Which Cure song are you listening to right now?

[MeltingMan]

Whispering Happy Birthday!

[Sacha8]

I've just watched the full Pornography album live from Trilogy to celebrate RS's birthday:

[word_on_a_wing]

Re Trilogy... I've been thinking for a while how amazing it is they played several albums in entireity, recorded and released them.  I think they really considered from a fan's perspective when offering this...

Songs of a Lost World (at Troxy)
Disintegration (at Sydney Opera House)
Pornography (from Trilogy)
Disintegration (from Trilogy)
Bloodflowers (from Trilogy)
4:13 Dream (album was played live in Italy (I think), and is up on YouTube)

Then we have the first 3 albums played and recorded as part of the Reflections shows, which i was lucky enough to see in Sydney but alas no release.

Anyway... I've just been reflecting on how much I appreciate them performing and recording the albums in full. There are not many (or any?) other musicians who have provided their fans with such a gift

[Sacha8]

I've just been reflecting on how much I appreciate them performing and recording the albums in full. There are not many (or any?) other musicians who have provided their fans with such a gift

Well, there are other artists who sometimes perform entire albums to their fans. I watched Marc Almond perform two of his albums from start to finish in a London theatre 8 or 10 years ago. But yes, I think The Cure are far more generous than the majority of artists in terms of performances. The length of the shows itself is impressive.

[Ulrich]

There are not many (or any?) other musicians who have provided their fans with such a gift

This has become quite common indeed, many musicians did it. (I seem to remember Robert said he witnessed David Bowie performing the whole of "Low" at a live show and thought it was a good idea.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Live_performances_of_an_entire_album

Article from 2015:
https://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/bands-playing-albums-live-in-full-is-the-trend-that-refuses-to-die-heres-why-763031

Often, they're a phenomenal experience – Spiritualized playing 'Ladies And Gentlemen...', Pixies doing 'Doolittle', the Manics' 'The Holy Bible' tour or Magnetic Fields' immense two-nighter of '69 Love Songs'. In an age when the joy of not knowing which songs your favourite band will play has been thoroughly wilted by setlist.fm, this is a different form of live enjoyment – a time-leap to idyllic times, an appreciation of the 45-minute 'journey' of the album format and the relief of knowing exactly when to pop to the bog during the shit filler bits.

Some acts – Suede, The Wedding Present, The Wonder Stuff, The Cure, acts from the days when 'indie' was an obsessive lifestyle choice rather than a sniffy term of abuse for The Pigeon Detectives – have taken the concept a stage further and recreated virtually their entire careers in order, playing shows or tours of each album in quick succession and making the hardcore fan feel like they're living their twenties again in fast-forward. Others – Patti Smith, The Jesus & Mary Chain, Weezer, Nas – have recently been using the format to cement their greatest or most overlooked albums as solid gold classics.

[Ulrich]

[Sacha8]

There are not many (or any?) other musicians who have provided their fans with such a gift

This has become quite common indeed, many musicians did it. (I seem to remember Robert said he witnessed David Bowie performing the whole of "Low" at a live show and thought it was a good idea.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Live_performances_of_an_entire_album

Yep!! Thank you for these useful pieces of information. I think artists exist in a continuum involving also what other artists do. In the best case scenario, this means they cooperate and take inspiration from each other, while in the worst case they simply copy or adjust their creative output according to what the new "hype" happens to be.

[word_on_a_wing]

Apologies, in re-reading my post the point of what I was saying was a bit unclear.   I am aware other bands have played albums in full.  I was aware of Bowie's Low album being performed (and that Robert had seen this).  Also was aware of some others and will add to the list that NIN played The Downward Spiral in 2009:

I also recently saw Max Richter performing two albums in full back to back. In addition he has performed the 8hr album Sleep in full several times (although I haven't been fortunate enough to experience this)

My point was that The Cure have done this, more times than any other band (that I'm aware of) AND recorded and released many of these shows in high quality.  ...which as a fan I really appreciate.

Yes there is a high quality recording of Bowie's Low, which is fantastic. But again, one vs the many.  Just wanted to acknowledge The Cure for treating the fans so well in this regard

[Ulrich]

Apologies, in re-reading my post the point of what I was saying was a bit unclear.   I am aware other bands have played albums in full.  I was aware of Bowie's Low album being performed (and that Robert had seen this). 

 
No need to apologise, it's all good. 
You're right, The Cure did very well for their fans by playing full albums (and releasing some of the live recordings).

Remember this is the "which Cure song are you listening to?" thread though. 

[MeltingMan]

Inspired by Putin's motorcycle storm troops. 

[MeltingMan]

Received a newsletter from the band...

Me too. You were a little quicker sharing. I hope you don't mind. 

[Sacha8]

What a great remix, thanks for sharing it! Still my favourite song of SOALW, even in this version...

[Sacha8]

I still can't believe this was chosen as a Bside...

[Sacha8]

One of the few songs I can personally salvage from WMS: Want That an artist might admit he/she wishes "more pain" is such an honest, genuine thing to say: you can't create without feeling any pain. Come to think of it, you can barely make it alive without feeling any pain. That's one of the many beautiful things about RS and his approach to lyrics...