title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith was also not the sole songwriter or lyricist in the group during their early years; the band name 'Easy Cure' came from a song penned by Lol Tolhurst, while "Grinding Halt" began as a Tolhurst lyric that Smith shortened to the first half of each line. Easy Cure condensed its name to The Cure shortly afterwards. Between 1978–79, Smith composed and recorded demo versions of some of The Cure's definitive early songs on his sister Janet's Hammond organ with a built-in tape recorder, including "".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: By the time the "NME" interviewed the band in October 1979 during their tour with Siouxsie and the Banshees, Smith was acknowledged as the principal writer of "almost all of The Cure's songs and lyrics", and stated that he was uncomfortable playing and singing songs that weren't his own. Following his return from the Banshees' tour, Smith also composed most of the music for the album "Seventeen Seconds" using the Hammond, a drum machine and his trademark Top 20 Woolworth's guitar, during a home demo session in his parents' basement. Most of the lyrics had been written in one night in Newcastle. Michael Dempsey, discussing his own departure from the group at this time, later remarked:


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Although Smith wrote most of the lyrics for "Seventeen Seconds", many were also rewritten by the group during the recording of the album itself. Dempsey's replacement Simon Gallup described the collective writing process to "Sounds" in 1980: Lol Tolhurst later stated that he, Gallup and Smith all wrote lyrics for The Cure's early albums, and that the group dynamic only changed after their 1982 album "Pornography": Tolhurst claimed to have written the lyrics for "All Cats Are Grey" from the 1981 album "Faith", which he later re-recorded with his own project, Levinhurst. In contrast to Tolhurst's recollection of their songwriting as a group effort until after 'Pornography', in 1982 Smith claimed to have written "90 per cent of the 'Pornography' album", and that he therefore couldn't leave The Cure, because it wouldn't be The Cure without him.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: For their first four albums ("Three Imaginary Boys", "Seventeen Seconds", "Faith" and "Pornography"), all members of the group had received equal songwriting credits. With Simon Gallup's departure reducing the group to a duo, and Tolhurst quitting drums to start taking keyboard lessons, from July 1982 until Gallup's return in February 1985, according to Smith, much of the writing and recording process within The Cure effectively became a solo effort. Nonetheless, Tolhurst was credited as co-writer of five of the eight songs featured on 1983's singles and b-sides collection "Japanese Whispers" (including "Let's Go to Bed" and "The Walk"), while "The Love Cats", "Lament" and "The Dream" were credited to Smith only. Of 1984's "The Top", Smith would say it was "the solo album I never made", having played nearly all instruments himself except for drums (by Andy Anderson), with Porl Thompson contributing saxophone to one song ("Give Me It")., and Tolhurst contributing keyboards to 3 of the album's 10 songs.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 1985, the band had success with "The Head on the Door", with Smith as the sole songwriter. The line-up also included Gallup, Tolhurst, Thompson and Boris Williams. In 1987, the double album "Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me", with singles "Just Like Heaven" and "Hot, Hot, Hot!" was released to increasing popularity for the band in the US. From that time and on subsequent records, the writing was made by the whole band but still with Smith as the main composer and arranger.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Robert Smith met Steven Severin of Siouxsie and the Banshees at a Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire gig at the London YMCA on 3 August 1979. Both the Banshees and The Cure had been signed to Polydor and its imprint Fiction, respectively, by Chris Parry, and Smith was already a fan of the Banshees. The pair hit it off, and Severin invited Smith to accompany the Banshees on a UK tour in support of their second album "Join Hands". The two bands embarked on the tour later in August, and meanwhile in September Banshees singer Siouxsie Sioux contributed backing vocals to "I'm Cold", the b-side to The Cure's next single "Jumping Someone Else's Train" (released in November), A few dates into the "Join Hands" tour, however, Banshees' guitarist John McKay and drummer Kenny Morris quit the band hours before they were due to go on stage in Aberdeen, placing the tour in limbo. Determined not to let the tour end, Smith volunteered to replace McKay temporarily on condition that The Cure remained the opening act, while ex-Slits drummer Budgie joined on drums. The tour resumed on 18 September, with Smith playing in both bands each night. At the tour's end, Smith returned full-time to The Cure.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Severin has attributed Smith's transition from a reticent figure to a more enigmatic front person to Smith's early experiences playing with Siouxsie and the Banshees


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith meanwhile conceived the Cult Hero side-project to collaborate with bassist Simon Gallup of the Magspies, recorded at Morgan Studios in October 1979. With some leftover time in the studio from the Cult Hero sessions, Smith also produced recordings by the Magspies and a young vocal and percussion duo the Obtainers (described by Steve Sutherland of "Melody Maker" as "two 11-year olds banging on pots and pans"), for the fledgling independent label Dance Fools Dance co-founded by Robert Smith and Ric Gallup, elder brother of Simon. The Cult Hero single was released on the Fiction Records label in December 1979, while the Magspies/Obtainers split single appeared on Dance Fools Dance the following year.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: On 3 and 4 April 1980 at the Rainbow Theatre in London, Robert Smith and Matthieu Hartley (also of the Magspies, Cult Hero and by this time, the Cure) were among the many guest members of a unique line-up of The Stranglers to play two protest concerts for Hugh Cornwell, who had been imprisoned on drugs charges in late 1979. Joy Division were also one of the support bands on the second night. Recordings from the event were later released as "The Stranglers and Friends – Live in Concert" in 1995. Also during April, Smith provided backing vocals for The Associates' debut album "The Affectionate Punch", released in August 1980. At the time, The Associates were also signed to Fiction Records, and had been joined in late 1979 by former Cure bassist Michael Dempsey. The Associates' front man Billy Mackenzie was a friend of Smith's for more than 20 years, and The Cure song, "Cut Here" (from 2001's "Greatest Hits" album), was written in response to Mackenzie's suicide in 1997. As Smith told "Jam! Showbiz" following the release of "Greatest Hits":


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: During 1981, The Cure received a home demo tape from And Also the Trees and immediately became friends. Front-man Simon Huw Jones later told "Abstract Magazine" that The Cure were AATT's "biggest fans, the first people who came up to us and said 'we think you're great'" and that the two groups were mutually influenced by one another. The group joined The Cure in support of the "Eight Appearances" tour of Scotland and Northern England during November and December 1981, together with 1313, featuring Steve Severin and Lydia Lunch, and the following year Robert Smith together with Cure/Banshees co-producer Mike Hedges co-produced And Also the Trees' 1982 cassette release "From Under The Hill". Smith was initially to have also produced the band's debut single "The Secret Sea", but instead Lol Tolhurst stepped in as producer between 1982–84, both for the band's first two singles, and for their self-titled debut album. Smith would again collaborate with And Also the Trees in 1991 (see → ).


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In the wake of The Cure's "Fourteen Explicit Moments" tour, which culminated in the departure of Simon Gallup and the temporary dissolution of The Cure, in June 1982, Smith began collaborating with Severin of Siouxsie and the Banshees again. Although released under the name of The Cure, the only personnel to perform on the original "Flexipop" single release of "Lament" in August 1982 were Smith and Severin, and soon afterwards, Smith admitted that The Cure as a band now existed in name only. That August, Smith briefly resurrected the Dance Fools Dance label to record and release the single "Frame One" by Crawley gothic/post-punk outfit Animation. In September, Smith with


