The Cure's 25 most haunting songs

Given the name of this track, you might think it’d be a romantic song celebrating two individuals’ shared love for each other. However, there’s a sense of longing, an acknowledgment of distance, and an underlying sadness you can practically feel in your bones while listening. Many fans believe Smith wrote this track about his wife and the weight of being apart while he’s touring.

This song is haunting in the literal sense of the word. Lullaby, which you’d think would ease one into a peaceful sleep, describes a terrifying nightmare. (The band has a knack for its contradictory, ironic song titles.) This morbid song details a “spiderman” climbing into bed to slowly consume its final prey (the narrator), with other dead victims scattered around the room. 

Alone is a more recent song from The Cure, with an infamously long intro and mournful sound. The opening lyrics are enough to instantly elicit tears: “This is the end of every song that we sing.” Not to mention, Smith’s voice hasn’t aged a bit—and it’s as haunting as ever.

This song paints a picture of a toxic relationship between two lovers who just can’t let each other go. Despite the betrayals and seemingly codependent patterns, the boy and girl feed into their addiction to each other, always returning for more, but ultimately causing further damage. The chorus echoes: “I wish I could just stop. I know another moment will break my heart. Too many tears, too many times, too many years I've cried for you.”

Smith wrote Burn specifically for the cult classic film The Crow starring Brandon Lee. The movie follows a man who was murdered, along with his fiancée, by an inner-city gang the night before his wedding. On the anniversary of their death, Lee’s character is resurrected by “The Crow” and becomes an avenger against his killers. The song highlights this hunger for vengeance, fueled by insurmountable grief. “Every night I burn, scream the animal scream,” Smith’s voice calls. “Every night I burn, dream the crow black dream.”

It Can Never Be The Same is an unreleased song, though the band has performed it live for years. Apparently, Smith previously told Radio X the song’s original name was “Christmas Without You” and revealed that it’s about his mother’s death. As with most of The Cure’s tracks, you can hear the sorrow in his voice.

Not only does its two-minute intro prepare you for the brutality of its lyrics, but Faith takes you through the gradual loss of hope and resilience. Yet somehow, the narrator still clings to what little faith he has left. Through the lyrics, Smith begs, “Please say the right words, or cry like the stone white clown and stand lost forever in a happy crowd.”

Many fans of The Cure speculate that Disintegration highlights heavy themes like drug use and addiction, which seem to threaten the narrator’s life trajectory. The lyrics, though poetic, elevate a cry for help from the hold these substances have on the individual. “Dropping through sky, through the glass of the roof, through the roof of your mouth, through the mouth of your eye, through the eye of the needle,” Smith sings hauntingly. “It's easier for me to get closer to heaven than ever feel whole again.”

Though a bit more upbeat and catchy in its melody, A Forest is still a deeply emotive track. The song follows a boy who hears a girl’s voice as he starts running away from her, into the forest. However, at the end of the song, he realizes, “The girl was never there. It's always the same. I'm running towards nothing, again and again and again and again…”

The title “Numb” perfectly captures the theme of this song. The lyrics detail the urgent desire to dissociate from life and escape the pain of being human. Smith sings of a boy seeking solace in a drug that will stop him from feeling anything at all. 

With another nearly three-minute-long intro, And Nothing Is Forever is a more recent song by The Cure. This heartbreaking track includes the words “however far away,” potentially a nod to Lovesong, which echoes the same lyrics. According to interviews, this song talks about a promise from the narrator to a friend on their deathbed, assuring the person he would be there with them “in the end.”

This song colors a scene between a boy and a girl, likely a couple, who sit in uncomfortable, agonizing silence. It seems as though the two are committed to the connection they once shared, yet can no longer force. In this case, their shared silence is “the loudest sound.”

While Smith’s voice is always poignant, in this song, he sounds particularly defeated, perhaps even a bit regretful or resentful. Treasure is heavily based on the idea of loss, especially in a romantic sense, with one partner passing away or no longer being in the other person’s life. The track was allegedly inspired by the poem “Remember” by Christina Rossetti.

Pictures of You is one of The Cure’s most popular songs, and for good reason. The lyrics are from the POV of a person who is staring, seemingly for hours on end, at pictures of an individual they hold near and dear. The narrator reflects on the moments from those photos, detailing the memories as if they were happening in real time. There’s an underlying tone of gut-wrenching yet bittersweet nostalgia.

Apart is the ultimate breakup song. But as always, The Cure takes it one step further by delivering detailed perspectives from both the girl and the boy involved. This deeply relatable song highlights the emotional aftermath of a romantic loss. “How did we get this far apart?” the narrator asks. “I thought this love would last forever.”

This nearly 10-minute song starts with the sounds of a storm, like thunder rumbling and rain falling on the pavement. It describes a deep yet hopeless love affair, seemingly describing one last night spent between lovers. Similar to Apart, it’s an incredibly captivating heartbreak song.

Unlike with most other songs by The Cure, Smith’s voice almost immediately opens the track of This Morning. The early lyrics set a grim scene: “Nothing left to feel, nothing more to do, nothing left to give, nothing more in you, nothing else to have or hold, nothing left, but time to go.” At one point, Smith even delivers his lyrics like spoken-word poetry. It seems to be describing a person’s last days on Earth, when they can almost sense their inevitable passing.

All Cats Are Grey is a dark song about growing old. Lol Tolhurst, one of the founding members of The Cure, has explained that his mother used to use the expression “all cats are grey," which basically means we all appear the same in death. Many believe the song was written about Tolhurst's mother's passing. 

One of the most haunting emotions one can experience is guilt. The Figurehead deals heavily with regret, shame, and painful self-reflection. “But the same image haunts me, in sequence, in despair of time,” Smith sings. “I will never be clean again.”

Lost is perhaps the most haunting track on this list. Smith mutters repeatedly, at first as if in pain, then later in anger: “I can’t find myself.” The song seems to play into the cliche idea of losing yourself in another person. Of course, The Cure explores this notion through poetic, complex contemplation. The music itself picks up as the song progresses, with Smith’s voice sounding panicked at times, before it all settles into a quiet realization: “I got lost in someone else.”

Another sickening (in the best way) breakup song, Bare is eight minutes of pure heartache. At least in my opinion, it seems to cover the themes of change, growing apart, and losing touch with another person. The closing lines of the song perfectly encapsulate how it feels once you’ve reached the end stages of grief: “However hard I try, I will always feel regret. However hard I try, I will never forget.” 

Cut is a great song for unrequited love at the breaking point of a relationship, when one person still helplessly adores the other while they no longer care. This fast-paced track packs the anger and panic that usually accompany such dynamics. There’s nothing more painful than holding onto someone who once valued you but won’t even look your way anymore. 

This song talks of a time when one still had hope, so much so that they’d dare “to wish impossible things.” But the narrator seems to look back at the faith he once had and reflect with bleak truth and realism. He’s seemingly haunted by the naivety of his past self. “All I wish is gone away.”

Us or Them is both a political statement and a reclaimation of control, and it's uncharacteristically angry compared to most others on this list. Smith's usual lullaby voice is nowhere to be found in this track and borders on unhinged in the best way. Many fans label the track as one of The Cure's worst songs, but I respectfully disagree.

As The Cure previously confirmed, A Letter to Elise was directly inspired by Franz Kafka's Letters to Felice. The song is a heartbreaking and honest message from a man to a woman he once loved but now realizes is no longer a match for him. Their connection is simply not there, no matter how much they wish it could be. "Oh, Elise, it doesn't matter what you do," Smith sings. "I know I'll never really get inside of you, to make your eyes catch fire the way they should."