Despite making one of the greatest albums of all time, The Cure had never won a Grammy before today. But in the ceremony\u2019s pre-show, Robert Smith and co. took home Best Alternative Music Album for\u00a0Songs of a Lost World\u00a0and Best Alternative Music Performance for \u201cAlone.\u201d Per a report, The Cure were not present to accept the award due to former bandmate Perry Bamonte\u2019s funeral.<\/p>\n
The Cure were nominated for Best Alternative Album 33 years ago for\u00a0Wish\u00a0and again in 2001 for\u00a0Bloodflowers. In the Best Alternative Music Album category, the band won over Bon Iver, Hayley Williams, Tyler, The Creator, and Wet Leg. In Best Alternative Music Performance, they beat out Bon Iver (\u201cEverything Is Peaceful Love\u201d), Hayley Williams (\u201cParachute\u201d), TURNSTILE (\u201cSEEIN\u2019 STARS\u201d), and Wet Leg (\u201cMangetout\u201d).<\/p>\n
In her review of\u00a0Songs of a Lost World,\u00a0Elise Soutar wrote:<\/p>\n
\u201cTo directly compare Songs of a Lost World to another Cure album\u2014just as a barometer of quality compared to more familiar corners of the back catalog\u2014is to misunderstand its purpose in the band\u2019s canon. If Robert Smith, on the brink of turning 30, made his masterpiece lined with hope\u2019s starlit glimmer on\u00a0Disintegration\u00a0and howled to emerge from the drug-fueled, claustrophobic paranoia of\u00a0Pornography\u00a0in his early twenties,\u00a0Songs of a Lost World is tired of flailing, having no time for ripping at the seams of his life\u2019s work to look for further meaning. The shaky hand that scribbled the line \u2018It doesn\u2019t matter if we all die\u2019 belongs to an artist who now knows there\u2019s never been a statement further from the truth, re-reading Ernest Dowson\u2019s poem \u2018Dregs\u2019 until his eyes go weak and begging loved ones to fight for his place in their life while they still can.<\/p>\n
Confronted with the deaths of multiple family members and a world crashing around him, Robert Smith can\u2019t simply \u2018return to form.\u2019 He\u2019s metamorphosed into a new form that suits both our larger societal moment and his own meditations on existence. He and the band have made a better album as a result. There are two elements which make up the quintessential Cure recording, both of which are present here. The first is expressive, sweeping instrumentals\u2014which Perry Bamonte, Jason Cooper and Reeves Gabrels, Simon Gallup and Roger O\u2019Donnell craft and deliver with aplomb on opener \u2018Alone.\u2019<\/p>\n
There are moments of restraint to underpin orchestral passages, but these opulent soundscapes continue to be so central to the band\u2019s sound, say, post-1985 because they do so much of the heavy lifting atmospherically. There\u2019s a reason so many Cure songs withstand the weight of these sprawling introductions they\u2019re so fond of, why our diminished attention spans still don\u2019t seem to feel the time pass when we\u2019re locked into the emotive swirl of sound. If you believe Smith\u2019s claim that the band will cease to exist after its 50th anniversary, giving the Cure about four years\u2019 time to release however much more material they supposedly have ready to go,\u00a0Songs of a Lost World will be an album we\u2019ll have to re-contextualize a few times over.<\/p>\n
Then again, Robert Smith has famously threatened to blow the band up whenever he wraps up a Cure project, so we may all be prepping for the next few years of goodbyes in vain. Yet, there will never be a time when a song centering his voice won\u2019t be welcome\u2014all worth it for an avalanche of guitars clearing the aisles for that voice to sing, \u2018Promise you\u2019ll be with me in the end.\u2019 The words may not be comforting, but with our hands on Songs of a Lost World\u00a0after so much time away, you\u2019ve never been more glad it\u2019s him saying them.\u201d<\/p>\n