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Tolhurst (now on keyboards) and session drummer Steve Goulding went into the studio to record a "blatant pop single" at the instigation of Fiction Records manager Chris Parry. Smith was reportedly so unhappy with the resultant track "Let's Go to Bed" that he attempted to have the single released under the name of Recur, feeling that the single let Cure fans down. During October, Smith and Severin also recorded early demos for what would become the Glove's "Punish Me With Kisses" single, at Mike Hedges' studio "The Playground".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith also returned to touring as a live guitarist with Siouxsie and the Banshees from November, following the collapse of then-Banshee John McGeoch from nervous exhaustion one week before the band were due to go on tour. His return to guitar duties with the group prompted Smith to remark: He later said that he was "fed up" and "really disillusioned" with the pressures of playing in The Cure, and that "the Banshees thing came along and I thought it would be a really good escape". Journalist/biographer Jo-Ann Greene noted that Smith's replacement of McGeoch "left a bad taste in many people's mouths, as [McGeoch] was informed of his sacking only a week after his recovery from a brief spell of clinical depression".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Returning to England from the Banshees' tour of Australia, New Zealand, and Japan in January 1983, Smith was approached the following month by Nicholas Dixon, a young choreographer with the Royal Ballet, to score a choreographed adaptation of "Les Enfants Terribles". To test the idea, Smith and Severin recorded a reworking of The Cure's "Siamese Twins", with Tolhurst on drums, and Anne Stephenson and Virginia Hewes (later known as Ginni Ball) of the Venomettes on violins, which was performed on BBC Two's music programme Riverside in March 1983, featuring two dancers choreographed by Dixon. Despite a positive critical reception, however, neither Dixon nor Smith were happy with the results, and the "Les Enfants Terribles" project was shelved indefinitely.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith and Severin meanwhile co-wrote the music to Marc and the Mambas' song "Torment", which appeared on the album "Torment and Toreros". Between March and June 1983, Smith recorded with the Glove and (ostensibly) The Cure; prompting him to remark: "I need a holiday ... I keep making plans to go every week, but every week I'm in another group."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith and Severin had first discussed collaborating on an external side-project in 1981, although their respective commitments to the Cure and the Banshees had previously left no time for the project. From May 1983, however, with The Cure on hold and Siouxsie and Budgie working together as the Creatures, recording of the Glove's album "Blue Sunshine" began in earnest. Budgie's then girlfriend Jeanette Landray, formerly a dancer with Zoo, was recruited to perform vocals, while Andy Anderson from Brilliant was brought in to play drums. The Venomettes with Martin McCarrick were hired to perform strings in studio. The Glove took its name from the "murder mitten" from the Beatles' animated feature "Yellow Submarine", while the album title came from a B-movie by the same name about a potent strain of LSD that caused people to lose their hair and turn into homicidal maniacs many years after their first trip. Severin said of the project: Smith described the creation of the album by saying: As well as "Barbarella", "Yellow Submarine" and the eponymous "Blue Sunshine", films cited as having fuelled the project included "The Brood", "Evil Dead", "The Helicopter Spies" and "Inferno". Retrospectively, the "Melody Maker"'s Steve Sutherland described the Glove as "a manic psychedelic pastiche".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: The Glove's "Blue Sunshine" album and its lead single "Like an Animal" were both released in August 1983, followed by the Siouxsie and the Banshees' single "Dear Prudence" (a cover of the Beatles' song) in September, all on the Banshees' own label Wonderland Records. Smith officially became a member of the Banshees. According to the Banshees' authorised biography, "Dear Prudence" had been recorded at Smith's insistence to document his time with the group, and it became their biggest UK hit, reaching number 3 on the Singles Chart.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Shortly before the group's scheduled Royal Albert Hall concerts in September and October 1983, Siouxsie and the Banshees were also invited to participate in an episode of Channel 4's television series "Play at Home", which they agreed to in order to take advantage of having the upcoming concerts filmed. Smith had previously suggested to Severin that "the Banshees shouldn't be doing tours, they should be doing something really ambitious like "The Wizard of Oz" on stage", and Severin decided to adapt this idea for the "Play at Home" episode, substituting the Wizard of Oz concept with "Alice in Wonderland" to tie the theme with the Banshees' Wonderland recording label. The result was a 45-minute television programme featuring performances from Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Glove and the Creatures, in which all four members of the Banshees appeared in a recreation of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party dressed as Alice, while each individual member scripted their own solo character performance and monologue. Musical interludes included the Glove performing "A Blues in Drag", the Creatures playing "Weathercade" and the whole band performing "Circle". The programme (which did not air on television until the following year) concluded with live footage of Siouxsie and the Banshees playing "Voodoo Dolly" and "Helter Skelter" live at the Royal Albert Hall. Meanwhile, both the Glove's second single, "Punish Me with Kisses", and the Banshees' live double album and companion video, "Nocturne" from the Royal Albert Hall shows, appeared in November. In March 1984, the next Banshees single to feature Smith on guitar and keyboards, "Swimming Horses" was released; Smith co-composed the new material with them. This was followed by "Dazzle" in May, and finally the album "Hyæna" in June – Smith having left the Banshees the month prior to release, citing health issues due to his overloaded schedule.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Meanwhile, in between commitments to The Cure, the Glove and the Banshees, Smith also found time to perform on Tim Pope's Syd Barrett-inspired "I Want To Be A Tree" single. Pope at the time was the regular director of promotional videos for The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Marc Almond, among others, but was taken aback when his fame on American MTV as a video director began to rival that of the bands he worked for. He described the project as "a real piss-take of what was going on in America", prompted by people referring to "Tim Pope Videos", and said that he "felt really strongly that they were not Tim Pope videos, they were Cure videos or Siouxsie videos or whatever". Over the 1983 Christmas holidays, Pope and a friend, Charles Gray, recorded what Pope described as "this really stupid song" that they had co-written years earlier as teenagers. Pope made an accompanying video for his showreel, asking several of the artists he worked with (The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Soft Cell, Talk Talk, the Style Council, Paul Young and Freur) to "come along and slag me off on the showreel". He then played the artists the song, while filming their reactions to it. "The Old Grey Whistle Test" screened the video, which Pope says resulted in several record deals being offered. The song was re-recorded with Robert Smith playing most instruments in January 1984, produced by Chris Parry, and was released on Fiction Records (with a new video) in June.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: With the completion of the "Blue Sunshine" project and his departure from Siouxsie and the Banshees, by 1984 Robert Smith had returned to recording and touring with The Cure as his full-time primary band. Between 1985 and 1996, his musical outings beyond The Cure were comparatively rare, with notable exceptions including remix work for And Also the Trees and Cranes. During 1989, Smith and producer Mark Saunders remixed 7'’ and 12'’ versions of the song "The Pear Tree", by And Also the Trees. The "Round Mix" of the song also appeared on the band's album "Farewell to the Shade" in 1989, followed by a US-only release of "The Pear Tree EP" the following year. In December that year while mixing The Cure's live album "Entreat", he also recorded a solo cover version of Wendy Waldman's "Pirate Ships", originally intended for ""; a compilation album celebrating the history of The Cure's US label Elektra Records. Instead, however, the full band line-up of The Cure recorded "Hello, I Love You" by The Doors for Elektra, and "Pirate Ships" did not see official CD release until "Disintegration"'s "Deluxe Edition" reissue in 2010.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 1992, Smith invited Cranes to support The Cure live on the "Wish Tour". For one of the French dates of the tour (Stade Couvert Régional, Liévin, 15 November 1992), Cranes' vocalist Alison Shaw was ill and the group had to revise their entire set, with Robert Smith replacing Alison's vocal melodies on 6-string bass, and joined by The Cure's guitarist Porl Thompson. Cranes wrote most of their next album (1993's "Forever") while on the "Wish Tour", and the album's title was partly influenced by touring with The Cure. In 1993, Smith and Bryan "Chuck" New remixed the extended 12'’ version of Cranes' single "Jewel" from the album; Smith again contributing his trademark Fender Bass VI sound and additional guitars to the remixed track. The single gave Cranes their first Top 30 single in Britain and Norway, and also became their biggest commercial breakthrough in the US.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: FHe was meanwhile invited to perform at David Bowie's 50th Birthday concert at Madison Square Garden (9 January 1997), where he duetted with Bowie on "The Last Thing You Should Do" and "Quicksand". Here Smith met Bowie's guitarist Reeves Gabrels and co-producer Mark Plati, leading to their collaboration on the single "Wrong Number". Although released under the name of The Cure, "Wrong Number" was one of several "one-off" studio projects recorded during this period by Robert Smith either performing solo, or with guest musicians from outside the full-time line-up of The Cure. Earlier versions of the song had already been recorded by the band, but Plati and Smith completely reconstructed the track, built around a sampled drum loop by Cure drummer Jason Cooper. Smith and Plati added keyboards, effects and new vocals, while Gabrels laid down "a gazillion guitar tracks".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In February 1998, Robert again collaborated with Reeves Gabrels in the studio, co-writing, singing and playing on the song "Yesterday's Gone" (eventually finding its way to CD release in 2000). The following month, Smith was again recording solo between RAK and Outside studios, assisted this time by co-producer Paul Corkett, whose production credits included Nick Cave, Björk, Placebo, Tori Amos and Suede. These sessions produced "More Than This" (not to be confused with the Roxy Music song) for "", and a cover of Depeche Mode's "World in My Eyes" for the tribute album "For the Masses". Again, both were released under the name of the Cure, but were essentially Robert Smith solo recordings. Smith said: Having made a guest appearance on an episode of "South Park" earlier in the year (see → ""), Smith again collaborated with Trey Parker under the name COGASM, featuring Reeves Gabrels and Jason Cooper, releasing the track "A Sign from God" for the film "Orgazmo". Smith's contribution to "Yesterday's Gone" appeared on Gabrels' solo album "Ulysses (Della Notte)" released in 1999 via Internet and in 2000 on CD by E-magine Music.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 2002, as "Exclaim!" magazine's Cam Lindsay later observed, The Cure became "the band to namedrop as a musical influence, sparking rejuvenation for their career. Artists such as Deftones, Mogwai, Tricky and Thursday praise the band and stress their influence, while others like Hot Hot Heat and the Rapture receive constant comparisons". From 2003–2004 a steady succession of guest vocal performances were released with other recording artists "feat. Robert Smith". Smith wrote the words and sang "Perfect Blue Sky (feat. Robert Smith)" for Dutch electronic music producer Junkie XL's album "", released in June 2003; "All of This (feat. Robert Smith)" for Blink-182's self-titled album released in November, and "Believe (feat. Robert Smith)" on veteran Bowie guitarist Earl Slick's "Zig Zag" album, released 9 December 2003. Slick meanwhile contributed guitars to the Mark Plati mix of "A Forest" featured on the "" box-set on 27 January 2004. Although issued under the moniker of The Cure, the "Mark Plati mix" was in fact an entirely new recording resulting from the studio collaborations between Slick, Plati and Smith. Smith had also recorded vocals for another completely new version of "A Forest" during 2003, this time billed as a cover version by the German electronic duo "Blank & Jones (feat. Robert Smith)". Released in September 2003, the single reached number 14 in the German Top100 Singles charts, and three separate remixes later appeared on the 2004 album "Monument"; "A Forest" being described by "AllMusic"'s Rick Anderson as "the centerpiece of the album".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: January 2004 also saw the single release of Junior Jack's "Da Hype (feat. Robert Smith)", which also appeared on the Belgium-based Italian house music producer's album "Trust It" in March. During the same month, an exclusive re-recording of The Cure's "Pictures of You", remixed by Australian electronic musician/producer Paul Mac and released under the banner "Robert Smith – Pictures of You (Paulmac mix)", featured in the soundtrack to the Australian "rave culture" film "One Perfect Day". "Truth Is (Featuring – Robert Smith)" appeared on former Nine Inch Nails drummer and co-founder Chris Vrenna's second Tweaker album "2 a.m. Wakeup Call", released 20 April 2004. In 2004, on 17 September at Old Billingsgate Market in London, Robert joined Blink-182 live onstage to perform "All of This" during the MTV Icon tribute to The Cure. On 21 October, Robert stood in as one of three guest presenters for John Peel on BBC Radio 1, just days before Peel's death. Near the end of the year, Robert Smith made two guest appearances live at Wembley Arena; first joining Placebo on 5 November on their song "Without You I'm Nothing" and The Cure's "Boys Don't Cry", followed by Blink-182 on 6 December to perform "All of This" and again, "Boys Don't Cry".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In June 2005, Smith appeared on Smashing Pumpkins/Zwan front man Billy Corgan's solo debut "TheFutureEmbrace", sharing vocal duties during the refrain for Corgan's cover of the Bee Gees song "To Love Somebody". In November 2006, Robert appeared on UK trance and trip hop act Faithless's album "To All New Arrivals", on the track "Spiders, Crocodiles & Kryptonite", featuring prominent samples of The Cure's "Lullaby", for which Smith recorded a new performance of the original vocal. Another guest vocal on Paul Hartnoll of Orbital's song "Please" was released as a single and appeared on "The Ideal Condition" in May 2007. Placebo's Steve Hewitt meanwhile announced plans to launch a solo dance/drum'n'bass-influenced album under the working title of "Ancient B" to feature Smith singing some tracks, and bassist Jon Thorne of Lamb.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: From 2010–2012, as well as continuing to collaborate with other artists as a guest performer, several cover versions were released by Robert Smith performing solo. Unlike his previous solo covers (such as "Pirate Ships" and "World in My Eyes"), these were officially released under the name of Robert Smith, rather than The Cure. In 2010, he contributed a cover of "Very Good Advice" from the 1951 film adaptation of "Alice in Wonderland" to the album "Almost Alice"; a companion release to Tim Burton's adaptation of "Alice in Wonderland", while "Pirate Ships" from 1989 also saw release on CD for the first time. Further guest vocalist/lyricist collaborations "feat. Robert Smith" during 2010 included the single "J'aurai tout essayé" (a reworking of Smith and Earl Slick's "Believe") by French Canadian rock singer, guitarist and fellow Bowie/Mark Plati/Earl Slick collaborator Anik Jean and the single version of Crystal Castles' cover version of Platinum Blonde's "Not in Love", released on Fiction Records, 6 December 2010. In June 2011, electronic dance act the Japanese Popstars from Northern Ireland released their album "Controlling Your Allegiance" in the UK, including the track "Take Forever (Ft. Robert Smith)", and the following month, a solo cover version of "Small Hours" by British singer-songwriter and guitarist John Martyn (1948–2009) was released on the tribute album "Johnny Boy Would Love This". On 25 October 2011, instrumental rock band 65daysofstatic released the track "Come to Me" featuring Robert Smith as a free download, coinciding with the release of their album "We Were Exploding Anyway". In 2012 Robert again recorded a solo cover version for a Tim Burton project; this time covering Frank Sinatra's 1957 hit song "Witchcraft" for "Frankenweenie Unleashed!", a 14-track collection of songs "inspired by" the filmmaker's stop-motion film, "Frankenweenie", released on 25 September 2012.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 2015, Smith contributed vocals to the song "Please" from the album , a project by Paul Hartnoll. The track is in fact a reworking of the track of the same name from the Ideal Condition, which he also contributed vocals for. On 15 June 2015, the Twilight Sad released a single featuring Smith covering "There's a Girl in the Corner", originally from the Twilight Sad's album "Nobody Wants to Be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave". In 2015, Smith also contributed vocals to "In All Worlds", a single from Eat Static's album "Dead Planet".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In September 2020, Smith appeared on the Gorillaz' song "Strange Timez" from their "Song Machine" series and also appeared in the song's animated music video.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In December 2020, Smith took part in two live stream charity events, including The Cosmic Shambles Network's "Nine Lessons and Carols for Curious People" 24-hour charity live stream, 12 December 2020. Smith played three songs from the "Seventeen Seconds" album: "In Your House", "M" and "Play for Today". On 22 December 2020, Smith played three songs from the "Faith" album, "The Holy Hour", "The Funeral Party", and "The Drowning Man", for the live stream the annual Second City 24-hour improvisation charity event for "Letters to Santa"


