Robert Smith, frontman of one of the most influential bands in goth, punk, and pop history, turned 46 this year – not that it’s affecting him. The beautifully haunted musician still sports his spidery black hair, smeared blood-red lipstick, and persona of mystery. “Because we’ve had a certain level of success, people think they know me, think they know who I am. I don’t like that feeling. There’s a reason for not appearing on the cover of our first records; for a long time nobody knew me, and I could live happily with that.”
Smith was born in Blackpool, England on April 21, 1959. His family moved to Crawley while he was still an infant, and he grew up in the heart of suburbia, where he started learning guitar chords from his older brother Richard at the early age of six. He later wore velvet dresses to school and was expelled for being a “malignant influence.” Smith’s childhood was difficult, due to constant run-ins with his parents and the law, and by the age of 17, he had formed Easy Cure with friends mike Dempsey and Laurence “Lol” Tolhurst, as a vent for his frustration.
Easy Cure soon changed to The Cure, and rose to fame, flooding both the United Kingdom and the United States charts. Two of the most notable appearances on the charts were the album Wish, ranking #2 in the US and #1 in the UK, and the single “Lovecats,” coming in at #2 on the US Billboard Charts. The Cure won “Best British Group” at the Brit Awards in 1991, and by 1997, they had sold 25 million albums, and scored their own book - Ten Imaginary Years. The album Head On the Door was ranked #27 in Spin Magazine’s “100 Greatest Albums: 1985-Now,” and the singles collective, Staring at the Sea came in at #4 on their “10 Greatest Compilations of the Spin Era” list.
Smith had a variety of other projects, too. The Cure toured with Siouxsie and the Banshees, allowing Smith to contribute his songwriting skills and play on their Hyaena Studio and Nocturne Live LPs. The Cure recorded an instrumental soundtrack for the movie Carnage Visors, and Smith was invited to sing with David Bowie at the Rocker’s 50th Birthday Bash in 1997. Smith also collaborated with Blink 182 on their self-titled album in 2003, for the song “All of This.”
However, it was no easy road for Robert Smith, or The Cure, for that matter. The Cure’s first single, “Killing an Arab,” had to include a disclaimer, which stated that the song “decries the existence of all prejudice and consequent violence,” and it wasn’t until the release of the Staring at the Sea/Standing on a Beach compilation that The Cure moved beyond its cult status in the United States.
The Cure toured extensively, and Smith even ended up playing two sets a night at one point to fill in for Banshee’s departed guitarist John McKay. There were frequent member changes in The Cure, leaving Robert Smith the only constant member. Three of the most notable line-up changes include the 18-month departure of Simon Gallup, who left after a fight with Smith; the long legal battle with Laurence Tolhurst, which was eventually settled in favor of the defendant, Robert Smith and Fiction Records; and the departure of Boris Williams in 1994, after which 7 drummers were used until Jason Cooper was found in 1995.
Smith’s songs are influenced by a variety of things, most being things that have happened to him or people he knows, events that have occurred, or dreams he has. “Killing an Arab” was inspired by Albert Camus’ “The Stranger,” and many of The Glove’s songs were influenced by movies the pair of artists watched. Drugs played a big role in The Top, “but before everything else,” says Smith, “It is the spinning top. Remember the strange noises from the intro… they were made by a member of The Cure playing with a spinning top.” Smith’s wife, Mary, is “M” in the song of the same name on Seventeen Seconds, and he wrote “Lovesong” for her. “The Blood” happened to be inspired by a drink someone gave Smith, which he said “gave me visions of the Virgin Mary and made me violently ill and deliriously happy at the same time.”
One thing that doesn’t influence Smith’s music, however, is politics. Smith said in an interview “Expressing political ideas doesn’t go with pop music, it doesn’t work. I’ve belonged to many social organizations for year, but as a person, not as the leader of a more of less well known rock band. I am socially active, but I have never wanted The Cure to be socially involved in one way or another. The group is neither a platform nor a voice for political ideas.”
The Cure’s songs cover a variety of spectrums, ranging from extremely happy to miserably depressed. As quoted from Spin Magazine, “The Cure have always been an either/or sort of band; either epically coifed Robert Smith is wallowing in gothic sadness or he’s licking sticky-sweet cotton-candy pop off his lipstick-stained fingers.” Every album is a new experimentation for The Cure. “Some of the demos were absolutely demented,” said Smith, about Head on the Door. “I’d say to Boris, ‘Can you try a bossa nova here?’ and he’d play a bossa nova. It was brilliant!”
Smith doesn’t have many responsibilities outside of The Cure, except for his wife, Mary (Robert Smith 88), who acts as his mother, little sister, older sister, and lover all at once (Russell-Powell 31). They don’t have kids, which allows Smith to “remain selfish,” and their nieces and nephews even wonder if they really are adults. “Ever since I was a teenager, I’ve always told myself I wouldn’t be a dad, and I haven’t changed my mind,” Smith stated, when asked if he regretted not being a dad. “I wouldn’t know how to bring up my child, having to lie, create an illusion about life in general. It’s too hard. If Mary had wanted kids, I would have had to say yes, but she, too, never felt the desire to have kids. She’s got enough work with me. I’m a real child.”
One of Robert Smith’s trademarks is his bright red, slightly smudged lipstick. When asked about it, Smith replied, “Ah, the lipstick! I’m not putting it on carefully because otherwise people are going to think I’m doing it out of vanity, when it’s for theatricality. I used to draw lipstick all around my eyes and my mouth, and once we were onstage I’d be sweating and it would look like someone had punched me in the mouth and my eyes were bleeding. But I had to stop because my eyes started hurting. I kept using it on my lips, because it’s not really in my private character to do something like that.”
Even with all the fame and success, Smith still prefers simple things, like the same worn out sneakers, Kodak disks, and bare-bones guitars - the simplicity of use permitting an ‘unbridled spontaneity.’ He likes to write, and believes that if he put all of his manuscripts together, he’d have “a book of short stories without endings,” which would all have the same title, found by Mary, ‘The Glass Sandwich.’ He also “feels more natural in the company of people who are mentally unstable.” He doesn’t believe in existentialism, but isn’t quite sure exactly what he believes in, this week.
To sum it all up: Robert Smith is a very talented musician, with a random and spontaneous twist. “Today people come and see me like if I was a dinosaur, and I’m not sure I like that.” Smith stated in an interview. Although he’s getting older, Smith’s career isn’t faltering in the slightest. He plans to re-release all of The Cure’s albums, re-mastered with bonus material, and go back to the studios with The Cure in January, to begin recording their new album, which is due next summer. Robert Smith might be getting older, but it looks like neither he nor The Cure will be disappearing any time soon.
