Music
An upbeat Robert Smith serenades the Isle Of Wight with a tune-packed two-hour set.
Earlier today, Bestival co-founder Rob da Bank confessed he was a teenage Cure freak, and tried for years to tempt Robert Smith’s melancholy post-punks out to Bestival. He finally managed in 2011, and Smith must have had a good time – because this year, says Rob, The Cure frontman volunteered himself.
Catch all the action from Bestival live on Red Bull TV at RedBull.tv/Bestival
Forty years old this year and proclaimed an influence by musicians as diverse as Dizzee Rascal, Adele and Crystal Castles, The Cure are a British music institution. But they’re hardly flagging – the opposite, in fact. Their festival sets have rightly become the stuff of legend in recent years, stretching out to two or even three hours.
I was here last year thinking please, Duran Duran, play your single
But there soon follows glorious renditions of upbeat Cure numbers like Friday I’m In Love, Just Like Heaven and Lovesong. By their standards, jokes Smith, it’s a hit-packed set. “I was here last year thinking please, Duran Duran, play your single,” he quips. “So I’m out there now in spirit.”
Even when they get dark, though – as on their first encore, with moody readings of Burn and The Forest – it’s engrossing. The Cure are the rare sort of band who can play a set that’ll delight the fans who want to hear that forgotten B-side from the mid-‘80s, but still entertain those who don’t know anything but the singles. And even their melancholy moments are curiously uplifting.
Scroll down to see every song The Cure played at Bestival 2016.
Setlist
- Open
- High
- The Walk
- The Baby Screams
- Push
- In Between Days
- Lullaby
- The Caterpillar
- Let’s Go to Bed
- Sleep When I'm Dead
- Friday I'm in Love
- Doing the Unstuck
- Pictures of You
- Lovesong
- Just Like Heaven
- Boys Don't Cry
- From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea
- End
Encore 1
- Burn
- A Forest
Encore 2
- Fascination Street
- Never Enough
- Wrong Number
Encore 3
- The Lovecats
- Hot Hot Hot!!!
- Close To Me
- Why Can’t I Be You
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