The Cure
Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me
Fiction/Elektra/Rhino
By David Chiu
One of the Cure’s most popular and successful albums, Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me (1987) charted the mope band’s ascendancy from the underground to the mainstream. Although brighter in sheen as opposed to an earlier album like the overwrought Pornography, Kiss Me… still remains a soundtrack for the ‘80s disaffected youth dressed up in black and raised on John Hughes movies. Though the music still serve as an outlet for singer Robert Smith’s cathartic angst and longing, the group’s most accessible and then-surprisingly upbeat tracks at that time (the uncharacteristically funky “Hot Hot Hot!!!”, the dance-happy “Why Can’t I Be You?, and the forever-popular “Just Like Heaven”) help leaven the tumultuous guitar-driven mood songs. With this overall focused set, the Cure was making Goth hip for everyone. There are studio demos of the Kiss Me songs and live tracks from the period that appear on the bonus disc of this reissue that will be mainly for die-hard fans.
NewBeats 