The Cure: Faith (Deluxe Edition) - Disc 1 of 2 CD Track Listing

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The Cure Faith (Deluxe Edition) - Disc 1 of 2 (1981)
Faith (Deluxe Edition) - Disc 1 of 2\n2005 Rhino Entertainment Company\n\nOriginally Released September 1981\nCD Edition Released February 1988\nDeluxe 2CD Edition Released April 26, 2005\nRemastered 1CD Edition Released April 4, 2006\n\nAMG EXPERT REVIEW: Part two of an unofficial trilogy that begins with 1980's Seventeen Seconds and ends with 1982's Pornography -- acknowledged as such by Rhino, who unloaded deluxe reissues of all three on the same day -- Faith now comes with the expected second disc of demos, outtakes, scarcities, and so-so-sounding performance material. The most noteworthy addition to Faith's original running order is "Carnage Visors," a sprawling funeral march that gradually fades in and then out after half an hour, as if it's only a segment from a piece that's being generated until the end of time. Its actual purpose: as a score to a film, made by Simon Gallup's brother, which preceded the band during some tour dates. Previously available only on the cassette version of Faith, it appears at the end of disc one, giving the album proper the feel of a double LP. (So, instead of the traditional, frenzied freak-out that you'd get at the end of some psychedelics-addled albums in the late '60s, you now have a mope-out that kicks the morbid tone of the earlier songs further downward.) The second disc opens with four barren demos trailed by an equal number of relatively clean-sounding studio outtakes. An alternate take of "Primary" puts the album version in front of a fun house mirror; the other three scraps are also for manic obsessives and few others. Distant-sounding live tracks, taken from several performances, will interest as many listeners, though the presence of a nine-minute "Forever" is worthy of a little more excitement (a studio version has surfaced on bootlegs, making it one of those much-talked-about rarities). The black licorice gumball at the bottom is "Charlotte Sometimes," a non-album A-side released in the autumn of 1981. As hoped, Faith itself sounds better than ever, whether it acts as a trip down memory lane or a minor revelation for moody teenagers. -- Andy Kellman\n\nAmazon.com Product Description\nOriginally a Goth-flavored post-punk outfit, the Cure evolved into one of the truly seminal bands of the '80s, and ultimately one of modern rock's most celebrated and influential acts. Guided by creative visionary Robert Smith, the Cure's signature sound balances a dreamy pop savvy with a dark, brooding majesty and fuses superbly crafted, literate songs with a feverish emotional intensity. The band's early catalog-newly remastered and expanded wtih a wealth of rarities-is a series of masterpieces that laid the groundwork for their phenomenal and enduring popularity. \n\nAMAZON.COM CUSTOMER REVIEW\nQuestioning the new "Faith" , January 5, 2006\nReviewer: A. Davis "music nut" (florida)\nAlthough heavy in topic the music of FAITH is marked with a sad beauty. Icy synth sounds feature heavily throughout and, combined with the machine-like pulse of Lol Tolhurst's drum kit, gives the music a fragile feel. Echo and reverb are treated on instruments and voices alike that linger over the music of FAITH like a heavy fog. \n\n"All Cats Are Grey" is lyrically sparse, yet conveys greater emotion through it's lengthy instrumental passages. The superb "Other Voices" has a great bass riff (courtesy of Simon Gallup) and opens with one of Robert Smith's memorable anguished howls. Two of FAITH's songs disrupt the dark tranquility of the album with surprising jolts (one being the propulsive tempo of "A Primary" and the other the jarringly violent "Doubt"). "The Holy Hour" and "Faith" are also standouts. \n\nFAITH is a four-star recording, but the latest repackaging of this fine album adds a bonus disc of largely forgettable material, and for this I feel I must subtract a star from the overall rating. Because B-side material from the Cure's singles was relegated to the JOIN THE DOTS box set, that leaves out-takes (mostly uninteresting instrumentals), demo material (murkily recorded, skeletal versions of FAITH tracks), and live performances to fill the bonus CD. Still, there are a few treasures to be found here. The early version of "A Primary" that is revealed here is practically a new song in itself. The A-Side single "Charlotte Sometimes" is awkwardly tacked on at the very end, but is a welcome addition nonetheless. And immerse yourself in the extended live version of "Faith" if you want the lingering feeling of gloom to last a little longer. \n\nIf the bonus disc did not add to the sticker price of the final product then I wouldn't raise much fuss. I have nothing but praise for the Rhino label and the packaging for the Cure reissues is very impressive (lyrics, liner notes, and lots of photos including Robert Smith entering his trademark wild-hair and make-up persona). This reissue nicely summarizes the look and sound of this early period in the Cure's history. More surprises were yet to come.\n\nAMAZON.COM CUSTOMER REVIEW\nStill Holding Up, November 5, 2005\nReviewer: Thomas D. Ryan "American Hit Network" (New York)\nWhile 'Seventeen Seconds' was dark, 'Faith' is pitch black. 'Seventeen Seconds' may have been sullen, but 'Faith' is downright bleak. For all of that, it's also a slightly better album than its predecessor. Singer/songwriter Robert Smith was getting very good at expressing depression, even when it was painfully over wrought (I'm sorry, but every time I hear him singing about 'crying at the funeral party', I have a perverse desire to laugh out loud). 