The Cure have shared the first single from Songs Of A Lost World, their first album in 16 years. And frontman Robert Smith says that Alone, the album's opening song, is “the track that unlocked the record.”
Earlier this month, the band teased the November 1 release of Songs Of A Lost World with a poster placed outside The Railway in Crawley, West Sussex, where Smith's band played their very first show, back in 1978. Now they've confirmed that release date, while sharing the album's first single.
“It’s the track that unlocked the record,” says Smith of Alone. “As soon as we had that piece of music recorded I knew it was the opening song, and I felt the whole album come into focus.
“I had been struggling to find the right opening line for the right opening song for a while, working with the simple idea of ‘being alone’, always in the back of my mind this nagging feeling that I already knew what the opening line should be.
“As soon as we finished recording, I remembered the poem Dregs by the English poet Ernest Dowson and it was in that moment that I knew the song and the album were real.”
The opening verses of the epic, ethereal single run:
“This is the end
Of every song that we sing
The fire burned out to ash
And the stars
Grown dim with tears
Cold and afraid
The ghosts of all that we’ve been
We toast with bitter dregs
To our emptiness”
Listen to Alone below:
Last month, The Cure released a limited edition 12-inch 'eco vinyl' record featuring live recordings of two previously unreleased songs, And Nothing Is Forever and I Can Never Say Goodbye, through Naked Vinyl, a record label dedicated to promoting sustainable vinyl. A percentage of the net profits was set aside for climate action charity Earth Percent, founded by Brian Eno.
“I’d like to thank The Cure and NAKED Record Club—both true innovators—for their generous support of vital climate projects through the release of The Cure - Novembre: Live in France 2022,” Eno shared in a press release. “It’s a powerful example of how the music community can work together to build a better world.”
After the release sold out, Robert Smith tweeted, “And then…,”, hinting that the world would soon hear more from his band.
