 The Cure I'm surprised by how powerful this disc still is for me. I've long since moved past my "Cure phase," which was pretty heavy in late high school/early college (drat! I am a cliché after all), and the Disintegration album in particular served as the soundtrack for one of my darker periods (double drat! Double cliché!), but nowadays you'll be more likely to find me listening to Gal Costa or Grieg. *Sigh* Times do change. But it's unlikely that Disintegration will lose its sway or its power to take me back to those wonderful late 80s/early 90s, the bulk of which I spent utterly miserable, and on which I look back "fondly." (Audience chuckles at playful irony.) The Love Song EP was the best of the four EP's released to promote the album, which I still contend could have been a great double album judging by the tracks that didn't make the album. This one features the Cure's best-ever b-side, "2 Late," one of those rare b-sides that should have made the album – in fact it's one of their best songs, a- or b-side. "Love Song," of course, is an amazing single, totally overplayed at the time but it never got old for me (I also still get a charge from "Just Like Heaven," despite having heard it a zillion and six times). The EP has the radio remix as well as a great extended mix, and as a second b-side adds "Fear of Ghosts," one of Robert Smith's most deeply interior songs, quite full of exactly the despair you associate with the group. I like pretty much everything the Cure has done, at least to a certain extent, and one thing I admire about the band is that it has successfully accommodated Robert Smith's knack for going waaayyy far out into suicidal territory and then also into crazy novelty territory a la "Lovecats" or "Close to Me." The Disintegration period had no humor at all but was very coherent in its exploration of mental and emotional dissolution, which will keep it on the must-have list for depressed white teens for years to come. Love Song is an important addendum to that album, and one I keep around for those moments when the craving for my old misery becomes irresistible. Fortunately I don't play it very often any more, but like the cyanide pill I keep in my false tooth, it's good to know it's there just in case. Now let me finish cracking this walnut open in my mouth – OUCH! Hey, why am I getting sleepy?
Review by Bojak Cristál |