'Lose Your Way Acoustic' out now

Hey, here is the preview of our new album ‘Lose Your Way Acoustic’! Available to pre-order, with ‘Watch Myself’... https://t.co/wspNJD55oA

— Love Amongst Ruin (@loveamongstruin) August 5, 2016

For new readers, or those who forget easily, Perry Bamonte plays bass in this band. Album release is scheduled for Sept. 2nd, 2016.

Update (Sept. 3rd, 2016): The album is out now. Here's the Amazon US link and the iTunes US link.
And a very Happy Birthday to Perry!

Also, Perry has left the band now, but is still on great terms with everyone, and did play on this album.
(Thanks Daryl and @RubyAli_GMW)

More London tickets released

More tickets , including some standing, have been released for all 3 London shows. Get them here.

'Cured' preview on Amazon

Amazon has posted a very generous preview of 'Cured', including photos. Go read it! And then pre-order a copy!

Bestival ticket offer for Cure fans

From The Cure on Facebook:

Exclusive Bestival day ticket offer for Cure fans!

Don't miss this one off chance to see The Cure at the UK's Best Major Festival!

Visit http://bestiv.al/thecurebestival now and enter the code CUREDAY to secure your ticket for Saturday 10th September.

VIP options available.

For more info visit: www.bestival.net

From Lol's personal photo collection

3 photos from Lol Tolhurst's personal collection, never been published before (or so I was told, though #1 & #2 were included in 'Ten Imaginary Years'), and not included in 'Cured'. A nice bonus for CoF readers. All photos are by Richard Bellia. Thank You to Lol for sharing them with us, and to Quercus for providing them.

'Cured' will be released on Sept. 22nd in the UK, and autographed copies can be ordered from Waterstones. Or bring your copy of 'Cured' to one of these events and meet Lol and have it signed in person.

Top of the Pops Christmas Dec. 1983

Recording The Top Dec. 1983

Paleo Festival in Nyon, Switzerland 1985

Beach Slang cover 'Just Like Heaven'

Beach Slang covered 'Just Like Heaven' at Rock en Seine 2016. (Thanks Patrick)

And here's another version from Dortmund on Aug. 18th.

Cure Garbage Pail Kids cards

From Stereogum: "Summer may be on its way out the door, but Topps has decided to celebrate the waning music festival season with a whole mess of limited edition Garbage Pail Kids sticker carders. The limited edition American As Apple Pie: Best Of The Fest series, only available this week, features demented little versions of festival headliners like Radiohead, Arcade Fire, Beck, Death Cab For Cutie, Morrissey, and more. Check them out below and purchase them here."

RS-2000 Stage Acoustic

Shipping this Autumn from Schecter Guitars. (Thanks Joeylom)

Some fun 'Cured' stuff coming soon

Cured - a memoir by founding member Lol Tolhurst

The 22 September will be an exciting day in The Cure community. Lol Tolhurst will be releasing his memoir, Cured with UK publishers Quercus. Lol met Robert Smith when he was just five years old and together they formed one of the most successful bands of their generation.

In Cured Lol threads the genesis of The Cure through his schoolboy years with Smith, the iconic leader of the group, and the bands most successful era in the 1980s. He takes us up to the present day, a riveting forty years since the band's inception.

The band's journey to worldwide success is woven into a story not only of great highs and lows but also of love, friendship, pain, forgiveness and, ultimately, redemption on a beach in Hawaii.

Cured highlights those parts of the creative journey that are not normally revealed to fans, incorporating many first-hand recollections around Lol's personal odyssey. From suburban London to the Mojave Desert, Cured brings an acute eye for the times to bear on a lifelong friendship, with tales of addiction and despair along the way.

Join us for exclusives

Chain of Flowers is working with Quercus and Lol to bring you, the real fans, exclusive material. Starting on 29 August we’ll be offering an exclusive each week on the site including unseen photos of The Cure from Lol’s personal album.

