Your favorite Cure drummer

lol amirite

for those less obsessive than me, their tenures (as drummers):

Lol: 1973(!) - 1983
Andy: 1983 - 1984
Boris: 1984 - 1993
Jason: 1994 - present

It's got to be lol, although Angry Anderson was OK. I've never heard of Jason.

You could make a very cogent argument that the main reason no one but die-hards cares about The Cure these days is because of Jason.

make it, make it, do it

Lol Tolhurst was an awful drummer, but a great keyboard player.

i voted for lol because lol

(i have never knowingly listened to the cure)

Boris was an incredibly precise, scary technical drummer; he did all of these little fills and percussive add-ins at very precise moments and was able to replicate them live to an almost frightening degree. This let a lot of the music ride on top of him in a very loose, free way; the other instruments could pretty safely go off and do their own thing because the drums were always going to be rock-solid and therefore finding exactly where the downbeat is was never an issue. Jason is a much more emotional drummer; for want of a better word, his patterns are messier and not nearly as prone to precise repetition. Counter-intuitively, this locks a lot of the music into a particular groove whereby extra riffing has to be done very, very carefully or else everything has the possibility of falling off of the rails. (It also doesn't help that they drown him in reverb, making his hits sound even more imprecise and muffled.) Sometimes they use this to extraordinary effect; angry atmospheric pieces like "Lost" and "The Scream" really make great use of the messy drum sound to help add to the overall aural angst, but most of the time what ends up happening is the drums lose power and that robs some of the songs of the weight they should have (this is rampant all over Wild Mood Swings, especially on songs like "Club America" and "Return", and also explains why Jason generally comes across better in a live setting when a sound engineer hasn't attempted to make it sound like he's keeping time on a gigantic marshmallow).

Fuck it, I'm going with Lol.

Question, coming from a non-fanatic...

Are any parts of the album "17 Seconds" a rhythm box, or is that all Lol? Cause I love that album a lot, and the cold, sparse drumming is a big part of the appeal for me.

LOL TOLHURST IN BLACKFACE??????

Lol Tolhurst was an awful drummer, but a great keyboard player.

Ummmm... no he wasn't. Legend has it that Robert had to put colored stickers on the right keys for him.

Lol I think went out on a bang with Pornography as his last drum outing and, while I love Boris, I often weep that Andy got kicked out for being an angry douche because "The Lovecats" and most of what's happening on The Top and Concert is some next-level OMG shit.

Are any parts of the album "17 Seconds" a rhythm box, or is that all Lol?

Judging from bootlegs I've heard from that time period, I'd guess it was Lol, but never having seen the band in that time period I can't say for sure. (and yes, he was an atrocious keyboard player, like my level of proficiency bad)

The best overall musicians to ever have been in The Cure are Porl Thompson and Roger O'Donnell.

Dan's comparison of Boris and Jason is an amazing synopsis!

(btw is Levinhurst any good?)

Porl Thompson was the only Cure guitarist who used traditional guitar "flourishes", if that makes sense. He was more fluid than anyone else, anyway.

Lol Tolhurst was an awful drummer, but a great keyboard player.

You have to re-read your Ten Imaginary Years. Lol could barely play keyboards with one finger. Robert did them all on The Top and Porl took care of them on The Head On The Door. By the time of the Kiss Me Tour they had to hire Roger O'Donnel, only to credit Lol with "other instrument" on Disintegration...

Anyway, Boris Williams.

Porl also played keyboards and sax; I still remember him playing the shit out of "Piggy In The Mirror" on "The Cure In Orange" while Lol was gamely playing Chopsticks off on the side.

"only to credit Lol with "other instrument" on Disintegration"

I didn't even realize he was credited on Disintegration, i thought he was totally gone by then.

I remember that now! Is The Cure In Orange on DVD? I still have an old VHS copy I haven't watched in years, but I'm suddenly nostalgic for it.

xpost

Lol's credit on Disintegration is one of the funniest album credits ever!

btw I looked up Levinhurst on Myspace and encountered this among their friends:

http://c4.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/111/s_8bfaa2631d17479fcf55c848e44ab25b.jpg

I've been looking for "The Cure In Orange" on DVD but have been unsuccessful in finding it.

btw I'm boggling that all of these dudes are like 50 this year

I've been looking for "The Cure In Orange" on DVD but have been unsuccessful in finding it.

Yeah, that's too bad, I just looked after asking that question, but nothing. I have a fair amount of Cure live stuff on VHS but only Trilogy on DVD (which is amazing, though). I'm feeling the need for some 80s and 90s live Cure. To YouTube, I suppose...

