Pictures of Me

by Fatal Bob and the Epicure

(Kevin, you will surely die for this - Deadseraph, Cure lover and Coven Webmaster.......)

(According to a Hobart share-housing urban legend, there was once a highly-strung Cure fan who broke up with his girlfriend.  The song “Pictures of You” reminded him of her and the pain of their separation.  His flatmates, who wished he would stop moping about and move on,  found out about this.  He would be doing some mundane task like eating dinner or watching TV,  and they would play the song over and over, causing him to immediately crash into a pit of despair and hide in his room.  After a few months he moved out. 

This song is for him.

The ranting linelessness of the original lyric sheet has been reproduced for your reading pleasure.)

I’ve been looking so long at these pictures of me that I almost believe that I’m great

I’ve been looking so long at these pictures of me that I’ve almost forgotten the problems I’ve had with my weight

Remembering me writing “Pornography” dying for the sake of my art and I moped and I thought about killing myself I was worshipped by all the goth tarts Remembering me and how thin I could be now I’m bigger and fatter and wider than a snowman screamed at the weight machine screamed at the mirror but I still haven’t found all the courage to go on a diet

Remembering me when I had a career full of songs full of doom and of doubt They were clever and credible but they never sold and that’s why I went and sold out Remembering me when I used to write songs this crap that I spew now more boring than everything tour for the last time and rake in the millions look in my mind and you cannot see anything

If only I’d eaten the right foods, the doctors would not watch my heart if only I’d eaten the right foods I’d never be bursting apart in these pictures of me

Looking so long at these pictures of me amazed that I made it so far I’ve been such a dipstick in all of my lipstick at least it has bought me this car full of pictures of me

There was nothing in the world that I ever wanted more than to sit right on top of the chart there was nothing in the world that I ever wanted more than to see sold in every K-mart all these pictures of me.

I do like the Cure, I really do.  They aren’t bad for a boy band, and that Robert Smith is quite a good-looking specimen, as far as ornamental poodles go.  I especially like their song “In Between Days”, because its such a soundalike ripoff of New Order that I can listen to it and forget the fact that Fat Bob is whining at me again, and …

Perhaps I’d better start that again.

The Cure are in my view a moderately good band, and, yes,  I am aware that Robert Smith has lost a lot of weight in recent years.  “Pornography” is a masterpiece of despair and among the finest fringe-goth records ever made.  “Disintegration” is excellent too, very cohesive and extremely well written even if the mood it chronicles is rather artificial.  I also like a lot of the Cure’s more poppy records, starting with the very early stuff and including “The Head on the Door”, which is pleasantly diverse.  What I don’t like, nay, actively loathe,  is what I’ve heard from the “Wish” and “Wild Mood Swings” albums.  “Bloodflowers” is reported to be good, but I’m waiting to find it secondhand rather than give any royalties directly to the artist(?) responsible for the dreadful  “Mint Car”.

As an example of the Cure’s stronger points, their lyrics may not be especially unusual, but their structuring of words is sometimes quite elaborate and distinctive – which made the parody above very easy to write.  I tried doing the same with the Sisters of Mercy but found that they used a lot of very short lines and repetitions which made it hard to write an effective parody.

Procrastination boulevard, yawn yawn …

Hey now hey now now, sing this inaction to me …

Some people get by without writing many records …

Last time I wrote songs, in nineteen eighty nine …

Just a few ideas to get you going.

Sandcat co-wrote the Cure parody.  But don’t hold that against her.