Pick four songs from any band and you can tell a lot about their sound. This summer, I’m featuring #RockBlocks, four picks from bands across various genres. They might be wildly different from each other, but what binds them together is the fact that they’re all a part of my life soundtrack.
Trent Reznor once credited The Cure for creating a world for its fans. I think this recognition is spot on. Hearing a Cure album or going to a show feels a lot like you’re entering a different world from your own reality. Sometimes that world was dismal and full of despair. At other times it was a world of ecstasy. But it was always immersive and always a form of musical escapism. This is the most noteworthy thing about the early single “Charlotte Sometimes”.
The Cure was only three members at the time of this song: Robert Smith, Simon Gallup and Lol Tolhurst. But they had already begun to master the use of complex instrumental layering to create a mood and an enveloping environment for us to get lost in. “Charlotte Sometimes” felt like a glimpse into a dream state. When I look back at all the great Cure anthems — and there are plenty of them — the swirling synthesizers on “Charlotte Sometimes” is one of the most iconic keyboard-centered expressions in the band’s history.
“All the faces. All the voices blur. Change to one face. Change to one voice.”