The Cure Trilogy

The Cure: Trilogy (Live In The Tempodrom Berlin November 2002) is a double live album video by The Cure, released on two double layer DVD-9 discs, and later on a single Blu-Ray disc. It documents The Trilogy Concerts, in which the three albums, Pornography (1982), Disintegration (1989) and Bloodflowers (2000) were played live in their entirety one after the other each night, the songs being played in the order in which they appeared on the albums…

An ambitious yet practical idea, Trilogy underscores the tonal and lyrical connections between three of the Cure's darkest albums in the last 20 years. The restless, ever-changing band, fronted by goth-gloomster Robert Smith, took up residence at the Tempodrom Berlin for a couple of nights in late 2002 for the express purpose of playing the group's 1982 Pornography, 1989's Disintegration, and 2000's Bloodflowers live and in their entirety…

The Cure edged into new territory with Wild Mood Swings, but nevertheless drew scorn from certain quarters because it eschewed goth rock for pop, both pure and twisted. For 2000's Bloodflowers, Robert Smith decided to give the people what they wanted: a classic Cure album, billed as the third part of a trilogy begun with Pornography and continued with Disintegration. That turns out to be more or less true, since Bloodflowers boasts all of the Cure's signatures: stately tempos, languid melodies, spacious arrangements, cavernous echoes, morose lyrics, keening vocals, long running times. If that's all you're looking for, Bloodflowers delivers in spades. If you want something transcendent, you're out of luck, since the album falls short of the mark, largely because it sounds too self-conscious…

The Cure edged into new territory with Wild Mood Swings, but nevertheless drew scorn from certain quarters because it eschewed goth rock for pop, both pure and twisted. For 2000's Bloodflowers, Robert Smith decided to give the people what they wanted: a classic Cure album, billed as the third part of a trilogy begun with Pornography and continued with Disintegration. That turns out to be more or less true, since Bloodflowers boasts all of the Cure's signatures: stately tempos, languid melodies, spacious arrangements, cavernous echoes, morose lyrics, keening vocals, long running times. If that's all you're looking for, Bloodflowers delivers in spades. If you want something transcendent, you're out of luck, since the album falls short of the mark, largely because it sounds too self-conscious…

It's hard to believe that the Cure could release an album even more sparse than Three Imaginary Boys, but here's the proof. The lineup change that saw funkstery bassist Michael Dempsey squeezed out in favor of the more specific playing of (eventually the longest serving member outside Robert Smith) Simon Gallup, and the addition of keyboardist Mathieu Hartley resulted in the band becoming more rigid in sound, and more disciplined in attitude. While it is not the study in loss that Faith would become, or the descent into madness of Pornography, it is a perfect precursor to those collections. In a sense, Seventeen Seconds is the beginning of a trilogy of sorts, the emptiness that leads to the questioning and eventual madness of the subsequent work…