Music Review – Lots of Albums

I just trawled through motley earlier entries on my blog and realised that it doesn’t really contain many recollections of what happened in my life. I guess events register less purport with me – I find thoughts and the attendant emotional power they stir – a much more visceral, raw, foetal expression. I may forget what happened, but usually the emotion stays with me. And I’m usually more adept at writing about feelings that merely events, the latter which could be a tad desultory and humdrum.

But I have had a rather interesting week. What made it so unforgettable was that it was totally a week which was choking with deadlines, bucketloads of work, reading papers until my eyes were about to writhe outta their sockets, late-nighters in the office and all the other stuff besides. Ergo, events-wise, there is nothing really out of the ordinary, aside from the pressure of having to scramble helter-skelter to meet deadlines. But emotionally – well I have not felt so emotionally capricious for such a long time. I’ve always prided myself on being able to garner my emotional wherewithal and package it however way I like – compartmentalise a bit here, and shelve this feeling under there – or what a colleague quipped as, "someone on an extremely even keel."

But this week I have not been able to finesse my feelings with such dexterity and ease. I don’t know if it was because I expended so much energy on work that I didn’t have much residual reserve to keep a rein on my thoughts, and so they kinda fled in assorted directions leaving me trailing in their wake, aghast but at the same time headily liberated.

One catalyst of all this was that I have started listening to music whilst working. I figured I had to do that because music is like a hallucinogen of sorts, an energy-booster which feeds and sustains me. And because I was so wrecked out mentally, I desperately needed my daily fix to keep me alert.

K - Kula Shaker



It went pretty well the first two days. On Monday I lovingly stowed an album I had almost forgotten, Kula Shaker’s K, into my bag as I headed for work. I bought this back in the mid 1990s when I was in secondary school, and though I have bought tonnes of other albums since, this remains one of the most contemporary in my collection... and that’s more than 10 years ago! It was scary how I remembered all the Indian lyrics to Govinda and Tattva even though I could not comprehend the language one bit. I guess some things, particularly lyrics, have an uncanny propensity to linger like a ghost whose memory never quite dissipated despite the transpiring of time. The rich textures, oriental mysticism and trippy, psychedelic ambience still sound as titillating as ever. Easily one of the best 90s albums I have heard.

London Calling by The Clash



Come Tuesday, and I decided to go for the Clash’s London Calling. Joe Strummer’s substance-addled, garbled and unapologetically dishevelled vocal delivery had the effect akin to someone in a terrifying apoplexy raining fire and brimstone and it just kept me awake cos I felt like I had to duck for cover. I love the furious energy of the Clash’s songs, the wide-eyed mutiny they stage through their music and the sluice of cutting scorn flowing through their gritted teeth. It is the perfect panacea when you feel you’re one strand of hair away from insanity. Be it their explicit political commentary, flippant self-deprecating underdog facetiousness or anarchistic dissidence, be it the rock or ska or reggae or jazz infusions, this masterful album is underpinned by a fractious and irrespressible loose canon energy that is quintessentially the Clash.

For the whole day, I could not stop humming the intoxicating, soporific bassline of The Guns Of Brixton, or tapping my feet to the boisterous, rollickin’ tune of Wrong ‘Em Boyo. One of the best things about the Clash, of course, are the lyrics, which seem to assume a careening impetuosity and intelligence of their own. Examples:

London calling to the faraway towns
Now war is declared - and battle come down
London calling to the underworld
Come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls

London calling, now don't look to us
Phoney Beatlemania has bitten the dust
London calling, see we ain't got no swing
'Cept for the ring of that truncheon thing
– London Calling

How you get a rude and a-reckless?
Don't you be so crude and a feckless
You been drinking brew for breakfast
Rudie can't fail, no, no
– Rudie Can’t Fail

When they kick at your front door
How you gonna come?
With your hands on your head
Or on the trigger of your gun

When the law break in
How you gonna go?
Shot down on the pavement
Or waiting in death row

The money feels good
And your life you like it well
But surely your time will come
As in heaven, as in hell
– Guns Of Brixton

In the gleaming corridors of the fifty-first floor
The money can be made if you really want some more
Executive decision, a clinical precision
Jumping from the windows – filled with indecision

It’s the pause that refreshes in the corridors of power
When top men need a top-up long before the happy hour
Your snakeskin suit, and your alligator boot
You won’t need a launderette, you can send them to the vet!
– Koka Kola

If it’s true that a rich man leads a sad life
And that’s what they say – from day to day
Then what do all the poor do with their lives?
Have nothing to say – on judgment day?