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In June 2021, Smith appeared on the Chvrches song "How Not To Drown" from their album "Screen Violence".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith has credited his older siblings Richard and Margaret with exposing him to rock music such as the Beatles and the Rolling Stones when he was six years old. He has said that his early songwriting "was influenced by early Beatles – the sense of a three-minute guitar-pop song", and early in his career The Cure's second single "Boys Don't Cry" was compared by British music paper "Record Mirror" to "John Lennon at 12 or 13". His parents encouraged their children's musical development, as he told French magazine "Les Inrockuptibles": "My parents were lending us their stuff; my mum made me listen to a lot of classical music to enable me to have a larger vision of music." When Smith was eight years old in 1967, Richard played him "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix, who became hugely influential. Of this period, he went on to say, "My brother was also crazy about Captain Beefheart, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, so much so that when I was 7 or 8, to the despair of my parents, I became some kinda little devil fed on psychedelic rock."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith was 10 years old in 1969 when he first heard Nick Drake's album "Five Leaves Left": "Nick Drake's on the other side of the coin to Jimi Hendrix. He was very quiet and withdrawn ... I think also that because he had an untimely death like Jimi Hendrix, he was never able to compromise his early work. He was never able to put a foot wrong. It's a morbid romanticism, but there is something attractive about that." It was not long afterwards that Robert Smith attended his first rock concert: Jimi Hendrix at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival. At the age of 13 in 1972, Smith first saw David Bowie on television, performing "Starman" on "Top of the Pops". He recalled, "Every person in Britain who saw that performance, it's stuck with them. It's like Kennedy being shot for another generation. You just remember that night watching David Bowie on TV. It really was a formative, seminal experience." Smith said that the first LP he ever purchased with his pocket money was "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars". According to Apter, Bowie also paved the way for Smith's love of glam rock bands such as Slade, The Sweet, and T. Rex, and during the same period, he also became a fan of Roxy Music. His parents maintained their supportive attitude: "My mum and dad were encouraging us to talk [about] the records we liked. I remember staggering talks about Slade and Gary Glitter."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith said that he was 15 when he first heard Alex Harvey, and that the Sensational Alex Harvey Band was the first and only group he ever really followed. He said, "[Harvey] was probably my only real idol. I travelled around the country to see them. [...] People talk about Iggy Pop as the original punk but certainly in Britain the forerunner of the punk movement was Alex Harvey. [...] I remembered the power of that live performance and I've tried to have that in my mind since I started up my own group." He soon became influenced by the emergence of the UK punk scene of 1977 and has cited the Sex Pistols, the Stranglers, Elvis Costello and the Buzzcocks as important influences on his own music from this period. He described the release of "Anarchy in the UK" by the Sex Pistols as "the last time something major happened to me and changed me [...] it was the best summer of my life. I remember listening to 'Anarchy' for the very first time at a party and thinking, 'This is it!' You knew straight away, you either loved it or hated it, and it polarised an entire nation for that summer." Elsewhere, Smith said that the Stranglers were his favourite punk band and that Costello "was a cut above the whole lot of them" in terms of lyrics and song crafting.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith was influenced by Siouxsie and the Banshees' "wall of noise" and the Buzzcocks' melodies, and aspired to combine the two. He said, "The two groups that I aspired to be like were [Siouxsie and] the Banshees and the Buzzcocks. I really liked the Buzzcocks' melodies, while the great thing about the Banshees was that they had this great wall of noise, which I'd never heard before. My ambition was to marry the two." Ian Birch of "Melody Maker" recognised the Banshees' influence on Smith's band early on, comparing The Cure's 1978 debut single "Killing An Arab" favourably to Siouxsie's "Hong Kong Garden" (released a few months earlier). Speaking of his stint of playing guitar with Siouxsie and the Banshees in 1979, Smith said, "It allowed me to experiment. I inherited an approach from John [McKay] which was just to have everything full up. [...] It was phased/flanged distortion noise." From that time, Siouxsie and the Banshees "were a massive influence on me". He said, "They were the group who led me towards doing "Pornography". They drew something out of me."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Along with the Banshees, early Cure gigs from 1978–1979 supporting other post-punk bands such as Wire and Joy Division also influenced Smith's shift in musical direction from The Cure's 1979 album "Three Imaginary Boys" to 1980's sophomore album "Seventeen Seconds". Playing support for Wire (at Kent University in October 1978) gave Smith the idea "to follow a different course, to hold out against the punk wave [...] Wire pointed out another direction to me".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith began sporting his trademark physical appearance of a pale complexion, smeared red lipstick, black eye-liner, a dishevelled nest of wiry black hair, all-black clothes, and brothel creeper shoes in the early 1980s, around the same time as the goth subculture took off. However, he denies any credit for this trend and claims it is a coincidence that the styles are similar, stating that he wore makeup since he was young and stating that "it's so pitiful when 'goth' is still tagged onto the name of The Cure". The sombre mood of early albums, combined with Smith's on-stage persona, cemented the band's "gothic" image. The band's aesthetic went from gloomy to psychedelic beginning with "The Top".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Although his public persona could be deemed to portray an image of despair, Smith has stated that his songs do not convey how he feels all the time: "At the time we wrote "Disintegration" [...] it's just about what I was doing really, how I felt. But I'm not like that all the time. That's the difficulty of writing songs that are a bit depressing. People think you're like that all the time, but I don't think that. I just usually write when I'm depressed."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 1986, Smith famously altered his image by appearing on-stage and in press photos sporting short spiky hair and bright polo shirts, which can be seen in "The Cure in Orange". His new look made the headlines. He soon returned to his usual style.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith has a tenor vocal range. In the band's earliest period, he used a soft vocal style on the demos of "10:15 Saturday Night" and "Boys Don't Cry", and a frenetic punk style on "I Just Need Myself". Both of those styles were left behind as a third emerged during the production of The Cure's debut album, "Three Imaginary Boys". This new sound, which can be heard on most of the final versions of songs from that period, became the signature Smith sound, which he generally abandoned during the "Seventeen Seconds" era. Around that time, Smith said he wanted to improve his singing, the opposite of his goal in 1984: he remarked in the documentary "Ten Imaginary Years" that he tried to sing badly on the album "The Top".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith's songwriting has developed a range of styles and themes throughout his career. Some songs incorporate literary paraphrase, such as Albert Camus' novel "L'Étranger" in "Killing an Arab", and "How Beautiful You Are..." (1987), based on a poem by Charles Baudelaire. The song "The Drowning Man" (1981) is also a reference to the "Gormenghast" books by Mervyn Peake. Others involve punk metafiction ("So What"), surrealism ("Accuracy"), straightforward rock/pop ("Boys Don't Cry", "I'm Cold"), and poetic mood pieces ("Another Day" and "Fire in Cairo"). In subsequent decades, Smith explored more poetic moods, which accorded with New Order and other bands of that genre. In an interview in 2000, Smith said that "there is one particular kind of music, an atmospheric type of music, that I enjoy making with The Cure. I enjoy it a lot more than any other kind of sound". When Smith was asked about the 'sound' of his songwriting, Smith said that he did not "think there is such a thing as a typical Cure sound. I think there are various Cure sounds from different periods and different line-ups."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith is considered to be one of the most influential and underrated guitarists of the 20th century. In a 1992 interview with "Guitar Player" magazine, Smith shared insights from his first guitar lessons—undertaken at the age of 9 years—and his guitar-playing style, as well as his habit of purposely detuning the high "E" (first) string on his guitars. Of his first lessons, Smith stated:


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith also described his detuning process: "I don't know what it adds, but the guitar just doesn't sound quite right to me normally. In the studio, I often defy the tuners, particularly with keyboard overdubs. I even change the speed of the tape to detune some parts. I think a lot of players presented with the same guitar and told to tune it themselves would come up with something drastically different. And the way you play [the guitar] affects the perceived tuning. If Porl [Thompson] and I tune together and play the same thing, but he plays hard and I play soft, it will sound completely off."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Speaking about "Wish" in 1992, Smith also offered the following input on how detuned instruments played a significant role in the album, and the challenges of capturing the sound live. "A lot of things on our record "Wish" that sound like heavy chorusing are actually just detuned instruments. The only drawback to that is onstage it's very confusing sometimes, especially with lots of phasing effects going on. It turns into this overwhelming pulsing sound, and you can't hear anything."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: While recording The Cure's debut album, "Three Imaginary Boys", in 1978, Smith was using a Woolworth's Top 20 electric guitar, and he was advised by Chris Parry to use a better instrument. Smith bought a Fender Jazzmaster, having recently seen Elvis Costello playing one on "Top of the Pops". However, he then decided to have the Top 20 pickup installed in the Jazzmaster, giving it a third pickup. Smith explained this guitar customization in 1992: "The third pickup [in the Fender Jazzmaster] is from a Woolworth's Top 20 guitar, my very first electric. I took it in to record our first album, along with a little WEM combo amp. [Manager/producer] Chris Parry, who was paying for the record, said," you can't use that!" We went out and bought a Fender Jazzmaster, and I immediately had the Top 20 pickup installed in it, which really upset Chris. I played the entire Three Imaginary Boys album through a Top 20 pickup. It's a brilliant guitar, though I actually bought it because of how it looked."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith's guitar work was first heard on the first Cure single "Killing An Arab", which was released in December 1978, where Smith performed an intricate Middle Eastern sounding descending and ascending guitar riff to accompany the song, as well as the B-side "10:15 Saturday Night", where Smith played a heavily-distorted 'tremolo bar' solo. Smith would soon expand on his guitar style further with The Cure's second album, "Seventeen Seconds", notably on the single "A Forest", where Smith played an extended solo-outro on his Jazzmaster, as well as the single "Play For Today", where Smith demonstrated an intricate use of harmonics.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: With every Cure album release onward, Smith would incorporate a number of different guitars and sounds into the Cure’s repertoire with stylistic versatility and craftsmanship over the course of 30 years. Notably, starting with "The Top", in 1984, Smith started incorporating Spanish acoustic guitars (notably on the songs "Birdmad Girl", and "The Caterpillar"), and from the mid-80s onward Smith included more acoustic guitar instrumentation on later Cure songs such as "The Blood", as well as notable singles such as "In Between Days", "Just Like Heaven", and "Friday I’m In Love". On the 1987 release "Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me", Smith showcased a diverse style of guitar playing across the 17-track album. Notably on the opening track "The Kiss" where Smith played an extended Wah-wah pedal introductory solo that opened the LP, as well as the single "Hot Hot Hot!!!" where Smith included an intricate funk playing style that intersected with Porl Thompson's guitar lines. Another ingredient of Smith’s guitar sound is the Fender VI, which proved to be a staple of The Cure’s sound during the early 80’s on Cure albums such as "Faith", was used as the main instrument on the Carnage Visors instrumental soundtrack that the band recorded that same year, and it was later played by Smith extensively on the 1989 release "Disintegration". Smith shared the following input of his use of the Fender VI:


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith started incorporating more distortion and feedback sounds and textures on albums such as "Wish" where Smith predominantly played a Gibson Chet Atkins as well.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Speaking to "The Hit" in 1985, Smith gave a frank assessment of his approach to guitar playing, and musicianship in general. "I'm not technically a good player but at least I don't sound like anyone else. For me the idea of being a musician has nothing to do with technical ability, but I suppose you have to have a certain amount to be able to put ideas into music. I think it's important to get past the stage of being comfortable with an instrument. You need the capacity to learn – most people tend to stay at the same level, which [I think] is boring to listen to."


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: An early "pop culture" reference to The Cure is found in the eleventh episode of BBC2's anarchic alternative comedy series "The Young Ones", from 1984. The series featured regular cameo performances from British rock and pop groups of the period, such as Motörhead, the Damned, and Madness. As the episode's title "Sick" suggests, all four of the main characters (Vyvyan, Rick, Neil and Mike) are ill, prompting Vyvyan to send Mike to the pharmacy for medicine. Neil remarks: "I hope Mike hurries back with the cure!" to which Vyvyan replies, "No Neil, Neil, it's madness this week." The band Madness then performs a musical cameo. Rock biographers Bowler and Dray note that increasing popular interest in The Cure in America during the mid-late 1980s became "a pat shorthand for TV and film writers to indicate mixed up children – the Steve Martin film "Parenthood" uses a bedroom poster of Robert to underline the point that 'this adolescent is confused and miserable'".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Notwithstanding the aforesaid "pat shorthand" references in mainstream media, during the late 1980s and 1990s, a number of film, television and comic book portrayals also paid genuine homage to Smith's iconic stature in pop culture. In 1988, a "Spin" magazine interview with Smith reported that "the director of "Pee-wee's Big Adventure"" (i.e. Tim Burton) had asked Smith to make an appearance in a film. The Cure's keyboardist Roger O'Donnell has since said that during recording of the "Disintegration" album (1988–89), Burton approached the group about providing the soundtrack to the 1990 film "Edward Scissorhands", and even sent them the script.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In a 1991 article discussing inspirations behind the look of the film's lead character, "Entertainment Weekly" (citing Burton and costume designer Colleen Atwood) reported that "the character's retro hair and penchant for leather clearly draw on punks like The Cure's Robert Smith". Burton is a self-proclaimed fan of the Cure and his sartorial style has been likened to that of Smith. In 1996, Smith confirmed to French magazine "Télérama" that Burton had approached The Cure about a number of collaborations, and regularly kept in touch with the group about each of his latest film projects, but that they had thus far always been too busy either touring or recording to contribute. Burton asked Smith to score the soundtrack for "Sleepy Hollow" (1999), but Smith said that "they were postponing it so much that I got involved with [The Cure's album] "Bloodflowers" and let it aside". In 2009 Burton presented Smith with the Shockwaves NME Godlike Genius Award, saying that when he was "chained to a desk" and "fucking depressed" during his time as a young animator for Disney, "this music was the only thing that saved me. I just want to thank you for inspiring me." Shortly after the award ceremony, Burton again reiterated to BBC 6 Music his long-standing admiration for the Cure, and his desire to collaborate with them. For his part, Smith said that Burton presenting the Godlike Genius award "makes it all that more special". Burton's unfaltering dedication eventually paid off; Smith has since contributed music to Burton's "Almost Alice" and "Frankenweenie Unleashed!" album projects ("See → ").