Oh, voted Boris on this poll.

Cure in Orange isn't out on DVD (yet?). Tempted to vote for Andy.

The band hate it, apparently.

I saw it at the Cinema, I think it needs that kind of scale to see it properly.

will probably vote for lol, even though boris' era is perhaps the best quality wise

Lol, because their best music came from that era. He was actually a decent drummer for the early stuff. Maybe a bit wooden, but I think he sounds pretty good on the 3IB-era tracks especially.

LOLLLLL

Dan's explanation for why the Jason Cooper years seem like such a drop-off is pretty awesome.

Anything that provides hope that Smith isn't the problem is awesome, really.

I wouldn't say he's my favourite, but I'll defend Jason Cooper a bit -- as Dan said, he's definitely a more "emotional" drummer, which can be a plus or minus depending on the song. For example, for me, Cooper's style has rejuvenated the live versions of "Fascination Street". I always thought that Williams' drumming on that song was too mechanical, but Cooper plays it looser and it seems to "swing" more (cf. Chuck Eddy).

Boris for me, obv.

dan OTM about boris. his lock-groove repetition with very subtle changes in phrasing is really amazing if you dissect his drum parts. amazing drummer.

Boris was actually the main thing that really grabbed me about The Cure; the second song I ever heard by them was "The Kiss" ('nuff said).

i don't see how anyone could really vote for anyone other than Boris.

reasons to vote for Lol:

1. "Jumping Someone Else's Train"
2. "All Cats Are Grey"
3. "Cold"
4. "Another Day"
5. "Play For Today"

reasons to vote for Andy:

1. "The Lovecats"
2. "Give Me It"
3. "The Caterpillar"
4. "The Top"
5. "Shake Dog Shake"

reasons to vote for Jason:

1. "Lost"
2. "The Scream"
3. "All Kinds Of Stuff"
4. "Trap"
5. "Jupiter Crash"

but did lol actually play on those? if not, they are not a reason to vote for him.

Andy was really good actually, it's too bad he was only on one album (which is admittedly my third favorite cure album)

I wonder what Lol thinks about the fact that his name is now synonymous with laughing out loud. I'd vote Lol for Seventeen Seconds alone, but I can appreciate the love for Boris. I haven't bought a Cure album in about 15 years, so I'm not really qualified to judge Jason.

I am reasonably certain that Lol was still playing instruments at the beginning of The Cure's tenure; at a bare minimum he is definitely playing drums on the bootleg recordings from that era that I have.

The thing about Anderson = at least recording-wise, it seemed like that period of the Cure involved him being less of the drummer in a rock band and more of a varied almost sessiony type who could let the band try different and more studio-based stuff -- I kind of like this, and while I know this is a totally unrealistic thing to ask for, I'd be a billion times more engaged with modern Cure if Robert steered away from the rock-band thing and toward that creative space where you try some synthpop one month, try "The Caterpillar" another, do "The Lovecats" another, etc. ... i.e., trying on and working with different aesthetics and recording style rather than receding into a hired-feeling band. (Someone should make him do a record entirely by himself -- I bet it'd be great!)

As a teenager I suppose I was always psyched to see black members of indie-type bands I liked, so that was another thing about him

Lol. He did put in the effort at one time.

As a teenager I suppose I was always psyched to see black members of indie-type bands I liked, so that was another thing about him

This cannot be overstated enough (and likely factors into why I was so willing to embrace The Cure and why The Top was my favorite Cure album until I heard Pornography).

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

i voted for Boris Williams.

i don't see how anyone could really vote for anyone other than Boris.

I think people may be confusing Lol for the coolness that is the Synare.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

LOL @ LOL

haha so not what I expected!

minimal cure is the best cure

lolz

results would have been different if it had been written "Lawrence Tolhurst"

I've flipped my lid over The Cure. I'm trying to keep quiet about this and keep it a secret and not make a fool of myself. I know a mixed race lady here in town who's married and everything but she's a huge Cure fan. She answered my email and she's the only one I can turn to, because I just don't know how else to handle it. I'm absolutely tripping out over the Cure right now, I don't know what to do. I guess I should say "live Cure" though, if I'm honest. Blistering stuff. Definitely more goth than you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isCv6k0U2k4

You know at the gig where the Cure tribute band played, when they played "A Forest" I got down on my knees. A security guard asked me if I was okay and I said "yes I'm okay, I remember this song from high school". I was trying to pay tribute, you know? Get down on my knees. People didn't understand.

understatement

I need to re-watch Trilogy one of these days. Last time I tried I oculdn't really be bothered to sit through the whole thing.