I’ve been beat up, I’ve been thrown out
But I’m not down, I’m not down
I’ve been shown up, but I’ve grown up
And I’m not down, I’m not down
– I’m Not Down

Why do people not write like that anymore?? Sigh.

Disintegration by The Cure



On Wednesday I made a terrible, terrible mistake. I brought Disintegration to work and listened to it whilst bustling about my tasks. It was withering. Don't get me wrong, I don't think words could ever describe how much I adore this record and the lackadaisically, languidly explosive effect it had on me when I first heard it. But then again, perhaps I had overlooked the sheer emotional wherewithal of this record when I expected that I could leave it playing in the background whilst I work. From the very first few seconds into the brooding soundscapes of Plainsong I felt like I was on a tailspin, webbed in a sort of emotional descent that was so heavy-going I had to yank the plugs outta my ears and walk out of the office to breathe properly. I love the album, but I couldn’t work while listening to it cos it is too overwhelming, too un-nondescript for me to simply leave it playing in the background whilst I attend to other tasks. When I listen to Disintegration, I have to drop almost everything else which I am doing, cos the music exacts a sort of ruthless concentration from me which is thoroughly absorbing, enervating but also regenerative. So I worked sans music for the rest of Wednesday.

Before I slept that night I decided to venture another listen. I lay on my bed and braced myself. Listening to this album is very much like watching a painful flower emerge gingerly through a frigid snow-laden wasteland. It hearkens to an epic opus of brooding, lugubrious themes, but it is also compellingly languid and hauntingly ambient and elegant, and there is a devastating beauty of hope amidst it’s all which is so keen it cuts into your heart, literally. How The Cure managed to cull such poeticism amidst such sombreness I would never know.

As the music pounded, flitted and quavered through my being, I felt like I was being whittled away, as though someone had made a huge indentation at the place where my heart is and then coursed through to grind away at my back and now was eating into the mattress beneath. It was like I was slowly being scooped away like a tub of ice-cream and now the base of the tub was exposed. Robert Smith’s plaintive, shrill vocals launched a full-frontal assault inside my head, and the invigorating drum patterns, lush layered guitars and keyboards were like relentless accompaniments of emotional intensity which spirited me away to a private phantasmagoria.

I flounced outta my bed and prayed for a while, then tried to sleep then got up and prayed again. I couldn’t sleep until 3am that night.

Greatest Hits by The Cure



On Thursday, after having learnt my lesson, I bundled a jauntier album into my bag – The Cure: Greatest Hits. For starters, I really hate the album cover cos there’s something horribly Jimmy Whitish about it, and the clunky middle-aged metal bracelets and naff lounge lizard feel made it seem as though Smith was about to grab the microphone and launch into a monologue-riddled rendition of My Way whilst sputtering on his absinthe. The title itself is a gross misnomer, cos it is too heavily skewed to poppy, preppy Cure and hardly representative of the sterling gamut of work the band has produced, in particular their darker, more lachrymose songs (apart from A Forest, which they criminally axed the excellent intro thereof). And I have to say this, much as I love this band, it is next to impossible to stomach the galling track Just Say Yes. I'd almost wish someone would stuff a chainsaw into my ears and let me be rid of this dross. Robert - what happened to ya?!??