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Neil Gaiman, author and creator of Vertigo Comics' "The Sandman" (1989–1996), based the appearance of his lead character partly on that of Smith, and partly on himself in his twenties. Other illustrators of the character over the course of the series' run have also drawn influence from other popular musicians; Sam Kieth, for instance, describes his rendering of the Sandman character as the "David Bowie/guy-from-the-Cure" version, and said that the Robert Smith look of the character was "really heavily championed" by Gaiman and DC Comics editor Karen Berger. Mike Dringenberg, on the other hand, compares Kieth's Sandman to Ron Wood and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, and asserts "my version ... was more like Peter Murphy or Robert Smith." Conversely, Kelley Jones, who illustrated the "Dream Country" and "Season of Mists" (volumes 3 & 4 in the series), said he "just hated The Cure" and thus based his own version of the character on the angular gestures and facial features of Bauhaus front-man Peter Murphy instead. Gaiman said that early conceptual sketches for the character by Leigh Baulch and Dave McKean drew influence from Bowie's Aladdin Sane persona, and Bono from U2. Cure posters were also "known to creep into the background of some of the sandman stories" and Smith told fans that he was flattered by Gaiman's reference, and thought "The Sandman" was "a brilliant series".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith's lyrics, as well as those of Joy Division's Ian Curtis, are quoted and referenced extensively throughout James O'Barr's comic book series "The Crow", which, like Gaiman's "Sandman", also first appeared on shelves in 1989. One issue of "The Crow" dedicated an entire page to reprinting the lyrics from The Cure song "The Hanging Garden", and O'Barr said that he was listening a lot to The Cure's early albums such as "Seventeen Seconds" and "Faith" while he was writing the story. O'Barr, however, has downplayed the influence of Robert Smith on the main character Eric Draven's physical appearance, saying that "the idea that the look has been inspired by him has really been overblown" and that the visual aspect of the character owed more to Peter Murphy and Iggy Pop. Smith said that the song "Burn", The Cure's contribution to the 1994 film adaptation's soundtrack, was deliberately written and performed in the style of "The Hanging Garden".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Garth Ennis's "Muzak Killer" stories for "2000 AD Comics" from 1991 also contain visual references in the form of characters resembling Robert Smith, and again, Smith himself is a self-professed fan of "2000 AD". Revolutionary Comics produced a biographical comic book on The Cure in 1991 as Issue No. 30 of "Rock n Roll Comics" series, and the following year "Personality Comics" produced their own Cure biography in the form of "Music Comics 4: The Cure". Ian Shirley, author of "Can Rock & Roll Save the World?: An Illustrated History of Music and Comics", considers the fact "that The Cure have spawned two biographical comics ... just shows the impact that Robert Smith and his Goth chic had upon America in the 1990s". In the 1980s, the Japanese music magazine "8-beat Gag" published a series of caricatures of western artists by manga artist Atsuko Shima; Robert Smith had his own edition, and figured on the cover. Gothic horror and fantasy writer Poppy Z. Brite, in his vampire novel "Lost Souls" (1992), uses a poster of Robert Smith on a bedroom wall as a sexual prop during a homoerotic encounter between two of his characters, Laine and Nothing. Colin Raff of the "New York Press" described "Poppy Z. Brite's enthusiastic appraisal of Robert Smith's mouth in her (sic) depiction of a fictional blowjob" as "an example of the unfortunate habit of many fiction writers (especially since the 1980s) to invoke pop stars and their lyrics with un-ironic ["sic"] reverence, resulting in prose about as reflective as voyeuristic journalism, bad porn and bumperstickers".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In television comedy programmes during the early 1990s, Smith was sometimes the subject of lampooning. MTV's "Half Hour of Comedy Hour" (1990–1991), for example, featured a mock episode of "This Old House" in which a parody of Smith's "Disintegration"-era persona is seen asking building contractors to leave his house in a semi-demolished state to retain the sense of "urban decay". "The Mary Whitehouse Experience" (1992) poked fun at Smith's attempts to use lighter pop music to "show his happier side", by presenting a series of sketches in which Smith (played by Rob Newman) performs comedic novelty songs "The Laughing Policeman", "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport", "Ernie", "Crash Bang Wallop", the theme to the children's programme "Play Away", and the WWI soldiers' "Chinese crackers in your arsehole" parody version of the patriotic anthem "Rule, Britannia!". Newman portrayed Smith dolefully wailing the lyrics over a backdrop of gloomy Cure-styled mope-rock. Another of the series' regular characters, Edward Colanderhands, appears in one episode as a member of The Cure's audience.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Another sketch on "The Mary Whitehouse Experience" revolved around "Ray: a man afflicted with a sarcastic tone of voice", also portrayed by Newman, and presented in the style of a medical case history. Ray’s catchphrase was "oh no, what a personal disaster". In the series' final episode, Ray is given a copy of the Cure's "Disintegration" LP as a present, and is so overwhelmed that he can no longer speak in a sarcastic tone, and spontaneously begins speaking Flemish. In the closing scene, Ray has a chance meeting with the real Robert Smith in a cameo appearance, who punches Ray in the face and declares "oh no, what a personal disaster". Rob Newman and David Baddiel's live comedy video, "History Today" (1992), also features Newman's Robert Smith character, singing the children's songs "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" and "I'm a Little Teapot". Smith later made another cameo in the comedy duo's spin-off series "Newman and Baddiel in Pieces" (1993). In a scene where David Baddiel fantasises about his own funeral, Smith appears graveside, saying: "I've never been this miserable. I always preferred him to the other one" (i.e. Newman), before leading a conga of mourners in party-hats around the graveyard.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Mike Leigh's 1997 film "Career Girls" depicts the reunion of two women who formerly shared both a flat and a love of The Cure as teenagers in the 1980s, featuring the band's music and imagery throughout. Smith was invited by Leigh to the premiere, which Smith described as "one of the weirdest afternoons of my life ... There's one bit in the film when they see a poster for 'The 13th', the first single from the last album, and she says to her friend, 'Are they still releasing records?' And I thought that was really unfair -'The unchanging man in the changing world.'"


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 1998, Smith voiced an animated version of himself in "Mecha-Streisand", an episode of "South Park", in which he battles "Mecha Barbra Streisand" in "a battle of Godzilla vs. Mothra scale" that completely destroys the town of South Park. Streisand is portrayed as a "calculating, self-centered, egotistical bitch" who wants to conquer the world with an ancient artifact accidentally discovered by Eric Cartman, known as the "Diamond of Pantheos". After film critic Leonard Maltin and actor Sidney Poitier transform into kaiju creatures (based on Ultraman and Gamera, respectively) to battle Mecha-Streisand, yet ultimately fail to defeat the beast, Robert Smith enters, confident he can defeat Mecha-Streisand, with the help of the boys. To battle Mecha-Streisand, the boys help Smith transform into "Smithra", who has the ability of "robot punch", and ultimately defeats the monster by taking it by the tail and hurling it into space. He offers to "roshambo" Cartman to get his Walkie-Talkie back, and immediately kicks Cartman in the groin, causing him to drop the walkie-talkie. At the end of the episode, as Smith walks off into the sunset, Kyle Broflovski calls out, ""Disintegration" is the best album ever!" and Cartman adds, "Robert Smith kicks ass!" To date, he is one of only a few celebrities to be portrayed in a universally positive way on the show.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: At the time, the episode brought "South Park" its highest ratings to date, with approximately 3,208,000 viewers; about 40,000 more than tuned into ABC's "Prime Time Live". Comedy Central's debut screening in February 1998 marked the first time a cable station had beaten one of the Big Three television networks during prime time viewing, and "Robert Smith Kicks Ass" T-shirts were reportedly "doing a healthy trade among Cure fans" soon afterwards. Smith later described the impact of the episode on his nieces and nephews to "Q" magazine: "Being in "South Park" has made a huge impact on their lives. Now that I'm a cartoon character I'm fully accepted into their world." He told Belgian magazine "Humo":


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Interviewed by Placebo's Brian Molko for "Les Inrockuptibles" magazine, Smith said that "South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone sent him the script, but deliberately left some portions blank "to keep the surprise". He said, "They didn't want anybody to know, they wanted to shock. When I saw myself, I found it surrealistic." In another interview set up by "Entertainment Weekly", Smith told Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz that the ""Disintegration" is the best album ever!" scene was one of his "greatest moments in life" and described the process:


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: In 2004, in an episode of the BBC surreal comedy series "The Mighty Boosh", "Nanageddon" (Series 2, episode 11), the character Vince Noir offers Howard Moon the opportunity to spend the evening with two goth girls, on the condition that he dresses like a goth. Vince produces a can of "Goth Juice", described as "the most powerful hairspray known to man, made from the tears of Robert Smith". In the same episode, the Moon sings "The Love Cats" over the credits. On the same night that Smith was presented with the Godlike Genius Award by Tim Burton at the "Shockwaves NME Awards", "The Mighty Boosh" also won "Best TV Comedy". Asked by NME.com backstage after the ceremony if there were any plans for more pop-star cameos in "The Mighty Boosh", series co-creator and co-star Noel Fielding replied, "We're trying to get hold of Robert Smith for the film – I want him to be my uncle. That would be great!"


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: The look of Cheyenne (played by Sean Penn), the main character in director Paolo Sorrentino's 2011 film "This Must Be the Place", is inspired by Smith's appearance.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: On 13 August 1988, Smith married Mary Theresa Poole (born 3 October 1958), whom he met in drama class at St Wilfrid's when he was 14. They have no children. Smith said he was against having children as he not only objects to having been born but refuses to impose life on another. Smith adds that he also "does not feel responsible enough to bring a child into the world". Smith and Poole have 25 nieces and nephews.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith later revealed that early in his musical career, Mary had not always shared his confidence and vision for The Cure's future, which was a significant motivating factor in his ensuring that the band was successful. It has been reported by the "Daily Express" that Mary used to be a model and worked as a nurse with intellectually disabled children; but, as The Cure became more financially successful during the mid-1980s, Mary gave up her day job so that the couple would not have to spend so much time apart.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith told "The Face" that he had once left a video camera running in their home "and after a couple of hours you forget that it's on and I was quite horrified at the amount of rubbish we say to each other. It's like listening to mental people ... I feel more natural in the company of people who are mentally unbalanced because you're always more alert, wondering what they're going to do next...". He claimed that Mary "used to dress as a witch to scare little children", that she sometimes dressed up as Robert Smith in his pyjamas, and that he could never take people home "because I never know who is going to answer the door".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: While The Cure was recording the "Wish" album at Shipton Manor, Oxfordshire, between 1991 and 1992, among the objects pinned to the wall was "Mary's Manor Mad Chart", listing seventeen members of the Manor's staff and residents (including The Cure and their entourage) "in order of instability". Mary was ranked in second place, after a woman named Louise who worked in the kitchen. "We all voted", said Smith, "and we had an award night. It was very moving".


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith said his mother Rita "wasn't supposed to have me", which was the reason for the significant age gap between him and his two elder siblings. "And once they got me, they didn't like the idea of having an only child, so they had my sister. Which is good, because I would have hated not having a younger sister". He has described his younger sister Janet as a "piano prodigy" and "the family's musical genius", but said that she was too shy to become a performer herself.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Janet Smith knew Porl Thompson, the erstwhile "second" guitarist of The Cure, since they were children, and the pair began dating during Thompson's early tenure as lead guitarist for Malice and the Easy Cure. As well as having participated in the Crawley Goat Band since around 1973, Janet played keyboards as a member of Cult Hero in 1979, and their older sister Margaret contributed backing vocals to the project. Janet, together with Simon Gallup's then-girlfriend Carol (both dressed as schoolgirls), with real-life schoolboys "the Obtainers", sang backing vocals for the Cult Heroes' live performance at the Marquee Club, opening for the Passions in March 1980.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: The Cure's in-house design company "Parched Art" (Porl Thompson and Andy Vella) created the album cover for The Cure's "The Head on the Door" using a manipulated photograph of Janet taken by Porl. During the mid-1980s, Janet gave up a professional career as a pianist to spend more time with Porl and The Cure, and the couple were married in March 1988. Janet is also credited with having taught Robert's guitar technician Perry Bamonte to play piano while the band were recording "Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me", prior to Bamonte joining the group as keyboardist in 1990. During the concert in Tauron Arena Kraków 20 October 2022, the Cure introduced the song "I Can Never Say Goodbye", dedicated to Smith's recently deceased brother Richard.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith says that he is generally uncomfortable with interviews and conversations with strangers and does not express an interest or desire to engage in either, giving rise to a dry sense of humour as exemplified at his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Although he has a presence on multiple social networks, he does not actively use it, instead using it as an official presence to prevent imposters and for Cure-related announcements.


