Aug
12
2007

A Night With The Cure

(Add / View Comments) (0)Sunday, August 12, 2007 - 11:47:56 pm
(Posted Under: Music Music)
Photobox ImageTonight was the big Cure show - which as it's grown closer we've gotten more and more excited about. Testament to that is my Hitter list, where The Cure are already, by far the most played artist, and have shot to the #8 played artist in the last year. Which is pretty impressive, as I hadn't played them excessively at all in that period, save the past two months. Which has been a cool thing in itself, dusting off Galore, which I played a whole lot in the day, but haven't listened to much recently. It's one of those things, like when you haven't listened to New Miserable Experience or Fizzy Fuzzy Big And Buzzy in forever, do so, and wonder why the fuck you haven't! And that the album sounds just as good as the day you brought it. More on that later I guess.

We showed up to Rod Laver Arena at around 6, a fair while before the show was scheduled to start (7:45). But that worked out well, to do the merch table thing before the show and crowds. There is something to be said for not being rushed and stressed while choosing merch. Walking around the arena, picking out merch (choosing the same t-shirts - how shocking, that's never happened before! [wink]), getting a drink and having a smoke, it really didn't seem to be that long before the time for the doors to open rolled around.

On getting in and finding our seats, the tickets seemed pretty good, at least for non general admission seats. I'd opted not to take my camera because of Rod Laver's no camera / no recording devices policy. Apparently I should have just taken it, as there was no pat downs or anything getting in, and cameras around the venue were a dime a dozen. Oh well, not the worst thing in the world, but it would have been cool to get some shots.

It was surprising how right up until 8ish both general admission and the seating around the venue seemed rather under occupied. Which didn't seem to make much sense, since it was The Cure, and general admission at least had sold out by the time we ordered tickets (the night pre-sale started). Was the Cure no longer cool and selling out stadiums all of a sudden? No. By the time the band went on, right on 8:15 it was a quite different view around the venue, one much more like what I'd expected.

One of my first thoughts that, while the seats were really good, seeing any detail, particularly of Robert Smith was still difficult. We'd expected obviously to have the band up on screens, however there were none. If there was to be any disappointment with the show, that was it. (It's kinda ridiculous to have any show at Rod Laver without screens, if you ask me). Still, it wasn't hard to remember, as I thought when we ordered the tickets, that being front row and seeing everything wasn't terribly important - the Cure music is just that good. (I will say that I would have still enjoyed a better view of Smith). And by the second song I wasn't at all bothered by the fact.

The show, which was exactly 3 hours long (8:15pm - 11:15pm - no opening act) was absolutely amazing, and worth every dollar spent. I needed to see The Cure live regardless, but gee, talk about worth the ticket price! The show was no bullshit and down to business - Smith probably said a total of 20 words throughout the whole show, 95% of which was "thank you" - it was just a train of song after song after song. Not that I'm against show banter at all, but geez, these guys so now how to give their fans what they should get. And with the amount of Cure songs you want to hear, in addition to playing such a long show, the packing as many in as possible was awesome. The other notable part of the whole show was that it's easy to expect just moody alternative, or fun pop songs, and forget that The Cure can totally rock out. There was no fucking shortage of that, and was just as much a rock show, if not more, than any other show I've been to. The selection was also great, with a perfect mix of the pop hits and hard and good runs of the hard and dark material. This is one show that I've been to where the consistency of the show / band was phenomenal - some of the earlier stuff, and stuff off of The Cure (2004) which I'm less familiar with was just as good as the rest of the show, and there was not one part where you could stop your foot from moving.

Highlights from the show - there are the obvious ones - Fascination Street (awesome that it was played so early, especially how I've been enjoying it even more recently), Lullaby, Pictures Of You, Inbetween Days, Just Like Heaven, Friday I'm In Love.

The highlights that took me a bit by suprise: Push - absolutely awesome, the album version (as great as it is) doesn't measure up after hearing the live version tonight, The Blood, A Night Like This, Boys Don't Cry - just sounded incredibly good - I can't put my finger on why, or qualify it, but it was definitely a stand out.

Of course, picking highlights is hard, because while there were some, the whole show was so good.

The three hour setlist went like this:

  1. Open
  2. Fascination Street
  3. alt.end
  4. The Blood
  5. A Night Like This
  6. The Walk
  7. The End Of The World
  8. Lullaby
  9. Lovesong
  10. Pictures Of You
  11. Hot Hot Hot!!!
  12. Push
  13. In Between Days
  14. How Beautiful You Are
  15. Just Like Heaven
  16. Shake Dog Shake
  17. Us Or Them
  18. Never Enough
  19. From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea
  20. Wrong Number
  21. Shiver And Shake
  22. End
  23. Encore 1:
  24. If Only Tonight We Could Sleep
  25. The Kiss
  26. Encore 2:
  27. Friday I'm In Love
  28. Let's Go To Bed
  29. Close To Me
  30. Why Can't I Be You?
  31. Encore 3:
  32. Three Imaginary Boys
  33. Fire In Cairo
  34. Boys Don't Cry
  35. Jumping Someone Else's Train
  36. Grinding Halt
  37. 10.15 Saturday Night
  38. Killing An Arab
And the sound check, of which we heard some of, albeit quite muffled, was:

  1. Lullaby
  2. How Beautiful You Are
  3. Jumping Someone Else's Train
  4. Open
So, there checks of one thing on my list of things to do before I do (or more appropriately really, is "before they call it quits") - "See The Cure" live. Definitely if I got the opportunity again, I wouldn't hesitate.
Now Playing: The Cure - The Kiss

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