I love Trilogy, it's actually beautiful, although I have to say I haven't listened to the Bloodflowers segment anywhere near as much as the Pornography and Disintegration ones. Part of my love for that DVD is simple -- I don't have anything else on DVD by the band, whereas, sitting in a box somewhere in my house are a shedload of VHS tapes (Staring At The Sea, Cure In Orange, The Cure Play Out, etc) and I've really been jonesing lately for some live Cure, especially '80s and '90s stuff. Trilogy is a substitute, but is absolutely gorgeous in parts ("Plainsong"!) and I would recommend 2/3rds of it for sure.

Gosh that sounds great! I'll put it in my Netflix cue. I sure wish I had In Orange, though, even on VHS. I've enjoyed listening to it on my iPod, but it's more fun to watch.

Yeah, I'm not sure why the band don't like it. It's great concert footage. I just know I'm going to have to hook up my old VCR soon and stick in all those old tapes (not at once).

(btw is Levinhurst any good?)

ftr I am currently answering this question for myself and the answer is "sort of, but not really"

i liked the first song by Presence, but never heard the whole album. Also apparently the follow up is on soundcloud, but I can't find it.

I saw Levinhurst in concert a long while ago (1999 or 2000?) and all I remember is Lol playing DJ and spinning some Cure backing tracks with some "remixy" sound effects thrown in, and some lady singing over the top of it all.

I had a big, paragraphs-long post typed up here, but why bother.

I came to the band late. Wild Mood Swings was my first album by the band (despite knowing the hits + it was the most easily available and cheapest at the time). Bloodflowers was my first "new album" after becoming a fan. I studied the catalogue and bootlegs for years. Determined the following:
1) Lol was a punk. He played fast, simple beats. Perfect for the band at the time, but a no brainer that the band outgrew him.
2) Andy is the most diverse drummer the band ever had. Even in his short tenure with the band, he played a lot more than most drummers would have been able to keep up with. Love everything he played on.
3) Boris was essentially a session man that was well liked. His drumming would have been fantastic no matter who he was playing behind. His playing was scary good (as articulated above). On the Wish tour, he had the best hairdo of any of the Cure's drummers.
— sidebar: I also read/post at a Cure fan forum and just searched the archives for about ninety minutes (to no avail, obviously) for a very complimentary post I made years ago about how I thought Boris was amazingly technical and perfect. But, ultimately, I arrived at the fact that he was ultimately disappointing because he played it the same exact way every single time—
4) Jason is perhaps the drummer Robert wanted all along. He has the longest run in the band, outside of Robert and Simon (and those two, if you really want to get technical, are actually what we refer to as "The Cure"). He is technically competent, but he "feels" the music as he's playing it. He is very much a "rock" drummer.
And, finally, and most importantly, 5) The fact that people obsess this much over the drumming in this band speaks volumes about how good the music they've actually created is. They are obviously in my top favorites of all time and I absolutely revere anything they do, just based on the track record and integrity of the music's creation. And let's not forget who actually created that music: in most cases, it was Bob and Simon. I mean, honestly, I've seen people bitch that the song 'Disintegration' saw a downturn in tempo after Jason joined the band and have subsequently deemed him a shit drummer. Does that seem likely, though — the FNG* giving orders to the boss? I think there's a reason Jason's tenure in the band is third, only to its main creative core: he's allowed the juices to flow. Call him a puppet or a tool or whatever, but he's allowed for Bob's most creatively fussy period to happen and, unlike Andy (unfortunately), hasn't had the ego to get upset and walk away.

There was a lot more to my initial post, but it was really convoluted and self-important.

*Fuckin' New Guy

Can anyone say anything about why Lol stopped drumming? He is quoted in Ten Imaginary Years saying: "there comes a point where barriers loom up because you don't have the technique. We wanted to do more complicated things and I was neither ready nor prepared to practice for years to get there".

But his argument is at odds with his decision (if it was his decision..) to take on keyboards - which he clearly wasn't able to master.

Was he *that* limited as a drummer that he had to step aside?

I think it's the case that Lol's drinking got well out of hand from the Pornography era on. The band split after the tour, Robert got himself back into things by doing home demos and stuff with session musicians, and Lol was along for the ride because of their long friendship. But he wasn't a force in the musical activities. Eventually Robert tired of the constant drinking and drugging, and Lol, who was stuck in that phase, became a scapegoat for Robert's self loathing at the kind of behaviour they had been into together, which is what led to Lol being ejected from the group. Apparently Robert made Lol sit in front of him while he sang the vituperative "Shiver and Shake" on Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me, to focus his disgust.

