Friday 1 November 2024, All Saint’s Day, was the worldwide release date for The Cure’s new album Songs of a Lost World. A very special release day, as it is the band’s first new studio album in sixteen years!
I like to keep up my old ritual of buying a physical copy of a new Cure album from my local record store on the day it is released. So on this very appropriate grey and foggy morning, I went to the Plato record store in my hometown Utrecht, which has just moved to bigger premises.
Apparently I was a bit early (though not usually an early riser), because they were still filling the shelves. I turned out to be the second person to buy the new Cure album, as I was told. In this store I bought the ‘retail exclusive 1 LP marble stone’ edition. This edition is pressed on grey marbled vinyl. Lines from Endsong ‘outside in the dark’ (A) and ‘left alone with nothing’ (B) are etched into the runout grooves. It looks really wonderful. Like other variations it comes with a poster of the cover art. What made it even better was that I got a promo canvas with my purchase. Thank you Plato!