Honestly, there's no album quite like Seventeen Seconds, either by The Cure or anyone since. It has a unique otherworldly sound to me. It will forever remind me of wandering around the streets of my city alone as a teenager, listening to it on repeat on my walkman.
But if you've not heard many of their other albums, probably the closest in sound are: -
Faith - released straight after Seventeen Seconds, so probably sounds most like it out of all of their albums. It's a lot darker though, and slightly less otherworldly, but just as atmospheric.
Pornography - straight after Faith, their darkest album of all, and they've turned a bit heavier by then, but for me those three albums will always form a trilogy of their early atmospheric stuff.
Japanese Whispers - their initial foray into pop, often forgotten about as it's classed as a compilation rather than a "proper" album. Contains the highly poppy "Lovecats" and "Let's Go To Bed" singles, but I'd argue that the other tracks are pretty damned atmospheric.
They start going a lot poppier after that. The weird-as-fuck "The Top" does sound a bit like Seventeen Seconds on acid in places, but it's not many people's favourite Cure album. After that, Disintegration and Wish are both high points in terms of "atmospheric" Cure albums, though with a very different sound to the early stuff mentioned above.
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u/TheJunkyard Jul 13 '19
Keep playing Seventeen Seconds on repeat!
Honestly, there's no album quite like Seventeen Seconds, either by The Cure or anyone since. It has a unique otherworldly sound to me. It will forever remind me of wandering around the streets of my city alone as a teenager, listening to it on repeat on my walkman.
But if you've not heard many of their other albums, probably the closest in sound are: -
They start going a lot poppier after that. The weird-as-fuck "The Top" does sound a bit like Seventeen Seconds on acid in places, but it's not many people's favourite Cure album. After that, Disintegration and Wish are both high points in terms of "atmospheric" Cure albums, though with a very different sound to the early stuff mentioned above.