June 21, 1987 - Joepie (Belgium)*  (Translation below)
"After 15 minutes in the sun I have an enormous headache"

After 15 minutes in the sun I have an enormous headache

 Annoying months lay ahead for The Cure’s Robert Smith
 ‘I’m a night person’ says Robert Smith in our brief conversation after a long day of shooting. ‘I don’t like telephones, traffic noise and especially not sunlight’. At my home in London the curtains are always closed, an atmosphere in which I feel very comfortable’. We are in his hotel room in Nice, the city in the south of France which The Cure have chosen to shoot a video for their upcoming single ‘Catch’. Everyone is a bit tired because of the lengthy tour in South-America they have just finished. And for Robert annoying months lay ahead. ‘That terrible sun is always shining’.

‘Sleeping is what I like doing the most’
‘I’ve never liked the summer’ Robert says when he looks back at his childhood vacations. ‘My father always wanted to take us with the car to the countryside or the beach to enjoy the sun, my brothers and sisters had the time of their life. But little Robert was sitting in the backseat of the car looking sad. After the holidays all my classmates got back looking brown and burnt. But I always looked deathly pale. Because after a day in the sun I look like a mess. I’m as red as a tomato and horribly ill. And to this day I still have an enormous headache after 15 minutes in the sun’.  How did you survive the tours in Brazil and Argentine because the sun can be merciless over there?

Robert, eyes narrowed to protect himself from the southern sun. ‘I much prefer living at night, he says, nothing bothers you then’.  
‘I have my own remedies for the sun´ Robert says smiling. ´When we arrive at the hotel in the afternoon after a long flight, I get some sleep in my hotel room. A couple of hours before the concert I'll be in the pub. A dark cellar like pub you know? I feel very at ease in an environment like that. Also I live at night. After a concert the other guys go to bed but not me. I’ll be in my room writing a letter or a note. Or I’m on the phone with my girlfriend (Mary Poole) quietly looking at the walls, we can easily talk for half an hour. I've always function best when it’s quiet. I hate traffic noise, I get crazy from hearing telephones.....’ Yep he’s a weird guy. Are you more creative at night? ‘Absolutely, I can think much clearer. The most of my lyrics are written at night. The most of my music too. I enjoy having a lot of fans and to travel the world with a group of fans but I actually like being alone the most.’ How does your girlfriend (Mary Poole) find all that? ‘Well she’s known me for 15 years now and she lets me live the way I want to live. You know what I most like doing is sleeping, just being away from the world’

 ´I had to learn to laugh´
The next day there has to be shot again. All The Cure-boys are on time at the balcony of the static hotel where the video is being shot. Only Robert, naturally, is late. There are a lot of laughs on the set. Simon Gallup and Lol Tolhurst are definitely the life and soul of the party. And Robert is happy to join in the fun. ‘I had to learn that’ he says somewhat later. ‘A lot of fans have a totally wrong image of The Cure. Maybe we stimulated that a little bit by always wearing black and never cracking a joke on stage. But I don’t want that anymore, we are five simple English lads who just want to have fun. You have to in this business the bigger a band get the more stressful it becomes. You have to laugh to break the stress.’ Anytime and with anyone? ‘Absolutely we even laugh at ourselves!’.

  Thanks so much Yan Hulsebosch  for TRANSLATING.