The Cure - Three Imaginary Boys (1979)

Two producers worked on The Jam's debut output: Vic Smith and Chris Parry. The latter also worked as a scout for Polydor records and had the fortune of discovering the demo of a band called The Cure. He signed them to his young, independent record label, Fiction Records, and produced much of their early recordings including the band's early singles and their debut album.

The Cure existed for several years before they were widely known and called The Cure. Formed in 1973 at a middle school in Crawley, Sussex, the band would go by the monikers The Obelisk and Malice; bands that held inconsistent lineups. By the time the band members graduated from secondary school, they stuck with a name (Easy Cure) a sound inspired by English punk, and a fairly solid lineup: Robert Smith (lead vocals, piano, songwriter), Porl Thompson (lead guitar), Mick Dempsey (bass), and Lol Tolhurst (percussion). After winning a talent competition, the band had a brief stint under the wings of German record label, Hansa Records. They soon fell out with their first big break, however, after refusing to compromise their artistic vision as they were expected only to cover songs.

Robert Smith, who had been forging himself as the leader of the band with his front man duties and creative output, would drop Thompson from the lineup (taking over lead guitarist duties) and change the name of the band to The Cure. By the fall of 1978, the trio were signed by Chris Parry to Fiction Records. Later that year, they released their debut single "Killing an Arab", a song title that seems racist even though its content derives from Albert Camus's The Stranger. Despite or because of the controversy, the song had no chart success. In May of 1979, The Cure released their debut album Three Imaginary Boys, a well-reviewed record that just missed hitting the UK's Top 40. The album was quickly followed up with two more non-album singles: "Boys Don't Cry" and "Jumping Someone Else's Train". The two songs had a more pop quality than their previous output but still didn't cause a ripple on the charts. In 1980, their debut album was repackaged to substitute in singles for an American release, called Boys Don't Cry, that gained no traction at the time but is now considered a classic.

The Cure had a post-punk sound that, at this early point in their creative arc, had two distinct products. Their singles tended towards pop-ier, riff-oriented song structure with simple, emotive lyrics and topics, while Three Imaginary Boys's music had a more descriptive, minimal feel to it with lyrics that tackled a wide range of subject matter in pretty clever ways.

Here is the discography surrounding The Cure's debut album:

Killing an Arab (1978 single)
Three Imaginary Boys
Boys Don't Cry (1979 single)
Jumping Someone Else's Train (1979 single)





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