Reviews

Record #909: The Cure – Seventeen Seconds (1980)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

Everyone has to start somewhere. For the Cure, that somewhere was Three Imaginary Boys, a charming if inauspicious collection of Buzzcocks-y songs that was more Pablo Honey than Are You Experienced, even if they did sneak the world’s weirdest Jimi Hendrix song onto it. The release was largely ignored until the later single “Boys Don’t Cry,” after which their debut was rereleased with a different track listing that included that hit.

But then two important things happened. First, the Cure toured with labelmates and goth pioneers Siouxsie and the Banshees, for whom Robert Smith even filled in on guitar after their guitarist quit midtour.

Second, they added bassist Simon Gallup to the band. While bassists are often overlooked, Gallup brought a brooding drive to the band’s rhythm section that would go on to be a major part of the group’s sound, and was a big part of why this is the first record in the group’s catalog where the Cure starts to feel like the Cure™.

Continue reading →

Record #908: Jack M. Senff – Low Spirit (2022)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

I’ll admit that I’ve had a hard time with Americana for the last several years. After Bright Eyes, Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes, and the like sent me deep into my own folksy singer-songwriter phase in college, the deluge of Stop&Holler copycats flushed my system. Especially after getting into Krautrock, post-punk, post rock, metal, and various other less middle-of-the-road scenes, it felt like the limited frameworks of traditional singer-songwriter music didn’t have much to offer my limited attention.

But every once in a while, I’ll come upon a really great songwriter that makes me remember what the appeal of stripped sonic palettes and subdued performances were in the first place. Case in point, Jack M. Senff, who spent years playing in various loud and exciting projects before settling into his most natural form.

Continue reading →

Record #907: Jack M. Senff – These Northwood Blues (2021)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

We interrupt your regularly scheduled Cure binge to clear out my extensive backlog (seriously, there’s still a MONO record waiting to be reviewed that I bought two years ago). And today, we revisit my friend Jack Senff with a look at These Northwood Blues, his second release under his given name.

His transition from emocore frontman to folk singer already seemed pretty realized with Boy Rex, but Good To Know You went so much further towards stripped, intimate songwriting that Boy Rex felt like indie rock. These Northwood Blues however takes it even further, adding earnest country western flavors into the space once occupied by bouncing lead guitar lines—and with brilliant results.

Continue reading →

Record #906: The Cure – Bloodflowers (2000)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald / 1 Comment

Let me start by explaining that my recent Cure obsession isn’t totally aimless: my podcast cohost and I decided to take an episode to do a deep dive through the legendary Goths’ discography—a daunting task for anyone, but especially for someone who had largely ignored their legacy for most of their life (namely, me).

While I’d already spent a decent amount of time with some of their most celebrated releases, I set off to familiarize myself with everything I was unfamiliar with. I’ve spent the last couple weeks binging their albums, reading Wikipedia and album reviews like I was cramming for college finals, and filling in the gaps in my Cure collection.

One thing that I learned during this time is that usually, the general consensus about each Cure album is mostly trustworthy. If an album is good, everyone says it’s good. If it’s bad, everyone says it’s bad.

But there is one blindingly glaring exception to that rule: 2000s Bloodflowers, a brilliant and understated record that is almost universally maligned. And while I’ll admit that its artwork does it no favors, this is one case where the collective music historian consciousness is very mistaken.

Continue reading →

Record #436 (Revisited): The Cure – Disintegration (1989)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald / 1 Comment

“I never quite said what I wanted to say to you,” mumbles Robert Smith in the closing moments of Disintegration, and those words might as well be about my original post about this record.

Because I’ve been listening to a lot of the Cure lately. Actually, that’s probably an understatement. In the last two weeks, I’ve listened to almost nothing else. I’ve listened to each record in their discography at least once, purchased many, and revisited the ones already in my collection multiple times.

Part of this is because my wife is on vacation with our baby and there’s no better soundtrack for an empty house, but the much larger part is that there’s maybe no other band that has had such a far-reaching influence or massive impact without ever compromising or contradicting themselves.