So he was a sort of drunk hanger-on from late 82 until 89? I dunno - he seemed still to be a real part of the band for a while before his decline in the second half of the 80s.

I think there was a kind of sliding scale of participant vs drunk which gradually slid toward the latter. The split was pretty acrimonious but he did play some shows with the current version of the Cure last year I think.

are those songwriting credits on '82 and '83 singles for real or gestures of friendship from Smith?

Lol maintains to this day, that through the Walk EP and surrounding material (Japanese Whispers), he was a contributing member of the band (it's come to light in recent years that he was actually completely responsible for 'All Cats Are Grey'). After that, it's unclear what his role in the band actually was, outside of touring keyboardist. He hit the bottle and the substances hard and was (perhaps inevitably) replaced by Roger O'Donnell.

All members received songwriting credit because it was a democratic situation. But look at the 'Just Like Heaven' video and you'll have a hard time trying to find him.

I've kind of understood it to be any album where Lol received the credit "other instrument", he didn't actually do anything, and that was Robert's nice way of saying so.

He's credited with "other instruments" on The Top, iirc. Smith credited simply with "instruments".

What I was trying to get at is why he quit drumming in 82. Was he forced to, because not good enough or was he already unreliable because of drinking or whatever?

For sure Lol was nowhere near as good as Boris, and those Boris parts as so absolutely essential to the stuff he's on that the Lol parts simply are not, cool Synare sounds or no. It's a common story, longtime good enough drummer discarded after years of patience due to pent up frustration on the part of the writer. Tom Petty, Wilco ...

Was he forced to, because not good enough or was he already unreliable because of drinking or whatever?

The former.

(It was still several years before Boris joined.)

Yeah, but the years between Lol on drums and Boris were relatively aimless, relative to the arrival of Boris, when everything falls into place.

I think the key element here is that in 83 the band effectively disintegrated so RS could reassemble/reinvent it as he saw fit. As a mainly solo outlet, I guess he became quite used to working with drum machines (which also fit the brief direction he took with The Walk EP) and by 84 everybody had kinda moved on

I love Lol's drumming on 'The Figurehead'.

Yeah, I like his Pornography drumming.

I have had the figurehead beat stuck in my head at least once a week since high school

Yeah, but the years between Lol on drums and Boris were relatively aimless, relative to the arrival of Boris, when everything falls into place.

This is partly true, but you left out the part where Simon also comes back on board.

The period between when Boris joined and when Simon came back is a short but interesting piece of the band's history, and oh man, are those recordings of those handful of shows ever good.

We're not talking about many years, guys -- at most 18 months.

Here's a good one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTiYodlDoyE

xpost: Yes, Alfred, that's what makes it so fascinating a period (for me, anyway).

Yeah at this very late stage of my fandom it's my favourite period. The few shows of 1983 are fascinating as the band is so clearly at crossroads

From the liner notes for The Top (deluxe ed) - "Lol Tolhurst, increasingly debilitated by chemical and alcoholic abuses that were serious even by Cure standards, was physically in the studio but no longer a reliably functioning band member" in the leadup to the recording sessions for The Top. The TV production for a 1984 show at Glasgow Barrowlands shows that Lol's "keyboard parts" often consisted of holding a button and pushing the pitchwheel up and down for the entire song. Nothing in the mix I could hear that bore a resemblance to his actions.
Mind you, a quick listen to the demos on the bonus disc suggest that Robert was a mighty long way from straight-edge himself at the time. But maximum respect for The Caterpillar and Piggy in the Mirror, gloriously unhinged pop songs that I've listened to for so long that I quite forgot how unlike anything else they are.
I'm sorry, my Cure nerd was showing there.

I quite like the quick little rolls that Anderson does on the hi-hat during 'Birdmad Girl'. In fact rolls on the hi-hat are one of my favourite drumming things, and I'm a big sucker for hi-hat work in general.

Yeah he brought a lot to the kit. Arguably too much for the Cure, but Birdmad was the perfect hybrid. The drumming on Concert sounds like heavy cal automatic weaponry, which I like on One Hundred Years but not so much on the other tracks.

Jason voted for himself here, I know it.

Either that or his mother did.

The reason Tolhurst stopped playing drums was due to lack of technique. He couldn't play the disco beat on Let's Go to Bed (after many attempts), so Steve Goulding was drafted in to play them. Basically, the songwriting outgrew Tolhurst's minimalist drumming ability.

I forget which of the various biographies I read this in. It wasn't Ten Imaginary Years though.

So, he drummed on "Hanging Gardens"?

He drummed on all of Pornography afaik.

So, winning this poll is fair play then.

Laughing at Geir's so blatantly ass backwards post near the beginning.