APRIL 2005

A quiet beginning of the year. Roger O'Donnell took the opportunity to record and release a solo album ("The Truth In Me") while the Cure were having a break. Robert Smith spent his birthday in Paris attending an Interpol concert and celebrating afterwards with Billy Corgan.

25th
Seventeen Seconds, Faith, Pornography remastered albums were released as a deluxe edition including a bonus cd with demos, live versions. A second Shecter Robert Smith guitar signature was also on the way (an acoustic guitar this time, the RS-1000).


MAY

The band's line up changed and the info leaked online of the Cure being a 3-piece group now (Robert, Simon and Jason). Not so much of a surprise since making the 2004 album revealed all kinds of different tensions/different visions within the group. Robert Smith decided that the longest incarnation of the Cure (Smith/Gallup/Cooper/Bamonte/O'Donnell) had reached its limits after a decade together.

Westside Studios, London
Robert, Simon, and Jason re-recorded Three Imaginary Boys, Seventeen Seconds, Faith, Pornography to promote the new batch of remasters. The session was engineered by Mike Hedges (and became available exclusively on iTunes UK in January 2006).

The 3-piece also recorded another batch of old songs for an online Yahoo Music session : The Figurehead, M, Fire In Cairo, The Drowning Man. But only the first two tracks were shown. But the most exciting was probably covering Love by John Lennon for an Amnesty International fundraising album and taking part on the promotion of the event.

26th
Robert Smith won an Ivor Novello "outstanding international achievement" award. He actually attended the ceremony with his dad.


JUNE

The official Cure website announced the return of Porl Thompson in the group and a concept that went back to the first Cure album : all guitars / no keyboards. The 4-piece started to rehearse for upcoming live performances.


JULY

02nd
Versailles, Live 8
Live 8 was an international event launched by Bob Geldof to point out living conditions in Africa and following an English government proposal to "make poverty, history" there. Free live shows were set up in several cities around the world. Bands would play for 15 minutes. Originally the Cure was planned for the London one. But finally moved to the "less glamourous" Parisian concert where they took the luxury to perform a two songs encore.


AUGUST/SEPTEMBER

The group appeared on nine festivals across Europe. The difference with the previous two years on stage was drastic : lots of enthousiasm and pleasure and trust as they had no fear to try out other things live, like a "guitar oriented" version of Plainsong (in France), having a b-side (on Porl's request) on the setlist, bringing back rare classic songs like At Night, A Letter To Elise... Or having The Blood played on two acoustic guitars, with Porl adding solos. Clearly the band hasn't been this aventurous since 1996 ! Killing An Arab even resurfaced (not played for the five previous years) to which Robert sang "Loving An Arab" and "Kissing An Arab" instead of the title line.


APRIL 2006

01st
London, Royal Albert Hall
Against all expectations, the band played live again before a new album would be released. But for a good cause, as it was part of the Teenage Cancer Trust charity concerts in the magnificent Royal Albert Hall. Robert warned online that they couldn't do new songs (as they're not finished !). So that show would be based on the 2005 repertoire. But playing Cure classics for three hours can't never be a disappointment.

Then the group entered the Parkgate studios in East Sussex (UK) for the next few months to record their 13th album without recording any demos (but learning the songs as they went along). About 30 songs were recorded and parts would be re-recorded later.


NOVEMBER

27th
Release of Festival 2005 live DVD. The artwork was done by the newly recomposed Parched Art (Andy Vella & Porl Thompson) and was a selection of live tracks from the summer 2005 filmed by DV cameras and big screens footage.



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