title: Robert Smith (musician)

text: Smith has described himself as a "liberal kind of guy" but he is "uncomfortable with politicised musicians". He sported a 'citizens, not subjects' slogan on his guitar on tour in 2012 and 2013, and has openly expressed his disdain for the British royal family, and lamenting how musicians he respects have accepted honours from them, while also stating "I would honestly cut off my own hands before I did that". In a 2019 interview with "Rolling Stone", Smith commented on his political views saying he has "always held what could be considered a socialist viewpoint on the world" before concluding that "I think right of centre is always wrong, and that’s as political as I get in public."


title: Podcast

text: A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing. Streaming applications and podcasting services provide a convenient and integrated way to manage a personal consumption queue across many podcast sources and playback devices. There also exist podcast search engines, which help users find and share podcast episodes.


title: Podcast

text: A podcast series usually features one or more recurring hosts engaged in a discussion about a particular topic or current event. Discussion and content within a podcast can range from carefully scripted to completely improvised. Podcasts combine elaborate and artistic sound production with thematic concerns ranging from scientific research to slice-of-life journalism. Many podcast series provide an associated website with links and show notes, guest biographies, transcripts, additional resources, commentary, and even a community forum dedicated to discussing the show's content.


title: Podcast

text: The cost to the consumer is low, with many podcasts free to download. Some podcasts are underwritten by corporations or sponsored, with the inclusion of commercial advertisements. In other cases, a podcast could be a business venture supported by some combination of a paid subscription model, advertising or product delivered after sale. Because podcast content is often free, podcasting is often classified as a disruptive medium, adverse to the maintenance of traditional revenue models.


title: Podcast

text: Podcasting is the preparation and distribution of audio files using RSS feeds to the devices of subscribed users. A podcaster normally buys this service from a podcast hosting company like SoundCloud or Libsyn. Hosting companies then distribute the these audio files to Apple and Spotify and other streaming services, which users can listen to on their smartphones or digital music and multimedia players, like an iPhone.


title: Podcast

text: A podcast generator maintains a central list of the files on a server as a web feed that one can access through the Internet. The listener or viewer uses special client application software on a computer or media player, known as a podcast client, which accesses this web feed, checks it for updates, and downloads any new files in the series. This process can be automated to download new files automatically, so it may seem to listeners as though podcasters broadcast or "push" new episodes to them. Podcast files can be stored locally on the user's device, or streamed directly. There are several different mobile applications that allow people to follow and listen to podcasts. Many of these applications allow users to download podcasts or stream them on demand. Most podcast players or applications allow listeners to skip around the podcast and to control the playback speed.


title: Podcast

text: Podcasting has been considered a converged medium (a medium that brings together audio, the web and portable media players), as well as a disruptive technology that has caused some individuals in radio broadcasting to reconsider established practices and preconceptions about audiences, consumption, production and distribution.


title: Podcast

text: Podcasts can be produced at little to no cost and are usually disseminated free-of-charge, which sets this medium apart from the traditional 20th-century model of "gate-kept" media and their production tools. Podcasters can, however, still monetize their podcasts by allowing companies to purchase ad time. They can also garner support from listeners through crowdfunding websites like Patreon, which provide special extras and content to listeners for a fee.


title: Podcast

text: "Podcast" is a portmanteau of "iPod" and "broadcast". The earliest use of "podcasting" was traced to "The Guardian" columnist and BBC journalist Ben Hammersley, who coined it in early February 2004 while writing an article for "The Guardian" newspaper. The term was first used in the audioblogging community in September 2004, when Danny Gregoire introduced it in a message to the iPodder-dev mailing list, from where it was adopted by podcaster Adam Curry. Despite the etymology, the content can be accessed using any computer or similar device that can play media files. The term "podcast" predates Apple's addition of podcasting features to the iPod and the iTunes software. Some sources have suggested the backronym "portable on demand" or "play on demand" for POD to avoid the loose reference to the iPod. This usage has been criticized as a retcon by tech blogger John Gruber.


title: Podcast

text: In October 2000, the concept of attaching sound and video files in RSS feeds was proposed in a draft by Tristan Louis. The idea was implemented by Dave Winer, a software developer and an author of the RSS format.


title: Podcast

text: Podcasting, once an obscure method of spreading audio information, has become a recognized medium for distributing audio content, whether for corporate or personal use. Podcasts are similar to radio programs in form, but they exist as audio files that can be played at a listener's convenience, anytime and anywhere.


title: Podcast

text: The first application to make this process feasible was iPodderX, developed by August Trometer and Ray Slakinski. By 2007, audio podcasts were doing what was historically accomplished via radio broadcasts, which had been the source of radio talk shows and news programs since the 1930s. This shift occurred as a result of the evolution of internet capabilities along with increased consumer access to cheaper hardware and software for audio recording and editing.


title: Podcast

text: In August 2004, Adam Curry launched his show "Daily Source Code". It was a show focused on chronicling his everyday life, delivering news, and discussions about the development of podcasting, as well as promoting new and emerging podcasts. Curry published it in an attempt to gain traction in the development of what would come to be known as podcasting and as a means of testing the software outside of a lab setting. The name "Daily Source Code" was chosen in the hope that it would attract an audience with an interest in technology. "Daily Source Code" started at a grassroots level of production and was initially directed at podcast developers. As its audience became interested in the format, these developers were inspired to create and produce their own projects and, as a result, they improved the code used to create podcasts. As more people learned how easy it was to produce podcasts, a community of pioneer podcasters quickly appeared.


title: Podcast

text: In June 2005, Apple released iTunes 4.9, which added formal support for podcasts, thus negating the need to use a separate program in order to download and transfer them to a mobile device. Although this made access to podcasts more convenient and widespread, it also effectively ended advancement of podcatchers by independent developers. Additionally, Apple issued cease and desist orders to many podcast application developers and service providers for using the term "iPod" or "Pod" in their products' names.


title: Podcast

text: Within a year, many podcasts from public radio networks like the BBC, CBC Radio One, NPR, and Public Radio International placed many of their radio shows on the iTunes platform. In addition, major local radio stations like WNYC in New York City, WHYY-FM radio in Philadelphia, and KCRW in Los Angeles placed their programs on their websites and later on the iTunes platform. Concurrently, CNET, "This Week in Tech", and later Bloomberg Radio, the "Financial Times", and other for-profit companies provided podcast content, some using podcasting as their only distribution system.


title: Podcast

text: As of early 2019, the podcasting industry still generated little overall revenue, although the number of persons who listen to podcasts continues to grow steadily. Edison Research, which issues the Podcast Consumer quarterly tracking report, estimates that in 2019, 90 million persons in the U.S. had listened to a podcast in the last month. As of 2020, 58% of the population of South Korea and 40% of the Spanish population had listened to a podcast in the last month. 12.5% of the UK population had listened to a podcast in the last week and 22% of the United States population listens to at least one podcast weekly. The form is also acclaimed for its low overhead for a creator to start and maintain their show, merely requiring a good-quality microphone, a computer or mobile device and associated software to edit and upload the final product, and some form of acoustic quieting. Podcast creators tend to have a good listener base because of their relationships with the listeners.


title: Podcast

text: Between February March 10 and 25, 2005, Shae Spencer Management, LLC of Fairport, New York filed a trademark application to register the term "podcast" for an "online prerecorded radio program over the internet". On September 9, 2005, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) rejected the application, citing Wikipedia's podcast entry as describing the history of the term. The company amended their application in March 2006, but the USPTO rejected the amended application as not sufficiently differentiated from the original. In November 2006, the application was marked as abandoned.


title: Podcast

text: On September 26, 2004, it was reported that Apple Inc. had started to crack down on businesses using the string "POD", in product and company names. Apple sent a cease and desist letter that week to Podcast Ready, Inc., which markets an application known as "myPodder". Lawyers for Apple contended that the term "pod" has been used by the public to refer to Apple's music player so extensively that it falls under Apple's trademark cover. Such activity was speculated to be part of a bigger campaign for Apple to expand the scope of its existing iPod trademark, which included trademarking "IPOD", "IPODCAST", and "POD". On November 16, 2006, the Apple Trademark Department stated that "Apple does not object to third-party usage of the generic term 'podcast' to accurately refer to podcasting services" and that "Apple does not license the term". However, no statement was made as to whether or not Apple believed they held rights to it.


title: Podcast

text: Personal Audio, a company referred to as a "patent troll" by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), filed a patent on podcasting in 2009 for a claimed invention in 1996. In February 2013, Personal Audio started suing high-profile podcasters for royalties, including "The Adam Carolla Show" and the "HowStuffWorks" podcast. In October 2013, the EFF filed a petition with the US Trademark Office to invalidate the Personal Audio patent. On August 18, 2014, the EFF announced that Adam Carolla had settled with Personal Audio. Finally, on April 10, 2015, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office invalidated five provisions of Personal Audio's podcasting patent.


title: Podcast

text: Podcasts vary in style, format, and topical content. Podcasts are partially patterned on previous media genres but depart from them systematically in certain computationally observable stylistic respects. The conventions and constraints which govern that variation are emerging and vary over time and markets; podcast listeners have various preferences of styles but conventions to address them and communicate about them are still unformed. Some current examples of types of podcasts are given below. This list is likely to change as new types of content, new technology to consume podcasts, and new use cases emerge.


title: Podcast

text: An enhanced podcast, also known as a slidecast, is a type of podcast that combines audio with a slide show presentation. It is similar to a video podcast in that it combines dynamically generated imagery with audio synchronization, but it is different in that it uses presentation software to create the imagery and the sequence of display separately from the time of the original audio podcast recording. "The Free Dictionary", "YourDictionary", and "PC Magazine" define an enhanced podcast as "an electronic slide show delivered as a podcast". Enhanced podcasts are podcasts that incorporate graphics and chapters. iTunes developed an enhanced podcast feature called "Audio Hyperlinking" that they patented in 2012. Enhanced podcasts can be used by businesses or in education. Enhanced podcasts can be created using QuickTime AAC or Windows Media files. Enhanced podcasts were first used in 2006.


