Press Conference, Viareggio, Italy, 16th July 1985


- It's interesting to note that at the moment with the Cure and Siouxsie and the Banshees in Italy, on tour, the press sees it as a kind of challenge between the two bands. But surely it's not a challenge, it's more like a kind of gratifying thing, it's a music psychodrama and you're all together the same.

RS : Hummm. (laugh) It's just luck. Really. I mean, I saw Severin two weeks ago, it's the first time the Banshees were going to Italy and the same with him. I'm still seeing the Banshees socially whenever we're in the same town or if we're in London. There's no, bad feelings at all. Between us, there's certainly no change. I don't think... maybe in Italy we have the same audience, but generally it isn't the same audience. It probably is in Italy, because we both are classified as particular sort of groups.


- The success of The Glove... do you see that as a...

RS : I didn't know The Glove did well here. That was just again, one project with Severin. We're working doing another record called "Music for Dreams" which is, humm, the title says it really, it has no vocals, it's really atmospheric kind of stuff. But we haven't released it yet, we might do. The Glove is a bit of a disaster really, because noone is that interested, it's a bit disheartening, 'cause we thought it was really good but noone else seems to like it.


- What's your musical aim in the future ?

RS : I don't... Again it's really difficult, 'cause, like... Whenever I'm answering questions people always imagine, I suppose, because of the myth that most people in groups perpertrate, that they actually know what they're doing. Maybe lot of people do. But I don't. I mean, it would be no fun at all if I had some kind of ambitional goal. That would be really awful. It would turn the whole exercise into a form of employment, which I think is for a lot of people. I don't know, that's why I like being in the Cure. You could really do anything. As long as it's good. It doesn't matter.


- Do you think this kind of fluidity that you have in the band, not wishing to have particulary one direction, is a thing that keeps you going ? And is that what the Cure is ?

RS : Again because we went for so long, I mean, I tend to forget how long we have been going. It's frightening really to think that we have been making records for so long, but... I don't know. At one point, I think, I did have an idea about what I wanted the group to be, how I wanted the group to be seen. Now I don't worry about it, I don't really care what people think, in terms of what they think we're achieving.

Because I mean, obviously the people in the group are the only ones who are going to be able to judge this. It can be bias but...it's impossible for me to be involved in a set up that has too many rules, I suppose, and conventions. That's why I work with the same people outside of the group, because everyone understands me so I don't have explain all the time. It's just trying to retain some kind of youth, exuberance in it, which very often the bigger it gets the more difficult it is to keep that. Because it has become a business.


- Why did your line-up change so much ? Are you directly responsible for that ?

RS : There's only one person that has gone through the Cure that I don't get on with...


- When did you record the songs All Mine and Forever ?

RS : God... Well. It's difficult, I don't remember. At the end, when we play a concert, usually at the end of the concert we make something up, it's just... And those two songs were just made up.So... They're not real songs.


- I can't understand what you are singing (on All Mine/Forever -note)

RS : You can't. I was drunk.


- I'd like to know if in England, for you, new wave is still something new ?

RS : Hummm. It's difficult. I still think that the best people making records are generally... Hum.. It's difficult to... My favorite people are people who have been making records for quite a long time, who I still think are the most inventive people. People like Echo and the Bunnymen or Elvis Costello, people like that. And then along the young or new, there's hardly any group of the new new wave. Most of them, I think, are really boring within anything. But maybe it's cause I'm old. I'm growing up, I don't know.

I just find, very very very occasionally, a group comes along this new, that's doing something new. They're all new groups but they're doing what everone else has been doing. Like everyone wants to... Most groups now it seems, they worry about what they look like and then they decide what they're gonna play. It's the wrong way 'round. I don't know. I don't like any of the, like Alien Sex Fiend and those groups, I think they're really boring. So...