But I was not looking for sobriety or melancholia, so happy, preppy Cure suited me just fine (again, save for a few tracks nearing the end). I love both spectrums of their styles, really. And this album was great for getting me through the day in office – it made me approach my tasks with a ridiculous sense of grinning and cheeriness. Even Mint Car, which I usually dismissed as sounding like a ridiculous sanitary napkin commercial, had me in gloriously high spirits. I was reading news of the stock market choppiness wreaked by the fallout of the sub-prime sector and of financial experts spouting disquieting mantra about the future trajectory of growth, but I just felt like a can of Coke fizzing with ebullience. Fizz fizz! Spizz spizz! Bliss bliss!!!!!

Plus, I’ve been having some good meetings this week. I learnt new, intriguing stuff which was another form of mental victuals, cos discovering novel things and hearing good insights make me happy. Couple that with feeling of humility, and delirium, and flukiness, and euphoria and gratitude. But most of all I realise how much I missed the music I love. I used to listen to these albums almost every night when I was overseas, and reliving all that was just such an incredibly cathartic, exultant experience, like Care Bears and rainbow stairways and lanes of sunshine, like bracing steam puffing outta my ears, like driving headlong through a field of towering flowers robed a riot of colour in Cornwall, like it’s raining pellets of joy and I’m thoroughly drenched in feverish cheer and I’m not reaching for my brolly or raincoat.

Poem - Gold-Lipped Conversation

I was up at 3am yesterday trying to finish some work – and wrote this when I took a break nursing a cup of tea. It was completed fairly quickly, which surprised me somewhat, but then I guess my mind is always the most active in the middle of the night with some deadline breathing down my neck.

==============================================

Gold-Lipped Conversation

Men in spiffy suits
Women in bouffant 'dos
Huddle round the table
Making poor men pay their dues

It’s time to spew the worthy talk
This company needs a vision!
Shall we fleece them geriatrics?
Shall we not steal their pensions?

How 'bout them feckless spawn
The unwashed plebian yob
Shall we make them open letter bombs?
They’d be grateful for a job!

What’s the latest spleen
From the fat bankrolling clique?
Was it the galling tree-huggers
Or were the elections not rigged?

They call for climate protection!
We don’t care if hell freezes over
They lobby to forgive third world debt
In Africa we'd run 'em over!

And looking after sweatshop kids
Is a real big royal pain
Perpetually malnourished
Even on water and sugar cane!

The children have no shoes, they cried
Their little feet grazed pink
When they should really be thankful
We didn't chain them to the sink

But we truly quite like China
This pickled diamond mine
And if you're caught pilfering coffers
Just pay a deal, it should be fine

Wisecrackin' economists
Fret over trade imbalances
But it ain’t matter naught to us
That’s the Americans’ business

We'd tell you what really matters
What is never superfluous
Is the time we decide the size of our
Top executive bonus

Cutting costs here
And trimming ethics there
It really is quite simple
Once you tune in to the blare

Of cash registers ringing
Stock markets palpitating
Share prices a-rising
And your Gucci boots a-tapping

Gucci boots a-tapping
Gucci boots a-tapping
Gucci boots a-tapping… (fade)

Poem - Disintegration

This is my tribute to the masterful nonpareil album Disintegration. It describes the first time I heard the album years ago - it was late evening and darkness was encroaching, which reminded me of the phrase "gathering gloom" from the track Lullaby. I just stuffed the earphones as hard as I could into my ears, plonked myself onto the floor with arms splayed on my bed, and soaked intently in one of the most glorious experiences for over an hour. To date, it remains one of my favourite albums ever.

==============================================

Disintegration

I was never quite prepared for this
As you heave hot whispers into my tingling ears
As you holler down the silver of my spine
As you wail chimerical poetry
Down the corridors of my mind’s repository

Your words slithering down my throat
Your heavy breath against my clammy skin
So dense and warm it mangles me
But it uplifts me
It uplifts me

The lush and sumptuous languor of your voice
Plays like an incessant fiddle
Wave after wave reprise like a
Mournful heart’s lament
Filled with words that cut me from all angles

Disintegrate, incinerate
The vestiges of sunshine
As the gathering gloom you speak of
The black lace of darkness
Engulfs the floor, engulfs my feet

