ROBERT SMITH speaks. Well he'd have to really. Wouldn't make his way through the world being silent all the time. On this occasion, however, he speaks to JON LEWIN about guitars, heroes, and all the other things in the big type.

EARLY DAYS

The first appearance was as a five piece, The Easy Cure — we sounded like a punk group as we turned everything up so loud we just got this great wall of feedback — more like the Jesus & Mary Chain, ten years early. Porl was in the group at that stage, though he left soon after, so we stripped it all down to just me, Lol, and Michael, to a very minimal idea of bass being a lead instrument, guitar filling in and drums playing simple patterns.

ROLE MODELS

First time we played with Wire I was very impressed with how powerful they were... stark, very atmospheric, even though what they were playing was still quite hummable. After that I wanted the group to harden up a bit, which is why Michael eventually left, and what led into "17 Seconds". But there weren't any real role models. And I always thought the Buzzcocks did what we were trying to do better.

Playing with the Banshees the first time, when I was doubling up with The Cure, it was just so different as the Banshees had Severin playing bass, Budgie drumming, which was much harder than what we were doing. People thought I wanted us to be a whimsical pop group, but I didn't. When we were doing 'Boys Don't Cry', that was what I wanted to do, but I wanted us to change.

PLAYING WITH THE BANSHEES:

I had to copy quite rigidly what John McKay had been playing — I had it all written down in scrapbooks that I kept on a little lectern at the side of the stage, and they took it away after the second night! If I ever forgot what I was doing, which was quite often — there was an MXR flanger, that typical Banshees sound — I just used to kick that on and hit an open chord until I could remember what I was supposed to be doing. No-one seemed to notice. I had two days rehearsal to learn the whole of "Join Hands" and "The Screams".

It was much more difficult the second time, trying to learn John McGeoch's guitar parts, as he's a much more interesting guitarist, though he actually helped, gave me hints, as I did to Carruthers — I gave Carruthers all my scrapbooks when I left.

GUITARS

I started on a Top 20 — the first album was recorded on it, and that's the only guitar I keep at home — it's still one of my favourites — memories... Through the next five years I played these two old Jazzmasters that I've still got, which I really like. I use them in the studio, but I don't take them to concerts any more as I m worried that they'll be destroyed. I always played Fenders exclusively up until getting my SG.

When we were finishing this album, we were over in Compass Point and the only guitar they had in the studio was an old SG, and as soon as I picked it up, I thought what a glorious guitar, and I'd never even tried one before. So I thought, maybe someone will buy one for my birthday. And Porl did, an old 1960s SG Custom. It's just completely different from a Fender, the feel of it, the sound as well. It has a really dense sound, which obviously a Telecaster hasn't.

MORE GUITARS

All the normal guitar on the album is an old Tele I've had about 10 years, though we used a lot of different guitars on the record, and on stage on the next tour, between me and Porl we'll be using seven different ones. That's because there are songs which rely on particular sounds, like a 12-string Ovation, or a Fender Electric XII, and then there's a Fender six-string bass.

Over the years I've bought up a fair collection of instruments. I only ever bought things when I actually wanted to play them — I've just swapped a Vox Teardrop with built-in distortion and echo, plus an old Ovation, for a Coral electric sitar. I've been trying to get one for years. The bloke who had it didn't want money, he just wanted another odd guitar. I'll be using that on stage — brilliant sound.

The sitar on 'If Only Tonight' on the album is a Mirage sample — though I have got a sitar, and I did attempt playing it for real for about four years, but I ended up being worse than when I started. It takes 15 years to become proficient.

GUITAR STYLE

If you ask a guitarist what's the first chord he plays when he picks up a guitar, you'll probably get an idea of what's to follow — A minor.

GUITAR STYLE

We always used to use Roland JCs in the group, but they didn't throw enough, so when the stages got bigger I just couldn't hear what I was playing. We changed to Peavey because they're a bit bigger, but just as clean. Very basic. We use them in the studio as well. Porl uses the Studio Chorus, I use a 412S cabinet, and the amp with a graphic on it, just for a clean sound.

EFFECTS

I'm very luddite with my equipment, advances in technology, MIDI and stuff. I've just been persuaded to use a DEP-5. I haven't actually opened the manual yet, though I have found a really good backwards echo. Everything else I use is Boss pedals in one of those little carrying cases, and I swap them about depending on what I want. And a Cry Baby wah wah I've had since the group's inception. I've been told it's become a very fashionable guitar accessory again — I keep reading about new designs of wab wah. It's like when you buy a car you always see your make on the road.

"I'm very luddite with my equipment, advances in technology, MIDI and stuff. I've just been persuaded to use a DEP-5. I haven't actually opened the manual yet, though I have found a really good backwards echo..."