Lol will also be answering any questions you have. Either tweet @CraigatCoF using #AskLolCured or comment on this post with your questions. Look out for his answers on 5 September.

Have you pre-ordered your copy yet? Waterstones have exclusive signed copies available but stock is limited. Order your copy now at Waterstones.

This is the inside story of The Cure.

Note: If you have a question for Lol but don't have Twitter, and can't post in the  comments, just email it to me and I'll post it for you.

Update (Aug. 26th, 2016): Last call for questions for Lol. Will be sending them to him next week, so if you want your question included, post it soon!

Update (Aug. 29th, 2016): Thanks for all of the questions for Lol. They have been passed on, and answers are currently scheduled to be posted on Sept. 5th. Also, those exclusives look like they'll be delayed a bit, but should still start this week. Will post as soon as they send them.

An Evening with Lol in Sheffield

Wednesday September 28th
7:30 - 8:40 PM
The Auditorium
University of Sheffield Student's Union
Western Bank S10 2TG
Tickets: £8.00 /£6.50 (Cons)

'Cured' audiobook up for pre-ordering

From Lol on Facebook:

"So the audiobook version of CURED is now available for pre -order! And In case you were wondering, the narrator "to be announced" is ...me! "

Scheduled for release on Oct. 11th. Get it at Audible.

James Graham on touring with The Cure

From A Music Blog, Yea?:

It’s been far too long since AMBY first spoke with Scottish rockers The Twilight Sad (three and a half years, to be exact). To our delight, the band passed through Toronto while on tour with The Cure to perform a captivating set at Bestival recently, and Alicia had the pleasure of sitting down with their vocalist and charismatic frontman James Graham. Indulge in their conversation as they discuss slowly working on new music, long song titles, arguing over beer, being “miserable”, the best movie ever made, and stories about touring with The Cure.

And check out Bill's great photos of, and Mauro's article about, The Twilight Sad's North American tour with The Cure, at Freakshow. (Thanks Bill)

Win a trip and tickets to the Barcelona show

From WXRT:

Start working on your Catalan because Knauz BMW in Lake Bluff Wants to Send a Lucky XRT Listener to Espana to See The Cure in Barcelona!

Tune into XRT all this week to find the code word and text number to be entered for your chance to win a 4-night trip to Barcelona, Spain, November 24th – 29th, to see The Cure perform on November 26th at the Palau Sant Jordi Hotel. The prize includes roundtrip airfare from Chicago to Barcelona, a 4 night stay in Barcelona’s Old Quarter, two tickets to the show, plus a $500 gift card to spend during the trip! We will pick 4 winners each day to see a private performance in the XRT Performance Stage and one lucky grand prize winner will win a trip to Barcelona to see The Cure!

The Trip is Brought to You by the Knauz BMW Sales Event. Start your shopping. Route 41, Lake Bluff.

Bona sort!

Listen to XRT in the 6A, 8A, 4P, and 6P hours to get the keyword. Once you hear it, text it to 5-9-3-9-3.

Can’t text? No problem! Simply enter in the contest keyword below and enter in the short code 59393.

Standard text and data rates apply, we’ll send you a text message confirming entry, alternate means of entry found on 93XRT.com.

Click here for official rules

200 Best Songs of the 70s

'Boys Don't Cry' is #47 on Pitchfork's list:

The Cure made countless songs about doomed romance, and “Boys Don’t Cry” is the only one that appears rooted in reality: Boy meets girl, boy treats her like crap, boy loses girl and has no one to blame but himself, boy ends up blaming everyone else, anyway. “Boys Don’t Cry” comes from a time when the Cure were pithy, punchy, and pouty. Its title was also co-opted by pop culture phenomena with far more complex takes on identity and sexuality than its inspiration. These two legacies aren’t in opposition, they’re part of a continuum established on “Boys Don’t Cry” that paralleled the Cure themselves: evolving from angry young men to overseers of an all-inclusive utopia where anyone can cry to their heart’s content. –Ian Cohen
(Thanks @guillaume_g_z)

Photo from 'In Between Days' press release

Tom Sheehan with Simon & Robert.