title: Podcast

text: A fiction podcast (also referred to as a "scripted podcast" or "audio drama") is similar to a radio drama, but in podcast form. They deliver a fictional story, usually told over multiple episodes and seasons, using multiple voice actors, dialogue, sound effects, and music to enrich the story. Fiction podcasts have attracted a number of well-known actors as voice talents, including Demi Moore & Matthew McConaughey as well as from content producers like Netflix, Spotify, Marvel, and DC Comics. While science-fiction and horror are quite popular, fiction podcasts cover a full range of literary genres from romance, comedy, and drama to fantasy, sci-fi, and detective fiction. Examples of fiction podcasts include "The Bright Sessions", "The Magnus Archives", "Homecoming", "Wooden Overcoats" , "We're Alive" and "Wolverine: The Long Night".


title: Podcast

text: A podcast novel (also known as a "serialized audiobook" or "podcast audiobook") is a literary form that combines the concepts of a podcast and an audiobook. Like a traditional novel, a podcast novel is a work of literary fiction; however, it is recorded into episodes that are delivered online over a period of time. The episodes may be delivered automatically via RSS or through a website, blog, or other syndication method. Episodes can be released on a regular schedule, e.g., once a week, or irregularly as each episode is completed. In the same manner as audiobooks, some podcast novels are elaborately narrated with sound effects and separate voice actors for each character, similar to a radio play or scripted podcast, but many have a single narrator and few or no sound effects.


title: Podcast

text: Some podcast novelists give away a free podcast version of their book as a form of promotion. On occasion such novelists have secured publishing contracts to have their novels printed. Podcast novelists have commented that podcasting their novels lets them build audiences even if they cannot get a publisher to buy their books. These audiences then make it easier to secure a printing deal with a publisher at a later date. These podcast novelists also claim the exposure that releasing a free podcast gains them makes up for the fact that they are giving away their work for free.


title: Podcast

text: A video podcast is a podcast that contains video content. Web television series are often distributed as video podcasts. "Dead End Days, a" serialized dark comedy about zombies released from October 31, 2003, through 2004, is commonly believed to be the first video podcast.


title: Podcast

text: A number of podcasts are recorded either in total or for specific episodes in front of a live audience. Ticket sales allow the podcasters an additional way of monetizing. Some podcasts create specific live shows to tour which are not necessarily included on the podcast feed. Events including the London Podcast Festival, SF Sketchfest and others regularly give a platform for podcasters to perform live to audiences.


title: Podcast

text: Podcast episodes are widely stored and encoded in the mp3 digital audio format and then hosted on dedicated or shared webserver space. Syndication of podcasts' episodes across various websites and platforms is based on RSS feeds, an XML-formatted file citing information about the episode and the podcast itself.


title: Podcast

text: The most basic equipment for a podcast is a computer and a microphone. It is helpful to have a sound-proof room and headphones. The computer should have a recording or streaming application installed. Typical microphones for podcasting are connected using USB. If the podcast involves two or more people, each person requires a microphone, and a USB audio interface is needed to mix them together. If the podcast includes video (livestreaming), then a separate webcam might be needed, and additional lighting.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Karla Leanne Homolka (born May 4, 1970), also known as Karla Leanne Teale, Leanne Teale, and Leanne Bordelais, is a Canadian serial killer who acted as an accomplice to her husband, Paul Bernardo, taking active part in the actual rapes and murders of at least three minors in Ontarioincluding her own sister, Tammy Homolkabetween 1990 and 1992.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka attracted worldwide media attention when a controversial plea bargain with Ontario prosecutors meant she was only convicted of manslaughter, and served only twelve years for the torture, rapes and murders of two teenaged girls, Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French. Homolka testified against Bernardo, who was convicted of the Mahaffy–French murders and received life imprisonment and a dangerous offender designation.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka stated to investigators that she had been an unwilling accomplice in Bernardo's murders as a result of domestic violence, resulting in a deal made with prosecutors for a reduced prison sentence in exchange for a guilty plea to the charge of manslaughter. Homolka scored 5/40 on the Psychopathy Checklist, in contrast to Bernardo's 35/40. However, videotapes of the crimes surfaced after the plea bargain and before Bernardo's trial, proving that Homolka was a more active participant than she had originally claimed, including in the rape and death of her sister, Tammy Homolka. As a result, the deal that she had struck with prosecutors was dubbed in the Canadian press the "Deal with the Devil". Public outrage about the plea deal continued until Homolka's high-profile release from prison in 2005.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Following her release from prison, Homolka settled in Quebec, where she married a brother of her lawyer. She briefly lived in the Antilles and Guadeloupe, but by 2014, had returned to Quebec.


title: Karla Homolka

text: According to Homolka, her husband Paul Bernardo became attracted to her younger sister, Tammy Homolka, during the summer of 1990 (This attraction was confirmed by Bernardo to have begun in July during an interview conducted in 2007 while in custody). Karla hatched a plan to help Bernardo drug Tammy, seeing an opportunity to "minimise risks, take control, and keep it all in the family." In July, "according to Bernardo's testimony, he and Karla served Tammy a spaghetti dinner spiked with Valium stolen from Karla's workplace. Bernardo raped Tammy for about a minute before she started to wake up."


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka later stole the anesthetic agent halothane from the St. Catharines veterinarian clinic where she worked. On December 23, 1990, after a Christmas party at the Homolka household, Bernardo and Homolka drugged Tammy with the animal tranquilizer. The couple subsequently raped Tammy while she was unconscious. Tammy later choked on her own vomit and died. Before calling 9-1-1, Bernardo and Homolka hid the evidence, did the laundry, redressed Tammy (who had a chemical burn on her face), and moved her into her basement bedroom. A few hours later, Tammy was pronounced dead at St. Catharines General Hospital without having regained consciousness. Bernardo told police he had unsuccessfully tried to revive her, and her death was ruled an accident.


title: Karla Homolka

text: On June 7, 1991, Homolka invited a 15-year-old girl she had befriended at a pet shop two years earlier, known as "Jane Doe" in the trials, to their home. "Doe" was then drugged by Homolka. Both Homolka and Bernardo sexually assaulted her and videotaped their assault. In August, "Jane Doe" was invited back to the couple's residence and was again drugged. Homolka called 911 for help after the girl vomited and stopped breathing while being raped. The ambulance was recalled after Homolka and Bernardo resuscitated her.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Early in the morning on June 15, 1991, Bernardo detoured through Burlington (halfway between Toronto and St. Catharines) to steal licence plates and found Leslie Mahaffy standing outside her home. The 14-year-old had missed her curfew after attending a friend's wake and was locked out of her house. Bernardo left his car and approached Mahaffy, saying that he wanted to break into a neighbour's house. Unfazed, she asked if he had any cigarettes to which he claimed he had in his vehicle. When Bernardo led her to his car he blindfolded her, forced her into the car, drove her to Port Dalhousie and informed Homolka that they had a victim.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Bernardo and Homolka videotaped themselves torturing and sexually abusing Mahaffy while they listened to Bob Marley and David Bowie. At one point Bernardo said, "You're doing a good job, Leslie, a damned good job", adding: "The next two hours are going to determine what I do to you. Right now, you're scoring perfect." On another segment of tape played at Bernardo's trial, the assault escalated. Mahaffy cried out in pain, and begged Bernardo to stop. In the Crown description of the scene, he was sodomizing her while her hands were bound with twine.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Mahaffy later told Bernardo that her blindfold seemed to be slipping, which signaled the possibility that she could identify her attackers if she was set free or lived. The following day, Bernardo claimed, Homolka fed her a lethal dose of Halcion; Homolka claimed that Bernardo strangled her. They put Mahaffy's body in their basement, and the day after the Homolka family had dinner at Bernardo's and Homolka's house. After the Homolkas and their remaining daughter Lori left, Bernardo and Homolka decided that the best way to dispose of the evidence would be to dismember Mahaffy and encase each part of her remains in concrete. Bernardo bought a dozen bags of cement at a hardware store the following day; he kept the receipts, which were damaging at his trial. Bernardo used his grandfather's circular saw to dismember Mahaffy. Bernardo and Homolka made a number of trips to dump the cement blocks in Lake Gibson, south of Port Dalhousie. At least one of the blocks weighed 90 kg (200 pounds) and was beyond their ability to sink. It lay near the shore, where it was found by Michael Doucette and his son Michael Jr while on a fishing expedition on June 29, 1991. Mahaffy's orthodontic appliance was instrumental in identifying her.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka was released from prison on July 4, 2005. Several days before, Bernardo was interviewed by police and his lawyer Tony Bryant. According to Bryant, Bernardo said that he had always intended to free the girls he and Homolka kidnapped. However, when Mahaffy's blindfold fell off (allowing her to see Bernardo's face) Homolka was concerned that Mahaffy would identify Bernardo and report them to the police. Bernardo claimed that Homolka planned to murder Mahaffy by injecting an air bubble into her bloodstream, triggering an air embolism.


title: Karla Homolka

text: During the after-school hours of April 16, 1992, Bernardo and Homolka drove through St. Catharines to look for potential victims. Although students were still going home, the streets were generally empty. As they passed Holy Cross Secondary School, a Catholic high school in the city's north end, they spotted 15-year-old Kristen French walking briskly to her home nearby. They pulled into the parking lot of nearby Grace Lutheran Church and Homolka got out of the car, map in hand, pretending to need assistance. When French looked at the map, Bernardo attacked from behind and brandished a knife, forcing her into the front seat of their car. From the back seat, Homolka subdued French by pulling her hair.


title: Karla Homolka

text: French took the same route home every day, taking about 15 minutes to get home and care for her dog. Soon after she should have arrived, her parents became convinced that she had met with foul play and notified police. Within 24 hours the Niagara Regional Police Service (NRP) assembled a team, searched French's route and found several witnesses who had seen the abduction from different locations (giving police some important details). French's shoe, recovered from the parking lot from where she had been taken, underscored the seriousness of the abduction.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Over the Easter weekend Bernardo and Homolka videotaped themselves torturing, raping and sodomizing French, forcing her to drink large amounts of alcohol and submit to Bernardo. At his trial, Crown prosecutor Ray Houlahan said that Bernardo always intended to kill her because she was never blindfolded and could identify her captors. The following day, Bernardo and Homolka murdered French before going to the Homolkas' for Easter dinner. Homolka testified at her trial that Bernardo strangled French for seven minutes while she watched. Bernardo said that Homolka beat French with a rubber mallet because she tried to escape, and French was strangled with a noose around her neck which was secured to a hope chest; Homolka then went to casually fix her own hair.


