The Cure: The Head on the Door poll

a night like this

I like the live version on Live In Orange better than the album version, but still, OTM

not their strongest album by any means...The Baby Screams and A Night Like This are so far ahead of the others it's not funny

was actually thinking about this the other day

I know Dan will vote for Push

Push used to be my favourite when I were young but these days I find it too depthlessly saccharine

whereas the two I named are pulsating, psychotic trips into the dark heart of the soul...AND great pop-songs too!

I voted 'A Night Like This' too... Funny story - for some reason - when I was in HS, liking this record a bunch despite my normal love of raucous Punk and Thrash Metal I remember accompanying some friend in my small town to a church youth group thingy - youth for christ or something similarly terrible. Anyways, the young preacher dude proselytizing was slammin' the youth about the danger and impurity and devil-worshiping in popular music - for some reason, this record was on the 'hit list' - for 'blood' and 'screw' I believe ... made me listen to it all the more. They even had it on some crappy video tape supplement material - off to youtube to look for that ...

I saw the local Cure tribute band Fascination Street do an absolutely fantastic gig this weekend. Really can't say enough good things about them, and the singer is a dead ringer for Robert Smith in every way as well.

I don't think this is a particularly strong album for them, either. In fact, aside from Push, Sinking & A Night Like This, I've never felt any need to play any of it again since it came out.

I'm going with Sinking.

"Close to Me" is one of the best singles from the 80's.

but still will probably vote for something else.

"A Night Like This." Love the sax solo, the bridges ("It goes dark, it goes darker still.."), the growling guitar lick, and the palpable sense of sexy menace.

1. Close To Me
2. Six Different Ways
3. Blood

Best I could do ..

http://www.forerunner.com/forerunner/X0007_Hells_Bells_-_part_2.html
http://www.ubu.com/outsiders/365/2003/138.shtml

Hahahaha - good stuff - gotta watch out for those Cure guys - they devil woshippas!

I love A Night Like This but the Sax just ruins the song for me. If only there was a saxless version. I love this album in general though. Probably my 3rd fav. behind 17 Seconds and Disintegration.

The sax version is a very good Andy Mackay imitation.

i had sax but I love it in this song, it's so incredibly 1986.

hate sax, that is.

my first cure album. it all seemed so mysterious to me. hmm, i'll have to think about it.

ok well if there wasn't a bug preventing me from voting, it'd be The Baby Screams

Actually, if I could see this poll I'd be voting for "Screw".

(stupid mod setup making some polls invisible to me)

any poll with a jpg in the title doesn't allow a mod (even of one board) to vote for it

hence: please refrain from putting jpgs in poll titles

Hahahaha THAT's why polls are loco sometimes. Mystery solved!

Anyway BLOOD for fucking real. If it comes out with zero, remember my words!

can a MOd delete the .jpg, we need the votes!

here is the album cover:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DV00XM0KL._SS500_.jpg

Can a mod make a poll so heavy not even a mod can move it?

seems like they can't fix that problem...:-(

I'm going to rep for "Kyoto Song" which apparently has no love here. "It's so smooth it even feels like skin" always gave me the creeps... the good creeps.

I really love In Between Days, Push, Six Different Ways, Close to Me and A Night Like this but I think I have to vote for In Between Days.

Oh my god, that Bob Larson clip upthread is hilarious and classic, BlackIronPrison. I can see Negativland having a field day with that one. I'm also impressed at the sheer range of groups mentioned in the first link. I guess going after "satanic" music turns out to be a good way to get a musical education!

"A Night Like This", but this album is crowded with gems.

"In Between Days" would win for me in most polls, so...

I voted "In Between Days" too, but so many great songs.

Really, the only song on here I have no time for is "Push".

"Sinking" is really the best of their synth-gunk ballads.

"The Baby Screams" is so so so great.

I'm going with "A Night Like This," but it almost went to "Push" and "The Baby Screams." Damn tough one, this.

My first Cure album and concert (Radio City, November 1985). Will rep now and forever for "The Blood".

I could very happily vote for any song on this album except for "Push".

Then why are you voting for "Push"?

don't make me find you

voting for "a night like this" but if "close to me" was the brass mix there'd be competition.

You know I am actually totally fine w/sax on 'A Night Like This.'

Whenever I buy a can of soda from a soda machine, the sound of the can landing reminds me of the opening of "In Between Days." Still, I'm going "Six Different Ways."

First time I heard "Close to Me," I thought it sounded like The Cars. I just realized this past weekend that it has such tight percussion versus all the reverb etc. on the rest of the album.

this was and still is one of my favorite cure albums. it was tough to choose, but i went with "the baby screams".

Whenever I buy a can of soda from a soda machine, the sound of the can landing reminds me of the opening of "In Between Days."

YES!!!

Not a bad song on this one. I love short albums with no filler. For me it's between "Push", "Sinking", and "A Night Like This". "The Blood" needs more love too.

Whenever I buy a can of soda from a soda machine, the sound of the can landing reminds me of the opening of "In Between Days."

YES!!! (seconded)

I don't think my heart will let me vote for anything other than In Between Days. And Mrs Fiendish would kill me.

I do have a tremendous soft spot for Push, too ...

voting for "a night like this" but if "close to me" was the brass mix there'd be competition.

^^^

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hprQpOdr34

Six different ways is amaaazing

Yeah I didn't want to start nothing, so I backed off, but this album is a stone cold classic from beginning to end.

There's some really great, nearly shoegazey live versions of 'A Night Like This' from the Swing tour in the mid 90's.

