Bad luck or incredibly bad timing?

You may or may not know this, but I like the Cure.  That may come as a surprise to you.  They are still incredibly good live in concert, as Sara and I found out earlier this summer, and every time we see them we assume it could be the "last" time.   

Last week I heard that they were coming to LA to tape episodes of Jay Leno, Carson Daly, and Jimmy Kimmel in December.  That got rumors going that they were going to headline KROQ's Acoustic Christmas.  This is a very real possibility because Robert Smith does not like to fly, so when the band does travel, it's usually by boat.  If they're going to come to Southern California by boat/bus/dirigiberbil/etc., chances are it's not just to film a couple US tv shows.  

Here's where the bad luck/bad timing comes in.

First the bad timing.  When I heard they were taping Leno, I thought this would be too good to be true because I have connections at NBC and could score tickets to the show, no problem.  In fact, just last year, I got hooked up with front row tix, so I figured I was in like Flynn.... until I found out the taping was on December 11th.  Why is this a problem?  Well, because 11 months of hard work is culminating on the 12th at a 9:00am meeting.  Thereby making it extremely unlikely that I would be done early enough to skip a 1/2 day to go trouncing around LA to see them play one song.  Okay, I'll live.  They're still playing Acoustic Christmas, right?

Here's the bad luck part.  Normally the AC concert is held on the first weekend of December, which would be a perfect excuse to skip my office's annual holiday party, but I digress.  Today they made the announcement on the line up and the dates.  ::Drum Roll Please::  The Cure is headlining and this year it's on the second weekend in December.  Guess what.  I've already got plans that weekend to go to Mammoth with friends for my b-day ski trip!   Now, I am totally stoked about the trip and wouldn't reconsider for anything... all I'm sayin' is today was a real bummer of a day to find all this out!  Aaaarrrgh!!!

4:13 Dream Releases on 10/24

The Cure's thirteenth studio album, 4:13 Dream, is going to be released next week! I haven't been this excited about a Cure album in a long time, mostly due to some of the disappointment I've found with the other recent albums. Their last studio album, The Cure, was almost unlistenable. I think I listened to it a total of five times and then I had to put it away. There was too much of Robert's screaming vocals and not enough of the melodic qualities we've grown to love. It was lacking the deep, rich, mysterious layers of music and swirling vocals that make the earlier albums so decadent. Craig Parker over at Chain of Flowers has already heard the album and used words like "magical", "dynamic", "manic", and "chilling" to describe it. I can't wait! I need to get it home, pop it in my stereo and listen in the dark to really get a good feel for it. Here is the track listing from Robert himself on his website:

IT WILL SOUND SOMETHING LIKE THIS...

01 UNDERNEATH THE STARS
02 THE ONLY ONE
03 THE REASONS WHY
04 FREAKSHOW
05 SIRENSONG
06 THE REAL SNOW WHITE
07 THE HUNGRY GHOST
08 SWITCH
09 THE PERFECT BOY
10 THIS. HERE AND NOW. WITH YOU
11 SLEEP WHEN I’M DEAD
12 THE SCREAM
13 IT’S OVER

In the meantime, Fuse is airing an hour-long set from the Cure's recent concert at Madison Square Garden today at 11:30am. Woo hoo! Here's "Inbetween Days" from that concert.

Music in the morning

I was just surfing around on the Sessions @ AOL site where they have live artist recordings and I came across a set performed by the Cure in 2004. This recording of 'FTEOTDGS' from the Wish album is by far one of the best live recordings I have ever heard. The guitars are absolutely amazing. If you have a few minutes, check it out. It's my favorite song, hence blog title.



One of my other favorite songs is 'One Hundred Years' from the Pornography album. This song is on the other end of the emotion spectrum from FTEOTDGS and often appears on my iPod when I'm upset or angry. Once again, the guitar mastery is amazing to watch.



They also had this little gem of an interview on the site. This is Robert talking about the new album (at the time) and also about his appearance on 'South Park'. Whenever I hear him speak, I wish that he would never stop. He's got an adorable personality.



Last, but not least, they had this video from the song 'Let's Go To Bed' posted on the site. Not sure why they have it, but it's a funny video and hard to believe that he looked so different back then, huh? The site has it incorrectly labeled as 1993... the song is from the Japanese Whispers album that was released in 1982. It's easy to see that there may have been a little, ah, illicit drug use going on around the time... ya think?