title: Karla Homolka

text: French's nude body was discovered on April 30, 1992, in a ditch in Burlington, about 45 minutes from St. Catharines and a short distance from the cemetery where Mahaffy is buried. She had been washed, and her hair was cut off. Although it was thought that French's hair was removed as a trophy, Homolka testified that it was cut to impede identification.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Citing the need to protect Bernardo's right to a fair trial, a publication ban was imposed on Homolka's preliminary inquiry.


title: Karla Homolka

text: The Crown had applied for the ban imposed on July 5, 1993, by Francis Kovacs, a Justice of the Ontario Court (General Division). Homolka, through her lawyers, supported the ban, whereas Bernardo's lawyers argued that he would be prejudiced by the ban since Homolka previously had been portrayed as his victim. Four media outlets and one author also opposed the application. Some lawyers argued that rumours could be doing more damage to the future trial process than the publication of the actual evidence.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Public access to the Internet effectively nullified the court's order, however; as did proximity to the Canada–US border, since a publication ban by an Ontario Court cannot apply in New York, Michigan, or anywhere else outside of Ontario. American journalists cited the First Amendment in editorials and published details of Homolka's testimony, which were widely distributed by many Internet sources, primarily on the alt.fan.karla-homolka Usenet newsgroup. Information and rumours spread across myriad electronic networks available to anyone in Canada with a computer and a modem. Moreover, many of the Internet rumours went beyond the known details of the case.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Newspapers in Buffalo, Detroit, Washington, New York City and even Britain, together with border radio and television stations, reported details gleaned from sources at Homolka's trial. The syndicated series "A Current Affair" aired two programs on the crimes. Canadians bootlegged copies of "The Buffalo Evening News" across the border, prompting orders to the Niagara Regional Police Service to arrest all those with more than one copy at the border. Extra copies were confiscated. Copies of other newspapers, including "The New York Times", were either turned back at the border or were not accepted by distributors in Ontario. Gordon Domm, a retired police officer who defied the publication ban by distributing details from the foreign media, was charged and convicted of disobeying a lawful court order.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Jamie Cameron, professor of law at Osgoode Hall, noted that "at the time of the Homolka trial, three features of the case worried and concerned the public. Little was known about the respective roles Homolka and Bernardo played in their actions and the killing of their victims. By spring, 1993, it was clear that the Crown's case against Bernardo depended on Homolka's evidence. In simple terms, to secure a conviction against him, her story had to be believed. Yet on no view of the facts then known could she be exculpated; by casting her as a victim of his predatory behaviour, her responsibility for the crimes that were committed could be diminished and her credibility as a witness preserved."


title: Karla Homolka

text: On May 18, 1993, Homolka was arraigned on two counts of manslaughter. Bernardo was charged with two counts each of kidnapping, unlawful confinement, aggravated sexual assault and first-degree murder as well as one of dismemberment. Coincidentally, that day Bernardo's original lawyer, Ken Murray, first watched the rape videotapes. Murray decided to hold onto the tapes and use them to impeach Homolka on the stand during Bernardo's trial. Neither Murray nor Carolyn MacDonald, the other lawyer on the defence team, were deeply experienced in criminal law and it was only over time that their ethical dilemma showed itself also to be a potentially criminal matter, for they were withholding evidence. By October 1993, he and his law partners had studied over 4,000 documents from the Crown. Murray has said he was willing to hand over the tapes to the Crown if they had let him cross-examine Homolka in the anticipated preliminary hearing. The hearing was never held.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka was tried on June 28, 1993, though the publication ban the court had imposed limited the details released to the public, who were barred from the proceedings.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Murray said the videotapes showed Homolka sexually assaulting four female victims, having sex with a female prostitute in Atlantic City, and at another point, drugging an unconscious victim. In February 1994, Homolka divorced Bernardo.


title: Karla Homolka

text: During the summer of 1994, Murray had become concerned about serious ethical problems that had arisen in connection with the tapes and his continued representation of Bernardo. He consulted his own lawyer, Austin Cooper, who asked the Law Society of Upper Canada's professional-conduct committee for advice.


title: Karla Homolka

text: "The law society directed Murray in writing to seal the tapes in a package and turn them over to the judge presiding at Bernardo's trial. The law society further directed him to remove himself as Bernardo's counsel and to tell Bernardo what he had been instructed to do," Murray said in a statement released through Cooper in September 1995.


title: Karla Homolka

text: On September 12, 1994, Cooper attended Bernardo's trial and advised Justice Patrick LeSage of the Ontario Court's General Division, lawyer John Rosen, who replaced Murray as Bernardo's defence counsel, and the prosecutors about what the law society had directed Murray to do. Rosen argued that the tapes should have been turned over to the defence first. Murray handed the tapes, along with a detailed summary, to Rosen, who "kept the tapes for about two weeks and then decided to turn them over to the prosecution."


title: Karla Homolka

text: The revelation that a key piece of evidence had been kept from police for so long created a furor, especially when the public realized that Homolka had been Bernardo's willing accomplice. The tapes were not allowed to be shown to the spectators; only the audio portion was available to them. Moreover, Bernardo has always claimed that, while he raped and tortured Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French, Homolka actually killed them.


title: Karla Homolka

text: After the videotapes had been found, rumours spread that Homolka was an active participant of the crimes. The public grew incensed as the full extent of Homolka's role in the case was finally exposed and the plea agreement now seemed unnecessary. However, as was provided in the plea bargain, Homolka had already disclosed sufficient information to the police and the Crown found no grounds to break the agreement and reopen the case.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka's plea bargain had been offered before the contents of the videotapes were available for review. Anne McGillivray, associate professor of law at the University of Manitoba, explained the continuing public antagonism against Homolka: There was widespread belief that she had known where the videotapes were hidden, that she wilfully concealed the Jane Doe incidents and, most centrally, that her claims of being under Bernardo's control – a central tenet of the plea bargain – were dubious. Speculation was fed by a publicity ban on the plea bargain which stood until Bernardo's trial.


title: Karla Homolka

text: "Print and website sources imagined demonic duos, vampirism, Barbie and Ken perfect-couple perfect murderers [sic], sexy 'Killer Karla', the comic 'Karla's Web' featuring Homolka's psy confessions. "The gaze centres, always, on Homolka" (italics added)... That [Bernardo] would be incarcerated for his mortal lifespan seemed a foregone conclusion. Homolka, in the popular view, should have taken her seat beside him in the prisoner's box and seat of ultimate evil... Homolka promised full disclosure and testimony against Bernardo in return for reduced charges... and a joint sentencing recommendation. In so doing, she escaped central blame for the deaths."


title: Karla Homolka

text: Although the contents of the videotapes would likely have led to a conviction of murder for Homolka, an inquiry into the conduct of the prosecutors who had made the plea bargain found their behaviour "professional and responsible" and the "resolution agreement" that they had established with Homolka "unassailable" under the Criminal Code. Judge Patrick T. Galligan, reporting to the Attorney General on the matter, indicated that in his opinion "the Crown had no alternative but to ...[negotiate with the accomplice] in this case" as "the 'lesser of two evils' to deal with an accomplice rather than to be left in a situation where a violent and dangerous offender cannot be prosecuted."


title: Karla Homolka

text: In December 2001, Canadian authorities determined that there was no possible future use of the videotapes. The six videotapes depicting the torture and rape of Bernardo's and Homolka's victims were destroyed. The disposition of the tapes of Homolka watching and commenting on the tapes remains sealed.


title: Karla Homolka

text: After her 1995 testimony against Bernardo, when Homolka returned to Kingston's Prison For Women, her mother, Dorothy Homolka, started to suffer annual breakdowns between Thanksgiving and Christmas. The collapses were severe enough that she was hospitalized, sometimes for months at a time. While at Kingston Homolka began correspondence courses in sociology through nearby Queen's University which initially caused a media storm. Homolka was required to pay all fees, as well as her personal needs, from her fortnightly income of about C$69, although, she told author Stephen Williams in a subsequent letter, "I did get some financial assistance". Homolka later graduated with a bachelor's degree in psychology from Queen's.


title: Karla Homolka

text: Homolka was moved from Kingston in the summer of 1997 to Joliette Institution, a medium security prison in Joliette, Quebec, 80 km northeast of Montreal.


title: Karla Homolka

text: In 1999, "Toronto Star" reporter Michelle Shephard came into possession of copies of her application to transfer to the "Maison Thérèse-Casgrain", run by the Elizabeth Fry Society, and published the story noting the halfway house's proximity to local schools, hours before the Canadian courts issued a publication ban on the information. Homolka sued the government after her transfer to a Montreal halfway house was denied.


title: Karla Homolka

text: In 2001, Homolka was transferred to the Ste-Anne-des-Plaines Institution, a maximum security prison in Quebec.


title: Karla Homolka

text: In a 2008 letter of apology to her family, she continued to blame Bernardo for her misdeeds: "He wanted me to get sleeping pills from work... threatened me and physically and emotionally abused me when I refused... I tried so hard to save her."


title: Karla Homolka

text: During Homolka's release hearing (under section 810.2 of the Criminal Code), Louis Morrisette, psychiatrist, said the then-35-year-old did not represent a threat to society. Various hearings over the years have left a mixture of opinions. If she posed any kind of danger, said Dr. Hubert Van Gijseghem, a forensic psychologist for Correctional Services Canada, it lay in the ominous but not unlikely possibility of her linking up with another sexual sadist like Bernardo. "She is very attracted to this world of sexual psychopaths. It's not for nothing that she did what she did with Bernardo," he told the "National Post" after reviewing her file. A scheduled newspaper interview with Homolka was quashed by her lawyer.