Me on the 30th anniversary:

http://thequietus.com/articles/18610-the-cure-head-on-the-door-review

Nice write-up! I still hate "Push"!

Hahah I was almost waiting for that.

I'll eternally find your dislike of 'Push' completely mystifying, DJP, even more so than your dislike of 'Domino Dancing'/Introspective... the guitar riff of 'Push' is just all-time for me, and it's one of those Cure songs that has stayed with me from the moment I first heard it!

nice Ned, thanks for the link.

The slurred introduction on In Orange sold me on Push.

I love The Cure, I think their output up to and including Wish is pretty much unimpeachably wonderful, yet I too can't stand Push.

I can barely make out what Smith is saying in most of the song introductions on In Orange, bar the song titles!

Something about wearing a dress on the train or something?

i think he says 'this is a song about when i used to wear dresses and ride the train'

I think In Orange serves as a good introduction to the band as well as the first singles compilation does... it's a bit of a shame that it hasn't been re-released yet.

NICE gonna listen to this during work today

Yeah, I think I'm going to give The Head On The Door a listen too... I expect I'll love it just as much as the other hundreds of times I've heard it. This album never, ever gets old for me.

Played Head On The Door last night and loved it. Followed it up with Japanese Whispers. Nice combo.

otm on the summer feeling of "In Between Days"

xpost:

Yeah, I completely agree! I've always been incredibly fond of Japanese Whispers... I know it's a compilation, but when I listen to it, I tend to listen to it front-to-back and I think it stands up well as a mini-album.

Some mad genius has given 'The Cure In Orange' a once over via deinterlacing and it looks pretty decent. Not as good as a pro clean up job but you can't have everything can you?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVS9EFUMUts

nice. love the version of 10.15 saturday night on there. push too!

Very lucky to see IN ORANGE at the Cinefamily in 35mm some years back with a great audience. The beginning with them walking in unison through a fog of dry ice like the gangstas they were at the time is just hysterical. People nearly gave a standing ovation for Lol’s 2 note keyboard solo on the “A Forest” outro

When Lol was promoting his memoir, he attended another screening (at the American Cinematheque’s Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood), but I didn’t catch it

That 4K interpolation looks TERRIBLE - I have a downloaded laserdisc rip which my TV upscales beautifully. Since I can't play my VHS tape any more.

Now 40 years old!

Hate that I can't see what I voted for, YouTube link is scrubbed out. I'm sure it was "A Night Like This."

'Push' is great, down with the haterz :)

What a good album

I think the single mix of close to me is superior otherwise i would probably vote for it here

Hm this is really tough but probably Kyoto Song

Push' is great, down with the haterz :)

;_;

For always and ever

By coincidence I bought a t shirt of the album cover last week, I LOVE it. Can’t believe I’ve been listening to this for forty years.

Phenomenal album, fully delivers on Robert's intention to make something multifarious, a 'Cure variety half-hour'. Fantastic B-sides too. If I have anything controversial to say then it's that the only sorta weak link for me is A Night Like This, which is good but I prefer All I Want when it comes to that sort of Cure track.

!

Glastonbury 1986 has always been my favourite live recording, brilliant versions of several HotD songs, especially Sinking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzJSGHdeYmI

I stand by my piece for the 30th anniversary

https://thequietus.com/opinion-and-essays/anniversary/the-cure-head-on-the-door-review/

Love this album so much, from the first time I heard it, and it has not wavered. Still play it all the way through. Love the variety; love every song. Top 20 all-time under 40 minute album for me.

A 45 min video essay on the HotD 40th anniversary just popped up on my YT feed, some American guy, looks a bit tl:dr tbh

Tour for this album was my first of many times seeing them and it was incredible.

xxxp would agree that A Night Like This is the worst track here, real stogy plod - even worse when played by later, less capable line-ups

It’s great when you crank it up, a really doomy grind to the chord progression. Also the video is the peak of their 80s look.

xxxp it’s that American voice again

I can’t even comprehend disliking “A Night Like This” let alone finding it the worst song on the album

this album having a "worst" song is like the ice cream shop having a "worst" flavor: even the bad ones are still decent.

My kids routinely get Superman ice cream and there’s no amount of money you could pay me to try that flavor.

This album is so great. I voted for at least half of it in the Cure tracks poll, maybe more. Good review, Ned! Totally agree that this is the start of a whole era for them. I think of it, Kiss Me and Disintegration as more or less a trilogy in terms of themes and musical explorations.

Thotd sounds like Robert Smith has just put together the best lineup of his band and knows it and is giddy about the musical horizons that it opens up

i love lol’s drumming and Andy Anderson’s too for that matter - but imagine getting Boris Williams in your band and hearing how everything just lifts (and how good he sounds playing against Simon Gallup too)

Screw is easily and obviously the worst song on this. HoTD has always been 2nd tier for me (and I would probably swap in most of the bsides)

Screw rules a lot. That bass is wonderful

i really like Screw too - it feels like some sort of compositional game-playing went on, “let’s see if we can construct a song around this most ridiculous bass riff”

would also say it has some of the demented quality of the era’s b-sides (which i agree were very strong, although i think the album as is was very well-sequenced and the b-sides are very happy being b-sides)

Yeah Screw is a b-side that crept onto the album, it would be more loved if it was switched with “A Man Inside My Mouth” (which should absolutely be on the album)

Screw is the spiritual predecessor to Drone:Nodrone

and of Freakshow, I guess. So much to answer for

So much awesome to beget, you mean

Although I don’t really hear that much Screw in Freakshow, I find that closer in spirit to Throw Your Foot and A Man Inside My Mouth. I suppose they’re all in the same neighborhood though.