The Cure have announced details of their upcoming single, ‘A Fragile Thing’ – confirming that it’ll arrive later this week.
The promise of new music comes as the post-punk legends have been preparing for the release of ‘Songs Of A Lost World’ in recent weeks. It’ll be their first album in 16 years, following on from 2008’s ‘4:13 Dream’, and has already been previewed by the lead single ‘Alone’.
Yesterday (October 6), Robert Smith and co. dropped a teaser of the second single planned via the group’s fan WhatsApp channel and mailing list. Now, they have revealed more details of the upcoming release on social media.
Taking to Instagram this afternoon, the band shared another snippet of the track and revealed that it’ll be available to listen to in full on Wednesday (October 9).
The snippet seems to be taken from the song’s introduction, and the accompanying visuals are similar to those shown before – depicting a portrait carved into a stone. Check it out below.
Following the lead single being shared ahead of the album’s November 1 release date, pre-order here, Smith has revealed that ‘Alone’ was inspired by the Ernest Dowson poem Dregs, and shared a number of new paintings that are going to auction for charity.
‘Alone’ was also one of many new tracks previewed on the band’s 90-date, 33-country ‘Shows Of A Lost World’ tour in 2022.
NME caught one of that tour’s dates at London’s OVO Arena Wembley, where they also gave ‘A Fragile Thing’ an early airing. In the four-star review of the show, NME noted: “The ticking clock piano rhythms and rolling bass of ‘A Fragile Thing’ accompany the promise that there’s ‘nothing you can do to change the end’.”
The profoundly moving tone of ‘A Fragile Thing’ may be influenced by the passing of Smith’s mother, father and brother, which he revealed in 2019 was the source for some of the new record’s “darkness”.
The band have been discussing ‘Songs Of A Lost World’ for some time, telling NME after their 2019 Glastonbury headline set that the record would be “merciless” and “express the darker side of what I’ve experienced over the last few years”.
Similarly, when speaking to NME backstage at the BandLab NME Awards 2022, Smith revealed that the band were working on two albums – describing ‘Songs Of A Lost World’ as “relentless doom and gloom” and the second one as “upbeat”.
Since its official announcement, Smith has shared his thoughts on why the record has taken so long to see the light of day: “I don’t think there was really a kind of an official beginning to this album because it’s been kind of drifting in and out of my life for like an awful long time. I mean if I have one regret is that I said anything at all about it in 2019 because I really shouldn’t have done that,” he said.
Before the LP’s release, the band will be playing two shows for the BBC at the end of this month. You can enter a ballot for tickets to the first show on the BBC’s website until 9pm BST October 9. The band have been teasing another song, ‘Endsong’, too, although further details about that track remain unknown for now.
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