'Faith' was the perfect record to play if you felt incapable of crying but wanted to experience your depression anyway. It offers eight dirges, each one capturing a different nuance of catatonic pain. The naive but appealing simplicity of "Boys Don't Cry" (their first album) is further expanded on here, but with some subtle and yet very significant changes. Words are boiled down to almost nothing, while the music provides atmospherics that fill in the moody blanks. For effect, somebody spent a hundred bucks on a flanger pedal, and quite obviously must have liked it, since it appears on virtually every song here, along with tons of echo and reverb. \nFor all of the atmospherics, though, the real mood setter is Robert Smith's voice; never in the history of recorded music has someone sounded so distracted, doleful, and depressed. He makes late-era Billy Holiday sound like Mary Poppins. I could be judgmental and claim that the album contains only eight songs due to a lack of songwriting ideas, but I think it is more due to the fact that they simply could not bring themselves to edit the chord progressions. Many songs build for over two minutes before vocals enter, but this only adds to the hypnotic appeal of the depressing themes. This utterly simple (or mind-numbingly redundant) game plan results in a record that is, for better or worse, extremely consistent in content, and in mood. \nThe extra disk (and extra track on disk one) is even creepier - and somehow even simpler in structure - than the main album. The audio quality for some of it sounds like it was recorded in a bathroom...underwater. Most tunes consist of a few repetitive, hypnotic chords, making time slow down like some musical version of Einstein's theory of relativity. "Carnage Visors" does this for thirty full minutes, with no vocal. \nThe fact is, you already know if you like the Cure or not. "Faith" captures them at a point in time when they completely abandon commercial acceptance and leap headlong into cult status. If you'd like to know where stylized gloom developed, then you've come to the right place.\n\nAMAZON.COM CUSTOMER REVIEW\nUtter Perfection, May 20, 2005\nReviewer: J. Brady (PAWLEYS ISLAND, SC United States)\nSleek. Streamlined. Minimalist. Incredibly beautiful and surprisingly varied. Faith manages to capture the Cure at their creative peak. From start to finish, this album is nothing short of perfection. The words and vocals, the music, the production and engineering - they all fall right into place. Nearly all these songs can be considered Cure classics ( for the fans of the band who prefer the darker, more serious Cure to the upbeat, more pop oriented side). Primary. Other Voices. The Funeral Party. And my personal favourite The Drowning Man. All incredible. This remastered and expanded edition sounds terrific as well, which is icing on the cake. The original cd issue on the Elektra label just didn't sound quite right. There was distortion in many of the basslines, and the keyboards sounded hollow and tinny. This version corrects those mastering mistakes. The synths are warm and rich in tone, and the highs and lows in the mix are much easier on the ear. Granted, the subject matter isn't exactly "upbeat" but the messages are important, and certainly open to interpretation. Listen to the final, title track. The last words - "there's nothing left but faith" - can be seen as a sign of defeat or of hope, depending on how it is taken. The extras on the bonus disc are a revelation, tracking the evolution of the songs on Faith, from listening to the demos, the songs in their rawest form, to hearing the live versions, where they are performed with complete conviction, if not total technical proficiency. My favourite here has to be the often bootlegged, 10 minute version of the title cut "Faith" performed in Australia and originally featured on the b-side to the Charlotte Sometimes 12" single. "This is the last song it's called Faith" Robert says. Turn the volume up very loud and you can here one lone female scream, then the count-off "one, two, three, four" and the familiar beat kicks in, the mourful bassline, and Robert's signature guitar playing. This IS the Cure. \n\nAMAZON.COM CUSTOMER REVIEW\nHeadlong dive into grey., May 3, 2005\nReviewer: Michael Stack (Chelmsford, MA USA)\nOften considered the middle of a trilogy of albums progressively darker in mood, "Faith" is an album about just that, about faith, or lack thereof. It is a stark, almost minimalist album, with Robert Smith handling keyboard as well as well as guitar duties and joined by bassist Simon Gallup and drummer Lol Tolhurst, the album is hushed, almost minimalist-- stretches where notes ring out over the light percussion background, there's little in the way of the ringing guitars that dominated the previous record, and the album is largely unaggressive in its presentation. This actually works quite to the strengths of Gallup and Tolhurst-- with the guitars and keyboards assuming a passive role, the bass is as aggressively voiced and Tolhurst's somewhat limited and minimalist technique match the music beautifully. \n\nIn fact, its a dark, funereal tone that drives the majority of this material, songs like "Holy Hour", "All Cats are Grey" and the bizarrely uplifting "The Funeral Party" don't rise in aggression above a sort of dark hazy swell, and even somewhat more aggressive pieces like the fantastic "Primary" and the title track maintain a despondent tone and a sort of hushed feel. The result is largely an album of delicate, fragile beauty, where the rare extroverted moments (the positively jangly "Doubt" and