Disintegration’s brilliance lies in its consistent gloom, settling into a beautiful despair and staying there. It’s a unified world you can completely inhabit. Wish, The Cure‘s follow-up, is more dynamic, both musically and emotionally, and strangely a tougher listen for it.
1992 / Fiction
The bright immediacy of singles like “Friday I’m In Love” and “High” sits oddly beside long, unravelling epics like “Open” and “From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea.” It’s a rollercoaster of emotions, a continuous, disorienting mood swing.
Disintegration’s darkness is tempered by its consistency. Wish, by comparison, is less comfortable—unhinged, even. The darks remain profoundly dark, the lights feel less like genuine optimism and more like feverish hysteria, and you’re never in one space or the other for long.
Key Tracks:
Open
From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea
Friday I’m In Love
Artwork:
7/10
Design: Andy Vella & The Cure
Further Listening:
The Cure / Disintegration
The Cure / Songs Of A Lost World
Cocteau Twins / Heaven or Las Vegas
Friday
Price range: £40.00 through £120.00
