But, of course, they do. Yes, I’ve deciphered Fat Bob’s pouty-lipped whinings, a mere 29 years after everyone else did. What’s more, Pornography was just a rather ponderous slab of doom-pop and not, after all, some unbelievably unnecessary etchings of Bob and Lol Tolhurst in flagrante. And The Head On The Door was a dream.
Anyway, ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ – in which not-yet-fat-just-a-bit-pasty Robert Smith and gang invented desperately wan indie-pop for The Mighty Lemon Drops and (bringing it into the 21st century) Good Shoes to pick up and run with. But you can’t blame The Cure for everything; this is an honest song, packed with embarrassingly familiar emotion, and a tempo that crashes into itself, awkward as a teenage lad. It’s concise and warm.
Still, only a twerp with windmilling arms in a fraying, too-large, black woolly jumper could dance to it. Junior refuses point-blank, but says she likes it all the same. Asks for a repeat too. The Cure repeated it themselves seven years later, re-recorded and buffed up. Don’t do that.
Ah, that dance, that jumper, them windmilling arms. How often did that ensemble help this twerp get lucky in the clubs of yore?
(Answer: Once)
YAY!
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