The Cure: The Head on the Door poll

RS was never the sole songwriter.

If I remember the album credits correctly, HOTD is the only Cure album where RS acts as sole songwriter. He cowrote three of the songs on The Top with Lol.

Ah, perhaps I'm getting ahead of myself then - I presume I misread backwards from the HOTD album credits...

I'd be interested to hear more from the band now about Lol's contributions. In the Deluxe Edition booklets for HOTD and KMKMKM (circa 2006 or so), RS is still definitely sticking the boot into the guy about being drunk and useless but I've always wondered how much of that is actually true. They've clearly patched things up since, going by his appearance at the Reflections shows.

This interview with Lol from Keyboard magazine in 1987 paints a markedly different picture than his usual characterisation as 'the drunk buffoon who could barely play, he seems pretty switched on and knowledgeable: http://www.musicfanclubs.org/cure/press/I15.html

For lyrics, yes. Not song ideas though. Simon was always Robert's backboard.

Which, if any, of the reissues has In Orange in the bonus material? Has it ever been issued in audio-only form?

Nope, none.

Not as a whole, anyway. Couple tracks were single b-sides, but the whole concert has never been on DVD or reissued.

I said upthread that Robert Smith has always been generous about songwriting credits. He said that for KMKMKM he accepted ideas from others for the first time (e.g. "Fight" was Williams'). It wouldn't surprise me if he gave Tolhurst credit on those mid eighties sessions as reward for Tolhurt's loyalty.

According to Roger O'Donnell, the genesis of 'Homesick' (from Disintegration) came from Lol. As to the exact nature of his contributions over the years, who knows? I mean, of course that's him drumming on the records from 1979-1982, but it does seem to be the case that he was off his face a lot from the mid '80s onwards, and the band used to bully him quite a lot as a result. I think Alfred is right that Smith was generous with songwriting credits, with the exception of Japanese Whispers and The Top (which feature songs which have Smith as the sole writer), and The Head On The Door (which has Smith as the sole writer throughout), most of the songs are credited to the entire band (whoever was officially in The Cure at the time)

It's easy to belittle a bandmate's contributions when he jumped or was pushed at the peak of acrimony.

Today is my birthday and looking at this thread sort of makes me sad as i see Bimble wished me happy birthday in this thread. RIP.

anyways some of you are so wrong, this is a classic album. the remastered version of this is incredible and made me appreciate all over again.

i voted for "Sinking" but these days my vote would be "Six Different Ways."

Six different ways is amaaazing

Yeah I didn't want to start nothing, so I backed off, but this album is a stone cold classic from beginning to end.

There's some really great, nearly shoegazey live versions of 'A Night Like This' from the Swing tour in the mid 90's.

Me on the 30th anniversary:

http://thequietus.com/articles/18610-the-cure-head-on-the-door-review

Nice write-up! I still hate "Push"!

Hahah I was almost waiting for that.

I'll eternally find your dislike of 'Push' completely mystifying, DJP, even more so than your dislike of 'Domino Dancing'/Introspective... the guitar riff of 'Push' is just all-time for me, and it's one of those Cure songs that has stayed with me from the moment I first heard it!

nice Ned, thanks for the link.

The slurred introduction on In Orange sold me on Push.

I love The Cure, I think their output up to and including Wish is pretty much unimpeachably wonderful, yet I too can't stand Push.

I can barely make out what Smith is saying in most of the song introductions on In Orange, bar the song titles!

Something about wearing a dress on the train or something?

i think he says 'this is a song about when i used to wear dresses and ride the train'

I think In Orange serves as a good introduction to the band as well as the first singles compilation does... it's a bit of a shame that it hasn't been re-released yet.

NICE gonna listen to this during work today

Yeah, I think I'm going to give The Head On The Door a listen too... I expect I'll love it just as much as the other hundreds of times I've heard it. This album never, ever gets old for me.

Played Head On The Door last night and loved it. Followed it up with Japanese Whispers. Nice combo.

otm on the summer feeling of "In Between Days"

xpost:

Yeah, I completely agree! I've always been incredibly fond of Japanese Whispers... I know it's a compilation, but when I listen to it, I tend to listen to it front-to-back and I think it stands up well as a mini-album.

Some mad genius has given 'The Cure In Orange' a once over via deinterlacing and it looks pretty decent. Not as good as a pro clean up job but you can't have everything can you?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVS9EFUMUts

nice. love the version of 10.15 saturday night on there. push too!

Very lucky to see IN ORANGE at the Cinefamily in 35mm some years back with a great audience. The beginning with them walking in unison through a fog of dry ice like the gangstas they were at the time is just hysterical. People nearly gave a standing ovation for Lol’s 2 note keyboard solo on the “A Forest” outro

When Lol was promoting his memoir, he attended another screening (at the American Cinematheque’s Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood), but I didn’t catch it

That 4K interpolation looks TERRIBLE - I have a downloaded laserdisc rip which my TV upscales beautifully. Since I can't play my VHS tape any more.