It’s cold now and I’m rapt
In the spell you cast with your song
An epic, ethereal mise en scène
You conquer the private fiefdoms in my head
You pare away the corporeal and the dead

And you cut my soul and you made me bleed
The blood of enervation
I’m an untidy heap
Of limbs and bones
Of pensive contemplation

"Come into my parlour," you said
To parley with my Dorian Gray
And capering and twisting
And I’m feeling alive in this
Salubrious lugubriosity

Sing for me, you little prodigy
Singing my whole life’s anthology
Singing of the kiss of treachery
Tell me how you knew the words
When you never ever knew me

75 minutes and it’s all over…

Tags: The Cure, Robert Smith, Simon Gallup, Porl Thompson, Boris Williams, Pictures Of You, Disintegration, Plainsong, Lovesong, Lullaby, Fascination Street, The Same Deep Water As You, New Wave, Gothic Rock

Feeling A Tad Misanthropic...

I just spent the last hour listening to the Cure and am stuck at Pictures of You. This is the fourth time I’m looping this track, and my hands are cupped to my ears in a rather insalubrious attempt to shove the earphones further down my auditory canals, cos the music never seems loud enough. At this rate, I’d need hearing aid by the time I reach 30.

I can’t sleep, partly cos I’m feeling pretty stoked after going for the Singfest concert and getting blown away by the Stranglers, and also cos I’m trying to finish this presentation paper which has been lingering in my list of to-dos like an incessant smoke ring. But now Pictures of You is on the stereo, and I’ve stopped cogitating about the paper. When this song plays, everything else is halted – a cinema stopped in action, a puppet suspended on its strings, immobilised – everything just evanesces out of my cognisance, because I simply HAVE TO STOP and LISTEN to this song.

Falling in love with a song is pretty much like falling in love with a person I guess. It takes a unique confluence of events to engender that emotion, and the more random and desultory the process, the more beautiful it is. I remember I was hooked on this song the first time I heard – it was a live CD version which spanned more than seven minutes and which has a languorous, almost dilatory two-minute instrumental opener. Words would not do justice to the instant effect it wreaked on me – it’s like, omigod, if there’s ever a thing called love at first sight (as hackneyed and asinine as it sounds), this is surely it.

For some reason, there is a certain vulnerability whenever I’m listening to it intently. You know some songs are just prime fodder for studying – you play these whenever you’re doing an all-nighter before exams (for me, Vivaldi and old Cantopop just about do the trick whenever I need a prolonged session of cerebral activity). Then there are the songs which invoke an emotional cruelty inflicted on self – the songs which make me confront myself, more candidly and brutally, than I otherwise would. And Pictures of You has this extraordinary effect on me. I have cried many times before listening to this song, but am almost always grateful for the insights it accords me. In any case it's a tad disconcerting that I am equating honesty to cruelty, but I think it is not without truth – to really see ourselves for who we truly are, sometimes we gotta be cruel.

And tonight, listening to it I suddenly get an overwhelming sense of frustration. I guess by now, I am resigned to the fact that some things which strike a mass appeal will never go down well with me, and that I will always be confounded by why people like certain things, or behave a certain way. One of my close friends once quipped, “The best conversations I’ve had are with myself.” That made me laugh, but it made me blanch too when I realised it’s kinda true for me. At times, I wish I could replicate myself so that I can talk to me.

Cos nobody else seems to understand. I’m not saying this in a self-pitying, chest-thumping, wailing and gnashing of teeth kinda way, but as a matter of observation. Or perhaps, nobody really understands without them first branding you judgmental/ cynical/ elitist/ misanthropic/ standoffish. Often I’ve felt like some inert element hovering at the periphery of the masses, and sometimes I look at them in complete and utter despair.

It's the same kind of despair when I see my mum plonked on the sofa watching Channel 8 dramas. I'm like, "How on earth can you spend hours and hours watching such insufferable dross?" I'm so vexed that sometimes I drape T-shirts over the telly when she's watching them dramas just to annoy her. Or when I see folks completely disinterested and yawning when the Stranglers were playing onstage whilst they gyrate in relish to the Nintendo sounds of the Pet Shop Boys. I won't even get started on contemporary hip-hop, cos I've quite run out of words to gripe about them.