'In Between Days - The Cure in Photos 1982 - 2005' will be released on Nov. 16th. Pre-order here or here.

If you're interested in the Super Deluxe edition, I'm told half of the edition is already sold out, so order it as soon as you can.

Roger in Ferrari magazine

That time I was interviewed for the Official Ferrari Magazine by Nick Mason of Pink Floyd hahahah https://t.co/FaqDYfY67T

— Roger O'Donnell (@RogerODonnell) May 3, 2016

Interview is only available to Ferrari magazine subscribers.

Update (Aug. 20th, 2016): The interview is now available to all. Read it here. (Thanks Roger O'Donnell Discography)

Andy MacFarlane on touring with The Cure

From Tenement TV:

HAVING established themselves as a staple part of Scotland’s thriving music scene with four well-received albums, The Twilight Sad are spending much of 2016 spreading their appeal around the globe. It’s not often you get to go on tour with your heroes after all; the Glasgow band were living the dreams of many when they were asked to join The Cure on the road earlier this year. With Robert Smith known to be a huge fan, even releasing a cover of their track ‘There’s a Girl in the Corner’, the trio have now completed a mammoth tour of the States which saw them play up and down the country, including world-famous venues like Madison Square Gardens and the Hollywood Bowl.

With the European leg set to kick off in October, the band now have some time on their hands and will make their live return on home soil with an appearance at Electric Fields festival next week. We caught up with Andy from the band to hear about his experience with The Cure and the upcoming festival.

“The tour was beyond amazing, very surreal. We’ve played some big gigs but never a full tour on that scale before.’ And with the European leg coming up, there’s still some massive shows ahead, ’We’re looking forward to all of it. Europe’s great to tour anyway, but getting to do it in these venues and see The Cure every night will be pretty amazing.”

Especially when they’ve been such a huge influence on the Sad: “I’ve always listened to some era of The Cure for as long as I can remember, so elements of their music will always overlap with ours in one way or another.”

Of course, with the post-punk legends having such a massive global appeal, the trio have found themselves in front of huge crowds every night, with many people hearing them for the first time. However, this hasn’t fazed them: “I actually look at every gig the same. To me, there’s no difference playing somewhere like King Tut’s, the Barrowlands, or an in-store in Mono to playing somewhere like Madison Square Garden or the Hollywood Bowl.

“It really doesn’t matter what the venue is or who the crowd are, you always need to appreciate that people have spent their money to get there, and if you overthink it, you can very quickly build up apprehensions and start to trip yourself up.”

Read the rest at Tenement TV.

And then go listen to Andy's reworking of 'Man is Not a Bird' by Haze.

Robert Smith UltraCure-XII

http://www.schecterguitars.com/guitars/robert-smith-ultracure-xii-detail (Thanks JoeyLom)

The Beatles, The Cure, The Who and Bray

From Swench.net:

What do Bray and three of the biggest bands of all time have in common?
.....
Around this time, Robert Smith started spending a lot of time in Ireland, especially on the South Dublin and North Wicklow coasts.“I came over in 1986 for a few weeks’ break and ended up spending a year-and-a-half there,” he told Stuart Clark from Hot Press. “I rented a cottage just outside Dalkey – it’s beautiful down there. I used to walk back along the DART line, that’s the only way I could find my way around. I went to Ireland on holiday a lot when I was very young because of my grandparents’ family connections. I was reconnecting with that.”

Read the rest at Swench.net. (Thanks @alex_meehan)

Congratulations to Eden and Nancy!

pic.twitter.com/LOUN7v4jmA

— VIOLET VENDETTA (@VIOLET_VENDETTA) August 17, 2016

Wishing you a long life together full of love, laughter and metal!