WRITING SONGS ON BASS

A lot of the songs that we've done over the years I've written on the bass. I think I've been influenced by listening to Severin play really, strumming bass chords. I was given the six-string bass by Mike Hedges when we were doing "17 Seconds", and as soon as I got that I thought — ah, unusual sound, and I translated that back on to guitar.

I just like the power that's in the bass guitar, and it's good to write songs on, as you can get away with just playing a note over which you can augment it however you want, whereas if you're playing a chord it rather limits things. "Why Can't I Have You" is an obvious example on the new album.

HARMONIES

I think I still tend towards a very minimal approach when we're in the studio — the less there is, the better, as it means the actual idea's good. Although our records have become more lush over the years, my voice is the last bastion really. I like the naivety of it stuck on its own... I don't always worry about singing perfectly in key, as I'm much more concerned with what it sounds like emotionally — and it would be a bit ludicrous to accentuate a flat note by putting a harmony behind it...

WHO DOES WHAT?

No-one is really tied to their instrument; apart from Boris on drums; everyone else apart from Lol (who can't play guitar or bass), but me Simon and Porl all play bass, guitar and keyboards, but we only credit Simon with playing bass as he doesn't want anyone to know he plays keyboards, he thinks it's a girly instrument. Usually what happens is we work for expediency's sake. I play something rough, and we figure who's going to play it best — there's no pride in sticking to your own instrument...

RECORDING THE ALBUM

We allowed ourselves a certain amount of time, we'd demoed everything, knew what we wanted to do, and finished a single album's worth of songs within a week, so from that point on we could just do what we wanted, knowing that whatever happened we'd still have an album. It was a very free-thinking few weeks... there were some attempts that went horribly wrong. Something like 'Hot Hot Hot' probably wouldn't have made it on to a single Cure album, but with the variety of stuff all around it, it works really well.

WHO SHALL WE PLAY LIKE TODAY?

While we were recording, we'd deliberately try to play like particular groups: Chic, in the case of 'Hot Hot Hot', Booker T & The MGs on 'Hey You', Led Zeppelin for 'Fight', "Umma Gumma" period Pink Floyd for 'Snakepit'... the guitar on 'All I Want', I was trying to get the Neil Young 'Rust Never Sleeps' guitar sound. We did actually manage to duplicate that, but then we pulled back as it was a bit obvious, and just left it as a garagey sound — that was through a little WEM Clubman with everything turned up and stuck in the bathroom.

WRITING THE ALBUM

We had 104 basic ideas, either chord sequences or tunes, because the others all contributed. Normally we wait until I think I've got enough songs to warrant making an album, and then the group interprets that. This time, I thought I'd get the others to bring in what they'd been doing, as everyone has a portastudio at home, and they all moaned 'do we have to?' But that added the second album, because a lot of it was really good stuff. 'Fight' is really Porl's idea, 'Perfect Girl' was one of Simon's things — he writes very chirpy stuff, though he also thought of the initial idea of 'Icing Sugar', which is probably the weirdest thing on the record.

HORNS

We got an acceptable brass section up by MIDI-ing the Emulator and the Mirage together, and sometimes the JX8P as well, and that was left standing, that was our horn section... we were actually going to double all the horn parts, though we made sure they sounded as close as possible, because that influences the way that other instruments work.

We were planning to do the horns in Nassau, in Compass Point, and I found this sax player in a bar there. First he played on 'Hey You' and 'Icing Sugar', and we then were going to get his brass section down, but he thought that the synth brass on 'Hey You' was real, so we reckoned we may as well leave it. Also because I was there on my own, I was feeling the pressure by then, and I couldn't stand the thought of trying to co-ordinate four unknown brass players...

DA FUTURE

We're trying to get away from doing so much live work. We're doing 70 concerts this year, and I worry about the concerts dropping below our increasingly high standard. When it's good, it's glorious, but when it's bad, it's horribly depressing, and it's difficult to keep it up when you play five dates in a row. Lots of improvisation has crept in during rehearsal, and that'll probably spill out on stage, so we don't even know how long we'll be on. When Lol was drumming, we couldn't improvise, as he wouldn't have known what was occurring.

ON BEING IN A BAND

I never held any expectations... no, that's a glib answer... I always thought that every group should be able to do whatever it wants to do, and it only gradually dawned on me that most groups didn't — they did either what was expected of them, or what they thought would sell most.

WHAT IS THE CURE?

Without exception, Cure line-ups changed because of the music — sometimes people don't like the direction I want to take. They're only in the group because they want to be. They can do what they want within a framework. The framework? It's What I Like.