the much more aggressive "The Drowning Man") are somewhat shocking and almost out of place. \n\nFor this reissue, the remastering has, if anything added to the album a great deal-- while the record deals in hushed tones and quiet synths, there's no sense of fuzziness throughout the album courtesy of the crisp remastered sound. Again, the liner notes detail the creation of the album (in rather candid tone at that), and the reissue is filled with extra material-- the dark and bubbling (and seemingly endless at 27+ minutes) "Carnage Visors" and the great single "Charlotte Sometimes" are the gems this time around, with again a number of great live takes on material from the album and a series of demos that are interesting but ultimately unfulfilling on their own. \n\n"Faith" is in many ways the musical equivalent of its cover-- a sort of grey album. It has a number of powerful moments, and while it can be a bit overwhelming due to its endlessly dark quality, it is a fine album. Recommended.\n\nAMAZON.COM CUSTOMER REVIEW\nSounds better than before, April 27, 2005\nReviewer: EerieVonEvil (The Rabbit Hole)\nThis review reflects the Pornography and Seventeen Seconds re-releases as well, but mostly discusses Faith Classic Cure remastered. Awesome. The middle of the three of their most morose works, Faith, is definitely their peak. The state of the band at this time influenced this record and especially Pornography, and thank goodness for it. The bass is thumping louder and the drums have more life to them. You have to hear it to know what I mean. Carnage Visors is the ultimate treat on this remaster. It's a 30+ minute soundtrack that The Cure did to an eerie student film of the same name that they played before shows to get the crowd in the right (or wrong) mood for what lied ahead. It has a brooding, menacing sound to it; It climaxes towards the end too, starting off slowly with metallic guitars, thundering bass and macabre synths until ultimatley everything grows louder and more intense. A must hear for any Cure fan who loves the Faith album (or any of them). Even if you have the original album it is worth it to get this, there is a BIG difference in sound. The best part is that the new mastering doesnt hinder the music. It actually makes it better to listen to. The bonus songs truly are hit and miss, mostly quality-wise. The good studio songs that are on here for the first time are excellent. It's just too bad their are no vocals... for any of them... on any of the three recent remasters. But they are still good. The live stuff is so-so... quality is pretty sour and the "home demos" are about the same quality as the live stuff so ya know. This goes for Seventeen Seconds and Pornography (which has the best new sound!). These albums managed to pack an emotional punch when they were first released, and they still do the same thing to this day. The lyrics on Faith create a vision of desolation and despair, and the music guides these visions into your very heart. You can call it goth. I call it soothing. This album along with Pornography and Seventeen Seconds all have the same eerieness; The same chilling edge that makes these albums so timeless... and classic. They literally self-destructed for a short while during this time period, and these albums reflect the emotional tailspins and debauchery shown in Robert Smith's lyrics. Just read the lyrics to Doubt and you'll see what I mean. Do yourself a favor and pick this up. A great buy even if you have to shell out a lil' cash for it. Special note: All Cats Are Grey is somehow twice as intoxicating now...\n\nHalf.com Details \nProducer: Mike Hedges, The Cure \n\nAlbum Notes\nEngineers: Mike Hedges, Graham Carmichael, David Kemp.\n\nThe Cure: Robert Smith (vocals, guitar, flute, piano, keyboards, synthesizer, bass guitar); Simon Gallup (bass guitar); Laurence Tolhurst (drums, drum machine).\n\nRecording information: Morgan Studios, North London, United Kingdom (1980 - 1981).\n\nIf you ever observed (or were) a pale depressed-looking teenager dressed entirely in black, sitting in the corner scribbling frantically into a marble bound notebook, then you already understand the Cure. In the 1980s, the Cure provided the soundtrack for an entire generation of misfit toys, and if SEVENTEEN SECONDS was a wake-up call for the dispossessed, FAITH is the daily affirmation. Scaled back down to a three-piece with the loss of keyboardist Hartley, the Cure is a lean, mean fighting machine, ready to rumble.\n"Rumble" is the best way to describe the propulsive bass playing of Simon Gallup, whose rolling bass anchors both mid-tempo numbers like "The Drowning Man" and faster fare such as "Primary." While no new ground is broken ("Doubt" is basically a rewrite of "Play for Today"), FAITH is stunning in its simplicity and haunting beauty, as evidenced by "All Cats Are Grey" and "The Funeral Party." Even drummer and mascot Lol Tolhurst's minimal beats work to perfection next to the spare-yet-effective instrumentation of "Faith." This is quintessential Cure.\nThis remastered edition features a 15-track bonus disc of rarities that includes numerous demos, studio outtakes, and live performances.\n\nIndustry Reviews\nIncluded in AP's 10 Essential Goth Albums - ...Epitomizes the Cure's sense of gravitas...It's short, but the earth stands still regardless.\nAlternative Press (11/01/2001)\n\n4 stars out of 5 - [T]here's a warmth and meditative quality to Smith's production and songwriting...\n\n'Primary' is as catchy as anything Ian Curtis managed.
This rock cd contains 9 tracks and runs 65min 5sec.
Freedb: 740f3f09
Buy: from Amazon.com

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