Page 80 - Classic Rock (February 2020)

The Cure at the 1989
MTV Video Music
Awards in Los Angeles.
Wayne Hussey: Within the first twelve months,
The Mission become the most talked about
alternative band. Reviled as much as we were
revered. Oh, the press still hated us. Probably hated
us even more because we were getting successful.
Carl McCoy: I met Robert Plant years ago, and he
said: “Keep getting those bad reviews. It’s a good
sign – we used to get that with Zeppelin.” That was
good encouragement.
Jim Morris: Fields Of The Nephilim supported us
at Stevenage Bowes-Lyon. It was a really early gig
for them. Certainly from the start they were a band
that considered what they looked like.
Wayne Hussey: Reading Festival eighty-six was
a pivotal gig. We’d released one single, maybe two,
and we were fourth or fifth on the bill on the
Friday. There were curtains across the stage.
I remember putting my head out of the curtains
before we started, and this big cheer went up.
That was one of those moments I thought: “Wow
we’re popular.”
Jim Morris: We played that year. It was great.
Like a gathering of the tribes.
Wayne Hussey: It was an awful show for us.
We weren’t used to playing
festivals. We vowed never to
play again unless we headlined.
And they asked us to headline
the next year. Us, Status Quo and
Alice Cooper.
Wayne Hussey: We supported
U2 at Elland Road [Leeds FC
80 CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM
“The Cure turned into
the goth Pink Floyd.
Good luck to ’em.
It worked.”
Billy Duffy, The Cult
football ground, in 1987]. We started drinking
early and just carried on. By the time we were on
stage we were completely pissed. We’d been touted
as the new pretenders to the throne and we blew it
in front of forty-five thousand people.
A parallel goth scene, dubbed ‘deathrock’, had
sprung up in the US in the early 80s, centred
on bands such as Christian Death and 45
Grave. But American audiences were hungry
for British bands. A steady stream of British
groups crossed the Atlantic for much of the
decade – and it would ultimately change goth
at a genetic level.
Nik Fiend: America was fucking brilliant. The
first time we went over, this car pulls
up and I think: “Fuck, we’re gonna
get shot.” Then this bloke leans out
the window and goes: “Fucking
Halloween!” I was, like: “Yes!”
Billy Duffy: I’d been over to
America before, but when we
went with The Cult it was different.
We went to [hip New York club] Danceteria, and
all the cool kids wanted to meet us. America
loved us.
Nik Fiend: We played the Club Masque, which
was a heavy-duty gay club. I’m looking like
a fucking banker compared to some of the people
who turned up there. It was fantastic.
Billy Duffy: We made Electric with Rick Rubin in
America. We were hanging out with the Beastie
Boys, people like that. It was a cartoon party
album. We were pirates. Like Captain Pugwash.
We were having a good laugh on this cartoon
pirate ride.
Wayne Hussey: With The Mission, we had crazy
times in Britain and Europe, then we got to
America and it was tenfold. We were off the leash.
It was the climate of Just Say No. We were the band
who Just Said Yes.
Billy Duffy: The Electric tour was wanton
destruction. Tellies out of the window, drinking
until you pass out then being stripped naked and
left in the elevator of the Holiday Inn.”
Wayne Hussey: Me and one of our crew guys, we
got into ice, which is kind of like crystal meth but
it’s pure. You do a little line and it sends you
doolally for three or four days.
Jim Morris: We supported Kiss at some massive
festival in New Hampshire. Sixty thousand-odd
people there, the most we ever played to. Kiss
breezed into the stage area in a white limousine
with a swimming pool in the back. I’m not even
making that up. GETTY