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"...10:15 Saturday Night..."
I'd honestly forgotten just how overtly Punk and even Rock 'n' Roll snotty "Three Imaginary Boys" was/is - The Cure's May 1979 debut album in Blighty. I'm reminded too of Joe Jackson's "Look Sharp!" debut sound-and-anger-wise and the economy of The Police's starter "Outlandos De Amour" - in - out - do the flick-guitar business - and then leave. And the Remaster on this bad boy only emphasizes this so much.
What you have here is the single-disc CD reissue/remastered version of September 2005 - in other words CD1 of the November 2004 Deluxe Edition 2CD Set minus any bonuses and a lesser booklet (8-pages). Real fans will have to have the double, but for those of us who just want a kick-ass version without seeking funding from pyramid schemes - this is the sucker - a really great Chris Blair Remaster done at Abbey Road Studios overseen by Cure main-man Robert Smith. Once more unto those Crawley Saturday Nights and suspect haircuts...
EU/UK released 5 September 2005 - "Three Imaginary Boys" by THE CURE on Polydor/Fiction 982182-9 (Barcode 602498218297) is a straightforward CD Reissue and Remaster (no Bonuses) that plays out as follows (35:46 minutes):
1. 10:15 Saturday Night [Side 1]
2. Accuracy
3. Grinding Halt
4. Another Day
5. Object
6. Subway Song
7. Foxy Lady [Side 2]
8. Meathook
9. So What
10. Fire In Camp
11. It's Not You
12. Three Imaginary Boys
13. The Weedy Burton
Tracks 1 to 13 are their debut album "Three Imaginary Boys" - released May 1979 in the UK on Fiction Records FIX 1. Ending Side 2, "The Weedy Button" is a 53-second ramshackle instrumental that wasn't credited on the original artwork, but is given a mention on the 2CD Deluxe Edition. Here it is spaced in the track list above, identifying it as separate from the LP. Produced by CHRIS PARRY - it peaked on the UK LP charts at No. 44. THE CURE was: Robert Smith - Lead Vocals and Guitar, Robert Dempsey - Bass Guitar and Lead Vocals on "Foxy Lady" only with Lol Tolhurst on Drums.
AMERICA Debut Album:
The 13-Track British configuration Of "Three Imaginary Boys" wasn't issued in the USA on LP, but instead they got something similar called "Boys Don't Cry" in February 1980. Fans and databases consider this to be a different album because the changes were so profound. The American "Boys Don't Cry" LP (complete with different artwork) retained eight of the UK LP songs, dropped four and "The Weedy Burton" hidden cut. They were replaced with "Jumping Someone Else's Train", "Boys Don't Try", "Plastic Passion" and "Killing An Arab". It won't take a genius to work out that with a wee bit of effort, this single CD could have upped the booklet with the US artwork included and had those four cuts tagged on here as genuine Bonuses so fans could sequence both variants - but alas. Let's deal with what we do have...
The 8-page booklet gives you two pages of credits - the original 1979 album that launched Fiction Records and the 2005 CD Reissue - itself based on the 2004 Deluxe Edition that had preceded it. The following pages print the lyrics amidst period photos of the trio (looking so young) and the images on the rear sleeve including a small shot of the Pyramid/Oasis painting that was used for the American "Boys Don't Cry" front cover artwork. There are no new liners which given its importance (and greatness for that matter) instantly feels like a mistake and letdown. What is not a bummer however is the super-crisp CHRIS BLAIR Remaster done from Original Master Tapes at the famous Abbey Road Studios. What a broadside - and it's rare that I say this, but maybe even a tad too clean in places.
Right from the clarity of "10:15 Saturday Night" and on to "Accuracy" - the sparse Post Punk vibe is startling. No food, no people, no clocks - everything coming to a grinding halt - "Grinding Halt" just makes you want to pogo around the room and dress-up in age-inappropriate outfits that made you Mum blush. As just as you're settling in nicely to the mullet melancholy, up spits "Object" - an echoed rocker that snarls contemptuous at her sophisticated smile (love those guitar chords just before the 1:45 mark).
And you just have to love the sheer melodiousness of "Another Day" - Drums, Bass and Jangling Guitar - the sun rising slowly, the eastern sky growing cold, shades of grey as something holds our Bob hypnotized. And who would have thought that The Cure could make a Hendrix cover version sound like one of their better songs - but that's precisely what they do to Hendrix's "Foxy Lady". Dempsey takes the lead vocals (the only one on the album in which he does) and its preceded by some vocal messing about in the studio - but it rocks and still sounds so fresh even in 2022.
They go Police bop-hit with the Andy Summers guitar of "Meathook", punchy Bass
too aiding Robert Smith as he repeats those echoed words. The British Punk and
New Wave attitude continues with the very Clash does Reggae sounding "So
What" - a gnarly brute that still impresses. "Fire In Cairo" softens
things a little - mirrors with heads in faded light - love that cool
guitar flick and her solar lips (take me in your arms and let's burn). "It's Not You" could have been the 45 - a snotty and cool little rebel pumping out of your speakers - questions you never wanted to hear. Brilliant wee tune, could have given The Damned a run for their "New Rose" money in my books. It comes to an end with RS staring at nothing, waiting for a tomorrow that never comes, our Bobby hearing his heartbeat echoing around his head in the LP's official finisher "Three Imaginary Boys". The less said about the 53-seconds of nonsense that is "The Weedy Button" the better.
The Cure would issue "Boy's Don't Cry" b/w "Plastic Passion" in May 1979 as a stand-alone British 45 and follow that with the equally cool combo of "Jumping Someone Else's Train" b/w I'm Cold in October 1979 (FICS 002 and FICS 005 respectively). But it would take the one after the next one - "A Forest" in May 1980 on Fiction FICS 10 - to finally kick start their staggering singles chart run career.
But "Three Imaginary Boys" is the unadorned Cure, the less self-conscious Fiction starter, an accessible British New Wave album bristling with tunes and dare we even say it - hope and glory.
Like I said at the beginning, I'd forgotten about TIB and I'm so glad I made its re-acquaintance on this clean he-man sounding Remaster (and its cheap too). A great debut album then, only let down here on this 1CD reissue by the what-we-can-get-away-with basic packaging approach, when you can't help feel that an album this good deserved a better digital show-and-tell...
