Faith (The Cure album)

Background

Following the tour for Seventeen Seconds, the Cure returned to Morgan Studios on 27 September 1980 to record a new album, minus Matthieu Hartley, who had departed due to disagreement with the musical direction of the band. During this session, recordings of songs "All Cats Are Grey" and "Primary" were attempted, but neither ended up on the album. Robert Smith was hoping the tracks would sound "funereal", but instead he said "they just sounded dull". Several other studios were tried: Red Bus, Trident, The Roundhouse and Abbey Road.

Much of Faith was written in the studio. At least two songs on the album, "All Cats Are Grey" and "The Drowning Man", were inspired by the Gormenghast novels of Mervyn Peake. Faith was the first album by the Cure to feature six-string bass guitar; "All Cats Are Grey" features Smith on keyboards and piano, with no guitar at all. The front cover, designed by former and future member Porl Thompson, is a picture of Bolton Priory in the village of Bolton Abbey in the fog.

The instrumental piece "Carnage Visors" (an antonym for rose-coloured spectacles; originally available only on the long-play cassette release) is the soundtrack to Carnage Visors, a short film by Ric Gallup, Simon Gallup's brother, that was screened at the beginning of shows in place of a support band on the 1981 Picture Tour, and featured animation of several dolls in different positions and stances. The film has since disappeared, and only Smith, Lol Tolhurst and Simon Gallup own copies of it, though during a televised interview in the mid-1980s, the host of the program surprised the band by playing a clip of the film on set.

Release and reissue

Faith was released on 11 April 1981. It reached No. 14 in the UK Albums Chart. The album was remastered in 2005 as part of Universal Music's Deluxe Edition series. The new edition featured "Carnage Visors", demos and live tracks as well as the non-album single "Charlotte Sometimes". It also included a few never-before-released tracks (in demo form, all instrumentals).

Critical reception and legacy

Faith received an ambivalent response from critics on its release. Sounds gave the album a rating of 4.5 stars out of 5. Reviewer John Gill felt that the two fast tracks, "Primary" and "Doubt", were reminiscent of their previous work, with a "sense of strong, haunting melody". However, he noted that the rest of the album was different, describing it as "a modern-day Dusseldorf" with a "Neu!-ish sense of smudged melody, soft tones flowing around a languorous, groaning bass", also evoking the Sixties of the Floyd and the Doors. Gill finally said: "Faith requires a personal act of involvement, the reward being a sense of belonging". Melody Maker found the record "impressive", hailing its "richness and deceptive power". Writer Adam Sweeting hailed Faith as "a sophisticated exercise in atmosphere and production". He concluded "It's gloomy, but frequently majestic, never using brute force where auto-suggestion will do. You may not love it, but you'll become addicted to it". NME reviewed the album with a picture of the band and a caption saying: "Gloomy? Gothic? Us?". Writer Ray Lowry lambasted Faith and wrote that "it says absolutely nothing meaningful". In the end, Lowry found that "this is just the modern face of Pink Floydism". Record Mirror panned the album, writing, "The Cure remain stuck in the hackneyed doom-mongering that should have died with Joy Division", ultimately calling it "hollow, shallow, pretentious, meaningless, self-important and bereft of any real heart or soul".

In a retrospective review, AllMusic called Faith "a depressing record, certainly, but also one of the most underrated and beautiful albums the Cure put together". Fact rated the album at No. 3 on their list "20 Best: Goth Records Ever Made".

"Primary" was covered by the Dandy Warhols and "The Funeral Party" was covered by Jesu for the 2008 Cure tribute album Perfect as Cats: A Tribute to The Cure. The drone metal band Nadja covered "Faith" on their 2009 cover album When I See the Sun Always Shines on T.V.

Live performances

In 2011, the Cure performed the album in its entirety over two dates for the Vivid Live festival at the Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia. The shows were billed as The Cure: 'Reflections'.

Track listing

All lyrics written by Robert Smith; all music composed by The Cure (Smith, Simon Gallup and Lol Tolhurst).

Personnel

The Cure

Production

Charts

Singles – Billboard (North America)