The Cure
Galore
»
The Cure
Galore
Elektra, 1997
RiYL: Siouxsee And The Banshees, The Smiths' Singles, New Order’s Best of New Order |
"The record company wanted a greatest-hits album, a career compilation, but it's just the last 10 years of singles, the companion piece to Staring At The Sea, which was the first 10 years," he told Alternative Press in the fall of 1997.
Fair enough, Robert.
Two decades since the Cure's moody, melancholy rock began to soundtrack the topsy-turvy lives of teenagers and jaded souls everywhere, the band's continued existence is arguable. It seems Smith has finally begun to admit this, as the band's next album (due in 1999) is said to be a return to the "benign dictatorship of old" and to sound nothing like 1996's jangly flop Wild Mood Swings.
But what's the harm in revisiting past glories? The Cure's singles are definitely one of the band's greatest assets, and to be sure, Galore assembles chart-toppers from such essential albums as Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me, Disintegration and Wish (do we really need four songs from Wild Mood Swings?).
Depending on the listener's age and relative level of cynicism, the Cure's music alternates from positively life-saving to downright ordinary. Galore reflects this dichotomy in the form of some highly questionable singles, specifically "Never Enough," which aspires to tough-guy jamming but comes off plain wimpy and redundant. "Close To The Night" sinks down the drain with childish keyboards and out-of-place horns.
The horns return on Wild Mood Swings single "The 13th" and benefit from a better arrangement but are nevertheless wasted by Smith's goofy, game-show-host-style enunciations. "Wrong Number," the collection's one new song, reverberates from the pumped-up guitar guesting of David Bowie collaborator Reeves Gabrels and the electro feel of programmed drums and synths. But what the devil is Smith singing about?
At its best, Galore instantly returns one to the gut-wrenching splendor of pained confessionals such as the get-out-the-scrapbook-and-sob "Pictures Of You" and the totally tear-inducing "A Letter To Elise." For those inevitable times when relationships just don't make sense, the Cure is the soundtrack of choice.
And never forget the Cure's ability to exhilarate. "High" serves as the optimistic flipside to the Smiths' "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out," as Smith dotes on the object of his desires, whom he "will never let slip away."
Even if your heart ain't thumping, 1992's universal lovesick anthem "Friday I'm In Love" epitomizes those occasions when you just can't think about anything except that you-know-who you've been admiring from afar. "Saturday, wait / Sunday always comes too late / but Friday never hesitates," damn right.
The objective of a greatest-hits retrospective is to provide the listener with the best -- a collection heavy on the hits and devoid of filler. When Galore is good, it's great, when it's bad, it begs to be turned off. But such is the legacy of the Cure, and Galore accurately portrays the band's transition from reluctant superstardom to an imminent passage into the annals of rock nostalgia.
JONATHAN COHEN | Jonathan Cohen co-created Nude As The News with his Indiana University mates Troy Carpenter and Ben French. When not traversing the globe for business and pleasure, he holds down the fort as a senior editor for Billboard in New York. Stop him and he just may ask, "what for lunch?"