There’s a quote by Robert Smith which is germane (and which I wrote about earlier), “I never think, 'Oh, grief, we're not in the top ten', because I look at the top ten and I'd seriously rather hang myself than be there if I had to be like the people that are in the top ten.” Alright, it’s a judgmental thing to say but I really do feel like that sometimes. I’m not just referring to music here.

And I’m ever trying to reconcile that with this: “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things… So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God's judgment?” (Rom 2:1-3). I’ve taken it slightly out of context here, but it does bother me. Perhaps at the root of all my bouts of misanthropy and frustration is really a sense of guilt. Yet whenever I try to be sugar and spice and everything nice about things, I feel like retching and wheezing and barfing into a paper bag. It’s like I just betrayed myself, being artificially and superficially diplomatic.

I do think it is not wrong to dislike things, cos we can’t be liking everything can we? (such as Liverpool and waiting in bank queues and washing the dishes and Channel 8 dramas and shite music and people with bad taste and that vegetable from hell, celery). But to dislike something without being negatively judgmental... I guess as I navigate the knolls and dells of my emotional and psychological make-up, entombed somewhere there is a girl with a sluice of caustic, trenchant predispositions who is trying to be a bona fide Christian.

Just now when I was listening to Pictures of You, I asked in earnest supplication, “God, even when nobody else understands, You would understand, wouldn’t You?”

The Cure Live At The Indoor Stadium, 1 Aug 2007

Alright, the big day. I was totally psyched, and felt strangely alive. Took half a day off work to avoid the evening traffic, so had a dilatory lunch and then zipped off to the Indoor Stadium.

Was past four when I reached. There was a queue, but a short one thankfully. Plonked myself on the floor, leaned against the wall and then bolted forward cos the thought that there might be lizards on that dratted wall suddenly gripped me like an epileptic seizure. Scanned the surroundings. Coast was clear. Leaned back.

One hour passed. The most exciting event that transpired was these few guys who set up a stall near us selling burgers and beer. Yaaawwwn. It’s gonna be a long, soporific afternoon.

Another hour. The fans started arriving in droves. Some had smeared back lipstick and eyeliner, but the coolest was this bloke who styled his hair like Robert Smith’s trademark dynamite-induced barnet. Started to message my friend to arrive quickly.

7.05pm. Gates opened, and my friend wasn’t here yet. Headed in anyway. The free standing area was pretty small. I managed to squeeze into the front row. Man, this was the first time I had touched the front barricade of any concert I’ve been to. Great. I’ll be staring straight at Robert Smith’s boots.

7.30pm. My friend finally arrived. Wormed my way outta the crowd to go outside and hand her the ticket. Before I left, I told this girl in black lipstick behind me that she could take my space at the front. She looked so grateful like she could offer me her firstborn. Goodbye, front row space.

My friend was sick but still managed to come, bless her. We headed back in and got a space facing the middle of the stage in the sixth or seventh row. Not bad at all. It’s a wider view and I wouldn’t have to wear a neck brace after the concert.

8pm. Still no band. Come out, ooi.

Lights dimmed. Cheers and wolf whistles. The band members started going onstage. Last of all was Robert Smith. Yes, it’s really him – black eyeliner, lipstick and all. OMIGOD I CANNOT BELIEVE I AM WATCHING ROBERT SMITH LIVE. I have a major crush on him, and even though he is now pudgier and messier than ever and he's old enough to be my dad, he is still uber charming.





He sounded pretty much like he does in the CDs, perhaps a tad deeper and richer than the Cure’s early albums. Am lovin’ the make-up and skirt. He could slather his face with gravel and comb his hair with an eggbeater, and still look fab.

Fascination Street!!!!! I freakin' love this song, it's insane. Simon is totally rocking the roof with the inimitable bassline. And he is like, really handsome for his age. Love the bouffant croissant do and the smooth, almost slinking way in which he moves onstage.

