Saturday, July 21, 2018

The Cure - What Happened Behind the Door

This past week I've been all over the map...so why not end it with a Cure bootleg?  I haven't featured Robert Smith et al on these pages, due to the wide availability of virtually every speck of their catalog.  In a nutshell, What Happened Behind the Door is comprised of demos and possibly alternate mixes of tunes that touch on several of their key '80s records.  By now, I think all of their albums up through Disintegration have been reissued and bonus-ized with generously expanded track listings, loaded predominantly with demos and songs-in-progress.  The rub?  The bulk of these prototypes were just instrumentals that hardly warranted repeat spins.  In some instances, What Happened... features alternate demo versions with vocals ("In Between Days" being a prime example) that you are unavailable on said reissues.  Some really rare tracks make an appearance here as well, specifically "Ariel" and "Cold Colours."  This handy and thoughtfully assembled compendium winds down with spare, acoustic versions of "Jut Like Heaven,"  "The Caterpillar," and "The Blood."  I've also tacked on an Easy Cure (an early incarnation of the band) take of the group's post-punk standard "A Forest."  Enjoy.

01. One Hundred Years
02. Forever
03. Ariel
04. Figure Head
05. Cold Colours
06. Siamese Twins
07. In Between Days
08. Close to Me
09. Kyoto Song
10. The Baby Screams
11. Sinking
12. To the Sky
13. Just Like Heaven (acoustic) 
14. The Caterpillar (acoustic)
15. The Blood (acoustic)
   Plus: A Forest

Hear

3 comments:

Failsafe said...

a fascinating band. got themselves into a bit of a dead end now but, you never know.

Paul said...

I've had Cold Colours floating around in my mp3 collection for a while now which is every part the equal of Primary, so nice to have some other similar materials to go with it.

What I love about this download is that it shows off the The Cure's - or really Robert Smith's - songwriting processes, how simple/straightforward they are. There's a version of "Pictures of You" I saw on TV from one of their more recent stadium tours, where the way Smith played the song you could picture (no pun intended) him in his bedroom figuring it out, before all the gloss and grandiosity got added later on. An it was loose, too, you know? Like their cover of Love Will Tear Us Apart

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kc1TZ-VSjj4

As Mark Prindle said "The Cure were never about phenomenal musicianship. You don't listen to them so you can go "Ooooh! What an innovative drummer!" or "Wow! Slide bass!!!!" You listen to them because somebody in the band (probably Rob Smith, but maybe not!) has one heck of a brain for fine chord sequence.

mineforlife said...

Thanks. The Cure is one of my favorite bands and I've been on a major Cure kick lately. Much appreciated post.