The Cure’s Robert Smith walked on stage in front of a very sold out crowd at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood to start night 2 of the 3-day Los Angeles stop of their “Reflections” tour … and he finished 45 songs later! This unique and stunning concert experience was exactly that, for old fans and new, it was an experience. It was a celebration of the band’s origins. The first three sets consisted of The Cure’s first three albums played in their entirety: Three Imaginary Boys (1979), Seventeen Seconds (1980), and Faith (1981). The three encores that followed were filled with B-sides and popular singles from throughout the band’s history, providing every fan both with something familiar and something new.
As Los Angeles saw with prince’s takeover of the city earlier this year, it’s great when an artist does something different and unique for their fans. The Cure’s “Reflections” tour gives their fans a new way to experience their performances. The opportunity to see an album played in its entirety is rare (i.e. Flaming Lips playing The Soft Bulletin @ Hollywood Forever in June), so the opportunity to see three consecutive albums is truly novel. The Cure has a very extensive discography from over 30 years of releasing albums and a 45 song set is a pretty damn good way of giving fans the songs they want to hear.
The show was organized like a 4-act play. It started with the quirky, offbeat, and unpolished Three Imaginary Boys. Their debut album has hit singles such as “10:15 Saturday Night” which started off the night and “Fire in Cairo”. It is the most recognizable of the three albums on this tour and immediately engaged the crowd. The stripped down stage and white lighting during this set played perfectly to the minimalism of the album.
Seventeen Seconds, as a second act, provided a more dramatic scene with the dark and eery whispers of “M” and a beautifully haunting version of “A Forest”. Fog machines turned the stage into a vision of the forest from the song and front lighting cast large shadows of the band members on the curtains behind the stage. Robert Smith’s shadow, whether intentional or not, resembled the shadows behind the curtain in their “Boy’s Don’t Cry” music video.
The third act, Faith, acted as the resolution to the 3-act play with a tone of wistful funereal grandeur. Then, to keep the play analogy going a little longer, the cast came on stage and played the hits! Smith finished with three encores, moving from one great song to the next. The crowd sang and danced to “Boys Don’t Cry” and “Jumping Someone Else’s Train” which are B-sides from Three Imaginary Boys that were included in the full length album Boys Don’t Cry. The third encore finished on a great high with “Let’s Go to Bed”, “The Walk”, and “The Lovecats”!
Pantages Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard
The Pantages Theatre provided an excellent backdrop, not surprisingly, for the theatre angle of the night. The sound quality was excellent and Robert Smith’s surprisingly strong voice and trademark squeals permeated every corner of the theatre. The expansive venue was necessary for the capacity crowd while still allowing for high acoustic quality. However, Pantages was not ideal for the rock concert angle. The security staff was noticeably unaccustomed to dealing with the type of crowd at a rock show. There were several bars inside the venue but no alcoholic beverages were allowed inside the theatre area, which led to masses of unsuspecting people with full drinks huddled around TVs with a live feed to the show they weren’t allowed to see. Thus fans had to decide: miss songs or chug your drink? Not a very difficult question to answer, but very inconvenient. Security staff also patrolled the aisleways strictly enforcing the “stay in your assigned seat” and “keep your arms and legs inside your area” policies.
It’s impossible to play every song in their catalog, so casual fans of “Friday I’m in Love”, “Close To Me” or the Wild Mood Swings album may have been left wanting. The “Reflections” tour, however, is not intended for the casual fan. It is a celebration of the band’s history and their fans, and its something other bands can learn from.
Set List:
Three Imaginary Boys
10:15 Saturday Night
Accuracy
Grinding Halt
Another Day
Object
Subway Song
Foxy Lady
Meathook
So What
Fire In Cairo
It’s Not You
Three Imaginary Boys
The Weedy Burton
Seventeen Seconds
A Reflection
Play For Today
Secrets
In Your House
Three
The Final Sound
A Forest
M
At Night
Seventeen Seconds
Faith
The Holy Hour
Primary
Other Voices
All Cats Are Grey
The Funeral Party
Doubt
The Drowning Man
Faith
Encore
World War
I’m Cold
Plastic Passion
Boys Don’t Cry
Killing An Arab
Jumping Someone Else’s Train
Another Journey By Train
Encore 2
Descent
Splintered In Her Head
Charlotte Sometimes
The Hanging Garden
Encore 3
Let’s Go To Bed
The Walk
The Lovecats
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