The Stub Project – The Cure – Red Rocks – 7.20.1987

The Cure: Where the Persecuted become Persecutors

The crowd was dressed in black, every last one of them. That is, except for me and my girlfriend. We were wearing tie-dyes (but my memory is apparently in black and white). The helpful goths behind us informed us that we were at the wrong show. Whispers of “nice shirt,” “wrong decade, dude,” and “do I smell patchouli?” followed us all night.

Only now do I realize the irony. We stuck out like they usually did; the tables had turned. These outcasts in their black uniforms and pale skin and mascara waiting to smear at the site of their idol Robert Smith, these broken kids who had spent their lives scattered on the edges … they were all together now. They had been isolated for so long in their bedrooms, in the cafeteria, in their awful suburbs where no one understood – and now they were one, a rolling black tide ready to obliterate everything in their path.

We had stumbled into a convention of misfits and they didn’t have to take it anymore. Collectively they had become the football team and we were the losers who needed to conform. Thankfully, instead of sticking our heads in the toilet, they attacked us with their withering wit. “Fucking hippies,” they said, as if they had a monopoly on the dark side. I wanted to say that I knew a thing or two about wanting to die. I loved going to graveyards. I’d read The Stranger, too. I got it … but my  t-shirt erased the possibility that we would ever get along. Instead of replying, we pretended we didn’t hear them and danced.

I actually enjoyed the show – dancing has that effect. When the band played, the sad, disgruntled murmurs of the crowd disappeared. And The Cure sounded wonderful in what is perhaps the most beautiful outdoor venue in the country.

As we drove back to Boulder with the Dead as our soundtrack, we could hardly wait, in less than a month we would be back to Red Rocks to see our favorite band play a three night stand. You’d always see a few stray goths at Dead shows back them – perhaps they had been tricked to attend by the band’s name? – and after this night I always made a point of giving them a extra-wide smile, further perplexing them to no end.

Going Down the Road Feeling Bad – MP3

The Cure, two years later: