The Cure - Listen (1979)

As a very belated coda to my seven part series of The Cures' singles and b-sides we go right back to their beginnings. The founding members of the Cure were school friends at Notre Dame Middle School in Crawley, West Sussex, and their first public performance was at an end-of-year show in April 1973 as members of a one-off school band called Obelisk, which included future Cure members Robert Smith, Michael Dempsey, and Laurence 'Lol' Tolhurst. In January 1976, Smith and Dempsey were in another school band called Malice, and rehearsed Bowie, Hendrix and Alex Harvey songs in a local church hall. By early 1977 Tolhurst had joined Malice, along with Martin Creasy on vocals and Pearl Thompson on guitar, and they renamed themselves Easy Cure, after a song written by Tolhurst. After winning a talent competition, the band signed a recording contract with German record label Ariola-Hansa, and after unsuccessfully auditioning  new vocalists, Smith assumed the role. The new four-piece of Dempsey, Smith, Thompson, and Tolhurst recorded their first studio demo sessions as Easy Cure for Hansa at Sound And Vision Studios in London between October and November 1977. Hansa was dissatisfied with the group's demos and refused to release one of them, 'Killing An Arab', as a single, suggesting that the band attempt cover versions instead. They refused, and by March 1978 Easy Cure's contract with the label had been dissolved. At the same time Pearl Thompson was dropped from the lineup because his lead guitar style was at odds with Smith's growing preference for minimalist songwriting, and the remaining trio were soon renamed The Cure. The band recorded their first sessions as a trio at Chestnut Studios in Sussex, which were distributed as a demo tape to a dozen major record labels, and Polydor Records scout Chris Parry signed the band to his newly formed Fiction Records label. The Cure finally released 'Killing An Arab' as their debut single in December 1978 on the Small Wonder label, as a stopgap until Fiction finalised distribution arrangements with Polydor. The record garnered both critical and commercial acclaim, but not without some controversy, as the single's provocative title led to accusations of racism. In fact, the song is based on French existentialist writer Albert Camus's novel 'The Stranger', and the band had to place a sticker on the 1979 Fiction Records re-issue denying any racist connotations of the song. The Cure released their debut album 'Three Imaginary Boys' in May 1979, recording a few extra songs at the sessions that didn't make it to the final track listing, and this mopping up album includes those studio out-takes, along with some of those early demos, and a very oddly titled track from a John Peel session, which later morphed into 'Grinding Halt'. The overall sound quality of these recordings is pretty good, and it's an interesting insight into the early days of the band that we've come to know and love today.   

Track listing

01 I Want To Be Old (Sound And Vision Studio 10/10/1977)
02 Listen (aka Pillbox Tales) (Sound And Vision Studio 10/10/1977)
03 Meathook (Sound And Vision Studio 10/10/1977)
04 See The Children (Sound And Vision Studio 10/10/1977)
05 Do The Hansa (Morgan Studios 1979)
06 I Just Need Myself (Sound And Vision Studio 10/10/1977)
07 Accuracy (John Peel session 1979)
08 Winter (studio out-take 1978)
09 Faded Smiles (aka I Don't Know) (studio out-take 1978)
10 World War (Morgan Studios 1979)
11 Play With Me (studio out-take 1978)
12 The Cocktail Party (home demo 1978)
13 Desperate Journalist In Ongoing Meaningful Review Situation (John Peel session 1979)