that builds up and up around a repetitive motif. Noise and sound rather than defined sequences of notes.
Robert Smith is highly underrated as a guitarist and songsmith, and this 1979 hit is a classic example of his proclivity for hooky singles.
Underrated guitar hero Robert Smith
... Smith's proficiency as a guitarist—something he's long been underrated for...
... often considered to be one of the most influential yet underrated guitarists of the 20th century...