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THE CURE Seventeen Seconds  ***/Faith  **  /Pornography  ****  Polydor

These three early Cure albums have been given the "deluxe" treatment and are an essential starting point for anyone wanting to discover the building blocks used by a band who on later releases would achieve considerable crossover success. The band - who used to wear lipstick under their eyes so when they sweated on stage it looked like blood was running (dig that, Marilyn Manson) - were always more than their perceived image as gloomy, sombre Goth-mongers and Seventeen Seconds boasts still-great songs such as A Forest. All in all, though, it's the sound of a band still feeling their way through the rapidly changing early 1980s musical landscape. Faith was always a difficult album - it saw the band reaching for the jet black make-up and doing the gloom/doom thing. It's not that it's impenetrable, it's just a bit portentous. Pornography, however, remains one of their best releases, with One Hundred Years and The Hanging Garden in particular leading the way back to well-structured compositions. Each album comes with a bonus disc of demos, outtakes and live performances - and you'll find some real gems tucked away here. www.thecure.com
Brian Boyd