Other Voices - Cure Members' Copies Update

I'm very pleased to let everyone know that copies of the Other Voices books have been given to all of the currently active members of The Cure and also to original member Laurence (Lol) Tolhurst. I would love to  give a copy to Porl (whose status with the band is unknown?) and to the ex-Cure members, so that's going to be a future part of this project.Thanks immensely once again to all the awesome contributors to the book, you really helped make it into an outstanding "thank you" letter to the band.


I found it to be highly appropriate and even somewhat poetic that the copies were given to the guys during the Reflections shows celebrating their first three albums, given that the original book was given to Robert shortly before the 30th Anniversary date of the release of Three Imaginary Boys.


And for those of you wondering, YES I did get  to ask Robert about getting the original copy of the book, when we met him in Sydney! (He got it.)

Without further ado, here are the photos of the book being given to the various members!

In Sydney Australia, May 31, 2011 - just prior to the first Reflections show. With me are April (Lostwishes) and Chris (Curejunkie), both contributors to the book, and Paivi (Spiggy):

Lol, Roger and Simon get their books:

Left to Right: April, Chris, Lol, Rev, Roger, Paivi

Rev and Simon

I didn't manage to get a pic of Simon  with his book, but he DID get it at this time! 

Paivi,Rev, Robert, April, Chris

 Robert already has the original, but we took a pic with him anyway, who wouldn't? 

Below, Jason gets his copy of the book at the third night of Reflections in LA on Nov. 23rd, 2011:

Jason Cooper in LA

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Here are the dedications written in the  front of each book. I did one similar in Jason's book but did not have time to photograph it, sorry! Also there was a "This copy provided by:" blurb in the back of each one listing all of the wonderful, generous people who made donations so that I could buy the books for the band members.  

Also as a side note to Jason, I'm so sorry we weren't able to give you your copy in Oz, and I apologize if you felt left out. The problem was solely economic, as the books are $100 each, I just didn't have enough money to buy four copies prior to the Reflections shows. So since it was Simon's birthday, and I didn't know if I'd see Roger and Lol again, I had a hard decision to make about the three books that I brought.  I hope you weren't too upset! Much love and respect to you!

Other Voices - Print Version

Greetings Cure peeps! You will be happy to know that the printed version of the Other Voices book is now available to order from Blurb books!

The book is available in a large format, similar to the actual book dimensions, and also in a smaller and less expensive version in order to make it available and affordable to everyone.

I want to assure you again that I am not making any sort of profit from this book at all. The prices shown on the book pages are the base prices that Blurb charges for the actual production of the book, and have not been "marked up" in any way. The final book is missing 10 of the original pages due to the wishes of the individual authors. I have added a couple of pages at the end that contain some of the detail of the book and there is also a page with photos of the band playing onstage at the Pearl theater on the night they were given the original.

Again, I do not do any of the printing, shipping or order fulfillment for these books, they are from the Blurb print-on-demand service and Blurb will handle all of the transactions and customer service for the print books, so if you have any problems at all, please contact Blurb directly. We also plan to buy a few copies of the large format version to send to the band so that all of the members have a version of the book for themselves.

So, without further ado, please click one of the books below to be taken to the different size versions. Remember to click through to the Preview so you can get a sense of how it will look in person!

Large Format 11" x 13"












Medium Format 8" x 10"

Other Voices - Signed, sealed & delivered!

Those of you that have been watching the updates on Chain of Flowers know that the book was delivered to the band in Vegas. Here is the "official" story of the how and why and when, as well as the extenuating circumstances surrounding it.

When Friday, April 17th, 2009 dawned in Las Vegas, Nevada, those of us who were there for the concert were full of optimism that it would be a very special night, indeed. The Cure were in town for an intimate show at the Pearl Theater, and many CoF peeps had gathered from all corners of the globe. We spent the afternoon at the casino in front of the box office, socializing and pretending to gamble. I received two last-minute pages at the casino and took over the concierge desk at the Palms so that I could put them in the album and make sure that the book was in top form before giving it to the Cure.

