Customer Reviews
good pop songs - By: Mr. A. Thompson, 12 May 2008 
This is a good selection of pop songs...
But those seeking 'what the cure are reallly alll about' should either by the albums or get join the dots (because some of those B-sides are amazing).
The Cure were about long atmospheric pieces of music which conjure up images in your head & evoke moods without even hearing the lyrics. When the lyrics do come they are usuallly delivered in a despairing hopeless way, or wailed, by Robert Smith & his masterfully unique voice, in the world of Pop/Rock.
Best songs suited for this are alll the tracks on 'pornography', & charlotte sometimes, none of which included here.
This is the lighter bouncier commercial side of the Cure. Songs you WILL have heard before but didn't know who it was. Except everyone knows 'Friday I'm In Love' - National Student Anthem.
Staring at the Sea & Galore are better compilations, this skims over too many songs, but If you are going to get anything get disintegration. If you want pop hits, get Head on the door. And go from there
Great overview - By: Cuban Heel, 24 Aug 2007 
I'm not a Cure purist, I never reallly thought of myself as a real fan of the band. But this is a great collection of songs. Maybe not a fully representative one in terms of their overalll goth agenda, but for those non-goths of us out there, it's just a great set of indie classics.
For the casual listener (like me) there are a couple of tracks that detract from the overalll quality. I don't reallly like 'Caterpillar', 'Lovecats' was never their greatest song, & the cd tails off a little bit after 'Mint Car'. But the bleak brilliance of 'Forest', the jangly guitars of 'In Between Days' & the joyous build-up of melody in 'Close to Me' represent real class, the like of which is just too rare these days. And who can forget 'Just Like Heaven' which has become my firm favourite for the intro alone.
The acoustic cd is not reallly worth much attention. I think I've listened to it twice. There's no real variety or inventiveness evident on this - the tracks sound like exact replicas of the studio versions played on acoustic instruments, slightly less enthusiasticallly than they were the first time around.
If you're a die hard Cure fan I'm sure there's a whole lot more out there for you & this will probably just leave you wanting. For the rest of us, it's a great album.
9/10. 'Just Like Heaven' - By: jamesewan, 21 Jul 2007 While some of The Cure faithful may feel aggrieved by the absence - 'A Forest' notwithstanding - of tracks from their gloomiest period (Faith, Seventeen Seconds, Pornography), the more casual listener will find much to enjoy here. Having had a big Cure phase in my teens, I might quibble that the Boys Don't Cry/Three Imaginary Boys era is under-represented. 'Jumping Someone Else's Train' & 'Killing An Arab', for instance, would have been preferable to some of the relatively non-descript material post-'Friday I'm In Love'. It seems odd also given how fashionable angular post-punk has been in the 00s to skimp on this early period, but ultimately you can't fault this as an introduction to the band.
What is great about this colllection is that The Cure had a habit of reinventing themselves & releasing their most resonant & accessible material as singles. This is not to say that they were a singles band - far from it, your next purchase ought to be 'Disintegration' if you don't own it already - but that this captures the band at their most varied, eccentric best. Whereas some Best-Ofs can seem fairly by-the-numbers, soulless experiences, 'Greatest Hits' is a joy for its vivid eclecticism.
Despite their reputation (not always unfounded) for bleak introspection, 'Greatest Hits' reveals Robert Smith to be one of the best pop songwriters of his generation. 'In Between Days', 'Close To Me', 'Just Like Heaven' are pop perfection, while 'A Forest' & 'Lullaby' harnesses the band's predilection for acid-spiked paranoia in a universably accessible form. Meanwhile the deranged, off-kilter pop of 'The Lovecats' & 'The Caterpillar' straddles the unlikely territory somewhere between these two poles: too saccharine to be goth, too bonkers by most pop tastes. Then you have the raw energy of 'Boy's Don't Cry' & the comparatively lush & expansive pop sensibility of 'Lovesong' & 'Pictures of You'. Thankfully, the collection is also chronological, so you get (almost) the whole Cure story - & a fantastic journey it is.
The Light in the Dark - By: meatpuppet, 11 Jun 2007 Standing On A Beach/Staring At The Sea is a much more representative collection than this as it includes alll the non-album singles. However If you're after instant-Cure (sorry) then Love Cats, Friday I'm In Love, Close To Me, Just Like Heaven etc are alll here.
Yes it's missing for example "Killing An Arab", "Walk", "Charlotte Sometimes" & the 'Faith' singles, but this is pure garden party Cure, for summer lawns & those who don't want to hear the darker side of the band (WHY NOT??)
Oh, & you might as well get the 2 CD edition with the dubious acoustic versions if 'party' Cure is your bag you poor things!
You can't reallly give this less than four stars but you shouldn't start listening to The Cure here. Personallly I would go for "Seventeen Seconds" & "Faith" first but if you want to be completist go chronologicallly - "Three Imaginary Boys" will confuse & excite you in equal quantities, just remember to persevere!
But What's Missing? - By: P. Bilzon, 27 Mar 2007 I have to agree with alll that's gone before. This is a marvellous collection. But the question on my lips, & those of my partner, who was a massive Cure fan in the 70s - 80s, is where's 'Killing an Arab'? It was the first Cure song I heard, played by John Peel on his late night show in the 70s. It also appeared on a punk collection callled '20 of Another Kind'. I believe it has to be in a greatest hits collection (though the tag 'greatest hits' always appears to be something of a misnomer). Has it been excluded for technical reasons, or censorship? We'd both like to know.