The Blood. I adore this song too, though the intro sounds inordinately similar to one of Justin Timberlake's songs. It should be the other way round, actually, since this track came out back in the mid 80s But whatever... oh, since we're on The Head On The Door, please play Push. That would totally drive me insane, i.e. absolutely glorious. And please play Kyoto Song and Screw.

Crowd went wild during Lovesong. You could really tell which numbers were the crowd-pleasers. I don't really fancy this song to be honest, despite it being a Cure classic. A bit torpid and colourless, but then I reminded myself that this is a live performance and to quit critiquing and enjoy every micro-second of it. Which I did.

Push. Omigoodness it's all coming true for me!! Am so floored by the wailing.

And then Cooper struck the tubular bells looking thing, and the familiar chords of Pictures Of You wafted into consciousness. I couldn’t quite describe that incredible, electric vibe you get when you finally hear a song which you have loved for such a long time, being played by the actual band itself, live. Back in my university days I’d listen to Pictures Of You almost every night, and it’s my muse for tonnes of things – doing school assignments, writing in the middle of the night, being stoned, cleaning the kitchen stove – it’s on the deck practically most times. Granted, they screwed up the introduction to the song (dunno whether it was cos of the band or the equipment being kaput) and I was REALLY disappointed I didn’t get to hear the lush, languorous and indulgently long intro, but to even see this song being performed live is just mind-blowing; I felt like my head was caving in.

Lullaby was up next. The spiderman is having you for dinner tonight. I was ecstatic. I'd almost wish they would haul a bed up the stage so that Robert could play lying down in his jammies. By the way, that video has Robert Smith in PERFECT make-up. It cannot get anymore beautiful and exquisite.

Kyoto Song. This is unbelievable. It's like turning up at a party and finding out that everything is all coming up roses. Thank you thank you thank you.





The crowd seemed to be enervated, for a spell they were pretty sedate. I looked back to get a good look of the audience and was kinda disappointed that it ain’t a lot of people. They had cordoned off certain sections of the stadium. It was an eclectic mix of teenagers, twenty-somethings, middle-aged folks and foreigners.

Guess the Cure would always be a niche sound, but at the same time I really wish more people are into them than the hordes of other eardrum-pureeing acts dominating the charts these days. Well, to quote Smith, “"I never think, 'Oh, grief, we're not in the top ten', because I look at the top ten and I'd seriously rather hang myself than be there if I had to be like the people that are in the top ten.” Hmmmm.

In any case, at least this was a much safer experience then when I watched the Red Hot Chili Peppers in London’s Wembley Arena. That free standing area was about three times bigger than this one, and when the mammoth crowd surged forward like a freight train I felt like my guts were about to spill out of me. One guy who was crowd-surfing nicely yanked his foot into my right eye. Plus, they were tossing cups of beer over everyone’s heads. It ain’t funny when everyone around you was towering at six feet. Thing is, you could not control how you were standing or your balance, you just had to cling on to the person in front of you for dear life and pray you don’t get trampled upon. I think after that experience I finally understood what it feels like to be a piece of seaweed being tossed around by the waves.

But, back to the Cure. The audience came alive again during Just Like Heaven and Friday I’m In Love. More bobbing, jumping and flailing of arms.

More tracks from Disintegration pretty please. And A Forest.

Band plays One Hundred Years, which is one of my favourite Cure tracks ever. The stormin' drums are completely divine and I'm beside myself. If you thought the drums on the remastered version of Pornography were out of this world, they sound even better live. For a track which was released back in 1982 (when yours truly was barely a year old), it still sounds amazing and progressive almost two and half decades since. It was great, but the crowd wasn’t too responsive. Goodness, what a chance to see the Cure live playing one of their paradigmatic tracks and you’re just gonna, stand there and stare??!?

