The Cure, Songs of a Lost World

In September, the Cure released their first new music in 16 years. The single was called Alone, and it encapsulates what makes the British band so singular and cherished: a dark, swirling six-minute symphony, half of which is a textural instrumental introduction before Robert Smith’s haunting vocals come in, sounding like he hasn’t aged a day. The song sounds like something straight off Disintegration, the Cure’s career-defining 1989 album that cemented them as founding fathers of a certain musical melancholia.

Alone was the first official taste of Songs of a Lost World, the band’s 14th studio album. The record is a gorgeous, cathartic return to what the band does best, and especially satisfying after the Cure’s last two records, 2008’s 4:13 Dream and 2004’s self-titled album, which were mutely received by critics and fans alike. Songs ... feels like classic Cure, that potent combination of heightened melodrama and emotional heft that’s contributed to their long-lasting legacy as one of the world’s great gothic rock acts.

Musically and aesthetically, the Cure operate in two distinctive and almost dialectical modes: vast, cinematic soundscapes that lean into the depths of despair to find beauty in the darkest places and the more upbeat pop singles, showing off Smith’s knack for melody and jangly guitar lines (think Friday I’m In Love, Just Like Heaven or Close to Me). There’s little of the latter on this album, which is all about texture and world. The heavy darkness is balanced out by airier tracks such as And Nothing is Forever, which begins with a simple piano and blooms into a lovely, string-drenched declaration of eternal love.

Theatrical dirges are a part of the Cure’s brand, but few have been as moving as I Can Never Say Goodbye, a six-minute tribute to Smith’s brother, Richard. Built on an eight-note piano refrain with subtle but strong bass, it’s an emotional farewell as Smith grapples with the reality of his loss: “Something wicked this way comes to steal away my brother’s life,” he laments. Smith has said that Richard’s death, as well as the loss of his parents, heavily influenced the direction of this album – their presences are felt keenly.

Slow melancholy makes way for thundering industrial darkness on Drone:Nodrone, the most urgent song on the record. A time-keeping single piano line, skittering synths, screeching guitars and pounding drums create a bed of sound for Smith to deliver his probing questions of existential crisis: “Could be a case of me displacing my reality?” he asks before answering himself a beat later: “I guess it’s more or less the way that it was meant to be.” It’s a thrilling, breakneck journey of a song, mashing genres with ease – one of the Cure’s most fascinating tracks for some time.

It wouldn’t be a Cure album without an epic closer, and Endsong does the job beautifully – a towering, synth-soaked 10-minute track that again eschews more traditional song structures for something boundless. A guitar motif recurs above the rich blanket of sound below, which expands into a dreamlike soundscape. Smith doesn’t start singing until six and a half minutes in, when the tension has built to breaking point: from there, the song maintains its trembling beauty as Smith laments the loss of a world he once loved. “Left alone with nothing at the end of every song,” he repeats as the song and album fade away.

It’s the opposite, though, really: for decades, the Cure has been making listeners feel less alone through song, and this album is a beautiful testament to their enduring power. Long may they reign.