Covered in Folk: The Cure
(Grant Lee Phillips, Julie Peel, Luka Bloom, Death Cab, +10 more!)
November 25th, 2009 — 07:16 pm
I was never a real fan of goth-rock, though as I’ve written about before, pretty much anything that made the Top 40 in the 80s seems to linger in the minds and hearts of both my own generation and the artists it has since spawned. And The Cure was undeniably the most prevalent band of its type in mainstream mall culture when I was growing up: in my early adolescence, I dated several girls with somber black-and-white Robert Smith posters on their bedroom walls, and – looking back – can only suppose that the band’s hits and the commodified counterculture they represented resonated with a certain subset of suburban teenagers looking for a safe way to reject the Duran Duran mindset of their pre-teen years and simultaneously speak to the dark, moody feelings which lurked in their self-doubting hearts.
For whatever reason, the songs of The Cure were in the air during that formative time frame, both as radio- and bedroom-presence originals and, later, through the glorious grunge of Dinosaur Jr., whose fuzzed-out version of Just Like Heaven was a boot to the high-school head, one of my first introductions to the true joy of transformative coverage done well. As evidence, it is necessary only to note that The Cure has an especially high incidence of tribute albums and coverage in the modern era – a phenomenon due, we are sure, to their gradual shift from post-punk to suicidal goth rock to the more optimistic alternative pop of their later work, and the impact they had on all those forms, as much as it is their sheer chart popularity in the eighties, the heavy lyrical genius of Smith himself, or the existential gloom they brought to a generation yearning to reject so much, and finding only emptiness in its stead.
Today, we take a look at some of my favorite Cure covers from the last decade or so – mostly the best and most delicate of popular hits like Just Like Heaven, In Between Days, and Boys Don’t Cry, all of which which turn out to play out exceptionally well as slower popfolk ballads and dark, tinkly acoustic atmospheric pieces without all the synth and driving drums. From ragged and honest to celebratory and sharp, each speaks to a culture continuing to mine its past for sense and sensibility, the folkways incarnate, whatever the source.
- Grant Lee Phillips: Boys Don’t Cry
- Kate York: Boys Don’t Cry
Kate York‘s echoey Americana evokes a cinematic narrator’s post-relationship train ride montage. Meanwhile, Grant Lee Phillips‘ use of the toy piano to support his slow, syrupy, otherwise guitar-and-voice driven singer-songwritery take on the song is more than just inspired; it’s utterly gorgeous, revealing the yearning of the original lyrics perfectly.
- Julie Peel: A Night Like This
- Dean and Britta: Friday I’m In Love
Two of the gentler takes from last year’s wonderful American Laundromat Records release Just Like Heaven: A Tribute to The Cure. Julie Peel, whose new album Near the Sun is a grungefolk goddess’ dream debut, goes for bass-heavy, dark and Suzanne Vega-esque; “electrofolk” duo Dean and Britta aim for indie dreampop, and hit the mark square on.
- Luka Bloom: In Between Days
Irish singer-songwriter Luka Bloom‘s all-covers album Keeper of the Flame features a holy host of great tunes like this one: melodic, sensitive, and surprisingly delicate, despite moving along at a decent clip. Bloom’s signature loose-strung, jangly guitarwork suits, and then some.
- Angie Hart: Pictures of You
Pop singer Angie Hart‘s torch song take, originally recorded for a Traffic Accident Commission ad in her native Australia, evokes the sadness of the original lyric in majestic piano, orchestral strings, and a tender, girlish vocal dripping with just the right amount of sentiment and introspection.
- Death Cab for Cutie: Love Song
- The Brooke (a tiny ocean): Love Song
- Mariee Sioux: Love Song
The high synth production of Death Cab verges on alt-pop; Mariee Sioux‘s busily discordant yet oddly delicate cover, found on the 2008 for-charity tribute Perfect as Cats is the epitome of freak folk. But The Brooke‘s stripped-down solo take is the simplest, and my favorite, the bittersweet, bedroom tone anticipating the fragility and tentative impermanence of love’s loneliness. Putting the three alongside each other is a textbook reveal, showing the breadth of modern singer-songwriter performance.
- Katie Melua: Just Like Heaven
- The Watson Twins: Just Like Heaven
- Laura Cortese: Just Like Heaven
- Charlotte Martin: Just Like Heaven
- Kat Edmonson: Just Like Heaven
Finally, a small smattering from the vast array of Just Like Heaven covers floating through the coverlore: Kat Edmonson‘s fluid, smoky jazz, alt-country from The Watson Twins, a frenetic fiddle-and-voice take from local favorite Laura Cortese, majestic Tori-esque pianofolk from siren Charlotte Martin, and megastar Katie Melua‘s gentle pop treatment.
As always, Cover Lay Down exists to support artists first and foremost; if you like what you hear, click on artist names to purchase records and pursue live concert experiences direct from the source.