The Cure’s Robert Smith Once Claimed Joy Division’s Bassist was “Jealous” of Theirs

October 3, 2024 11:44 am

With The Cure gearing up to release a new album on November 1, their first in 16 years, it seems only right to revisit some of frontman Robert Smith’s iconic moments. There was one in particular where he got under the skin of New Order/Joy Division bassist Peter Hook for reasons unknown, even after Joy Division supported The Cure in 1980.

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Smith has never shied away from speaking his mind, and he gave Hook what-for in a 2013 interview. Before that, The Cure and Joy Division/New Order were close contemporaries and even friends. They supported each other at shows, and The Cure even covered Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” at the time.

However, in 2012, former Joy Division and New Order bassist Peter Hook released the book Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division. In the book, he chose to shade The Cure, claiming that they had “sold out a bit.” Robert Smith didn’t take kindly to this, and who would? In a 2013 interview with Radio Urbana, Smith fired back at Hook for the jab.

“Peter Hook always had a real big problem with us because our bassist Simon Gallup was so much better looking and the better bass player…I think Peter was so jealous he could never get over it, and he stopped the rest of them from being friendly…” he said.

Robert Smith of The Cure Claimed Peter Hook of Joy Division was “Jealous” of Their Bass Player After Sell-Out Jab

However, Smith later shared praise for New Order, who continued without Peter Hook in 2007. Seemingly, New Order as a whole had no problem with The Cure, but Hook, for some reason, did.

“We’ve bumped into them over the years, and since [Hook] left, we’ve played with New Order a few times in the last summer, and it’s so nice to be able to chat with them, you know, to talk with them because I’ve always loved New Order I think they’re one of the best bands – they also have a fantastic back catalog, and they like us, it’s so nice to say to Bernard [Sumner] ‘I like your band’, and he says ‘I like yours as well,’” he said in 2013.

He continued, “[and] it’s taken an awful long time to say hello again to them. They’re a good example of a band that gets better as they get older. They were fantastic when we played with them last year, and we’re playing again with them this year at a couple of festivals.”

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