And while I’ve reviewed the several new Cure records in my collection over the last week, I need to come back to their perennial classic, Disintegration. I wrote a post on this record when I got it six years ago, but I’m compelled to make another, because friends, I have a lot to say about this record. 

Continue reading →

Record #905: The Cure – The Head on the Door (1985)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

If there’s one thing Robert Smith hates, it’s being pigeonholed. After releasing a gloomy trio of goth rock classics in the early part of the decade, Smith began to feel like his band was misunderstood as producers of monochromatic dourness. With a slightly shifted lineup, they released a trio of standalone pop singles that shattered the conception that they were one note.

And while that same pop perfection failed to infiltrate their following album, The Top, their 1985 record The Head on the Door was a masterpiece of hook-laden pop songs that didn’t forsake their mastery of dark atmospheres.

Continue reading →

Record #904: The Cure – Faith (1981)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald / 2 Comments

As it turns out, my mid-thirties aren’t too late for my first Cure phase. And friends, this phase is deep, and I have no recourse against the urge to fill in the gaps in my collection for one of the deepest and most rewarding discographies of all time.

Just like Rome though, the Cure wasn’t built in a day. It took a few releases for them to find their own voice. But Faith, their third record, is where the spectral, teased-hair silhouette of their legacy started to take shape, introducing gossamer atmospheres and dirgelike tempos to their increasingly dark post punk. And while it’s still massively indebted to bands like Joy Division, Television, and Siouxsie and the Banshees (who Robert Smith would briefly play guitar for later), it’s the clearest picture of The Cure to come they had yet released.

Continue reading →

Record #903: The Cure – Wish (1992)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald / 2 Comments

When I first heard Disintegration, which I bought on reputation alone, I lamented that I didn’t get into the Cure when I was a teenager. My thirties were too late to start a Cure phase—too late for the gloomy goth rockers to sink their hooks into my soul as deeply as they were meant to be (I even blamed my very 80s child mother for not exposing me to them).

Then, I had a child, and at six months old, she is certainly not too young for a Cure phase. As we’ve tried different strategies to get her to sleep, we’ve discovered that the most reliable tool is the Rockabye Baby series’ collection of Cure lullabies. And as those delightfully sweet arrangements have played on repeat in our house the last few weeks, I’ve found myself obsessing over the Cure with the same earnestness I thought I had missed out on by getting into them later.

That new obsession has gotten me to finally check out Wish, which I had assumed for years was an unabashed pop backlash to the dirge of Disintegration, based solely on the sugary hit “Friday I’m In Love.”

Boy, was I wrong.

Continue reading →

Record #902: Floorbird – Fall Apart Anywhere (2020)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

Getting into music as a kid, my journey was flanked by a chorus of older dudes chanting “they don’t make it like they used to.” I brushed it aside as grumpy old man complaining, because of course there’s still great music being made. But in the last few years, I’ve started to see more and more of my own peers joining that old refrain, assigning it to ’00s emo and pop punk instead of classic rock.

But my reaction remains the same. There’s tons of great music being released now, much of it checking off the same boxes of the music they loved as adolescents.

Take for instance Floorbird. They’re a newer act, but if you were to tell someone that they played Warped Tour in 2003, they’d likely believe you. Fall Apart Anywhere was released in 2020, but it pulls off the same sort of hooky blend of emo and pop punk as Dashboard Confessional, The Ataris, and Jimmy Eat World.

Continue reading →

Record #901: Elder – Innate Passage (2022)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

Elder has been one of my favorite active metal bands ever since I heard Reflections of a Floating World, a psychedelic sojourn through doomy riffs and Krautrock-esque instrumental passages. But ever since Lore, much of the discourse around Elder has focused on the balance between metal and prog rock, and as the band has continued, they seem to favor more and more of the latter with each release.

Innate Passage might pose the question of whether they have finally crossed the line between Metal and Not Metal, but Elder doesn’t seem very interested in debating it any further. Instead, they spend an hour offering up epic journeys through massive riffs, third-eye-opening solos, and the catchiest melodies they’ve ever released.

Continue reading →