Robert Smith was kinda smiley tonight. It was a pensive, gentle, fatherly smile. Charming. And can I say how sterling his wailing vocals were? He even attempted a I’m-A-Drunk-Fairy-Attempting-The-Salsa groove during some songs. I felt a bit sad, somewhat, that at 48, perhaps he's a bit too old to be doing those Robert-Smith-esque slightly gauche but utterly charming moves which were his trademark. It also feels a tad surreal given that most videos I've watched of them were in the 1980s, when he still had his poppish looks, and that it is difficult to reconcile with the fact that they are in fact, middle age now. That's what happens when you're too young and miss the heady period when they were in their prime back in the 80s, and so you're left to sort of live out the experience vicariously and retrospectively, through other people, through videos and CDs. But then again, I'm just grateful they are still touring. Imagine my generation of Cure fans – and I see many of them tonight - folks who aren't even born back when EasyCure was formed – imagine us missing the experience of watching them live. It would be a bit cruel, don't you think. Perhaps I should be heartened, and glad, that great music transcends the ephermerality of time.





I kinda like, secretly wish they would play Killing An Arab. I know the title is politically incendiary, but I really adore that song. Not much chance of them playing it here though.

And then the band trooped offstage. It’s barely 10.30pm. Come back, ooi!

Wolf whistles and shouts of encore ensued. A few minutes later, and still no band. Come back, please.

Alright they were finally back up, to much whistles and screams. Looked like the crowd was finally outta their siesta. Great. After a couple of songs, they play Close To You. I was completely stoked, even though they didn’t do the ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-rah bit. I love the claustrophobic stuck-in-a-closet-and-drowning video.

They play Three Imaginary Boys next. And Fire In Cairo. I love that song (pardon me for repeating this so many times but I am so completely adoring so many of their tracks). Every time I hear Fire In Cairo it puts me in a nice, shifty, dancing mood. Swollen lips and silken hips. 10:15 Saturday Night and Grinding Halt followed. This is superb stuff. This is vintage Cure.

And finally, as if to wrap up the evening by sticking two fingers at the politically squeamish, the familiar oriental-laced intro of Killing An Arab rolled off like a slab of smooth butter. I strained my ears to catch whether Smith was really mouthing “killing an Arab” or some other variant, but couldn’t quite make it out. Never mind. I was just so darn happy they played this song.

I love this photo - it's sooo him.



And so it was over. I didn’t quite know what to feel, as if the crescendo of anticipation and buzz which had been frothing and bubbling in me these past few weeks had finally reached its apex, combusted in burnished, resplendent arcs and a cacophony of glorious soundscapes, and then folded into restful slumber. That’s it.

I'd hate to gripe after such a fantabulous night, but I feel compelled to write this. Three hours is a paucity when you are in the company of a great band. They played tonnes of songs, but I'd love to hear much more. Then again, I perhaps have a license to be greedy given that this is likely the first and last time they'd ever perform in Singapore. I have yet to hear Plainsong (one of the best tracks ever, and it's sad Roger is no longer in the band cos I can't quite fathom how it'd sound without keyboards), Screw, A Forest, The Figurehead, Object, The Hanging Garden, A Letter To Elise, To Wish Impossible Things, Charlotte Sometimes, Closedown, The Same Deep Water As You, Disintegration, Other Voices, etc etc etc. But – and it'd probably take a few days to sink into cognisance – I had just watched one of my favourite bands perform live. Before my very eyes. For someone whose musical tastes are often anachronistic, that is a real honour.

I made my way out of the stadium slowly. I was desperately thirsty, but a piece of lyric was playing on my mind. It’s from the Cure’s Mint Car, which is a deliriously happy song that speaks of “strawberry kiss”, “vanilla smiles” and being “so fizzy I could burst.” Perhaps not the definitive song which would characterise this most uncategorical of bands (given that the gamut of their genres is quite staggering and at times are quite the antithesis of each other), but the lyrics here are most apropos of the way I felt after the concert, considering that I have never dreamt that I would one day see The Cure live:

Never guessed it got this good
Wondered if it ever would
Really didn't think it could
Do it again?
I know we should!!

Do it again? Someday perhaps, fingers crossed.

Tags: The Cure, Robert Smith, Simon Gallup, Porl Thompson, Jason Cooper, Pictures Of You, New Wave, Gothic Rock