Album Review: The Cure, Bloodflowers

The Cure

Bloodflowers (Elektra)

Bloodflowers (Elektra)

Listening to the Cure's first studio release since 1996's Wild Mood Swings, one wonders why it took Robert Smith and company four years to write nine songs that sound exactly the same. Considering speculation that Bloodflowers may be the Cure's oft-threatened last album, it seems that this droning noise could possibly be the sound of ancient gothy New Wavers finally boring themselves to death. As a Cure fan, I show no restraint in tapping my inner reservoirs of bitterness, misery and melodrama to moan: believe me, it's that bad. The End is Near (But Not Yet) seems to be the principle theme of the obsessively fatal and needlessly long 5 to 11 minute whiners on this album. Smith mopes about "The Last Day of Summer," the fact that love always ends ("There is No If...") and flowers that eventually die ("Bloodflowers"), but it's the lyrics of "39" that seem most appropriate: "I used to feed the fire but the fire is almost out...and there's nothing left to burn." Somehow these last two, almost prophetic, songs are also the most driven. Even diehard fans are likely to be embarrassed. C+