Returning to the "line" near the box office, several people had asked to see the book, and so we pulled up some chairs and went through the book several times so that people could see their pages and the cover and other decorations. Many people commented on how much better the artwork pages looked in person, and I agree, it was hard to capture the real beauty of the pages of the book in photos, and I hope that can assure all of the contributors that the band will be very impressed at all of your dedication, all of the love you have for the Cure and their music was very evident in the pages that you sent in.

Many fans who were waiting at the box office got to meet Simon at one of the nearby bars, and if I had only known how the night was to end, I would have given the book to Simon, as I was one of the first fans to approach him that afternoon. Hindsight, as they say...

When the concert began, I had at least three separate avenues lined up to be able to connect with the band prior to or following the show, but as we all know, the concert did not end as expected. When the lights went up after "A Forest", I had a strong feeling that I should try to give it to them that night, in case something went wrong and they canceled their Coachella appearance. We weren't sure quite why the concert had ended early, and when the setlist with the encores on it was given out to those in the crowd, it confirmed to us that there was something going on. There was a lot of speculation that night about just what had happened, but in the heat of the moment, all that mattered to me was that it was my one chance that I was certain of to make sure that people that I trusted were able to take the book from me and deliver it to the band. So I handed it to Darren (Simon's guitar tech) as he was onstage breaking down the equipment, and he promised me at that time that he would give it to them. I confirmed through my contacts that the Cure were not receiving visitors backstage following the show at the Pearl.

When we were at Coachella on Sunday, I approached Darren after the show to confirm that they received it, and he assured me that he would give it to them at the soonest possible time. One of my contacts had also emailed a person connected to the band who confirmed on Monday morning that it had been given to Robert and the band. My original plan was to try to get a photo of the band with the book, but as we know now, Robert had injured himself at the Pearl, and it was not possible to do so.

So, will Robert or the band acknowledge the project somehow? Of course we would love him to do so, but most likely, he will not. Their own 30th anniversary celebrations must be getting underway, and of course with an injured hand he cannot type very well, so I think that we can be happy knowing that they have gotten it safely and that our messages have been signed, sealed and delivered. However, if I DO hear anything, I will be sure to let you all know!

Thank you again to all of the contributors and supporters for being a part of this amazing project. I am still doing the hard copy of the book and I will be announcing that here when they are ready to order, they will be available very soon.

P. S. - If you haven't yet heard the interviews with myself and Vicky, one of the contributors to the book on Studio Brussel, you can read about that here and also listen to the archived interviews. We were interviewed about the book and I was also asked about the Cure's set at Coachella.

Photo 1 courtesy of Caterpillargirl2
Photo 2 courtesy of Barb / Thistle
Photo 3 courtesy of Faithdesired

Studio Brussel Interviews

Thanks to Vicky from Belgium, I got a fantastic opportunity on the day of Robert Smith's 50th Birthday to be interviewed on Studio Brussel (part of the Belgium national radio station) regarding my experiences at Coachella and about the 30th Anniversary book. I will be posting more about that here soon, but for now you can read Vicky's translation of her interview (first posted at Curefans.com) and you can listen to both of our interviews on the archive pages from the radio station. Thank you again to Vicky for this great opportunity, I can't believe I got to say Happy Birthday to Robert on Belgium radio! What an exciting and fun way to celebrate!

More about my interview (added 4/28):

I woke up early on Tuesday, April 21st (which is to say, early for me, as I am an extreme night owl) after arriving home at nearly 3 am from the long trek driving home from Indio, CA. We had also had to make two stops on the way home to pick up our dog and our children, so it was a very long night from the night before, and we had not had very much sleep! When I awoke, I reached for my phone as I always do, and updated my email. There were two messages about the interview, and so I responded to them quickly from my laptop and then jumped into the shower to get ready to go to work. Almost before I could get dried off completely, I had a phone call from one of the people at Studio Brussel, who spoke to me for a moment about doing the interview, mainly just long enough to get my permission, and told me that I would recieve a call back. I was finishing up getting ready for work when I got the call back just a few minutes later. Bram was the interviewer, and he spoke to me for a few moments and then started to interview me. I admit that I did stumble on my words much more than usual, sorry Bram! But that's what happens when I have to do interview within 20 minutes of waking up, haha...

He started the interview by asking about Coachella and our experiences with attending the concert, and about seeing the plug be pulled on the Cure at the end of the night.

I also thought that the part with the "fuck" was funny too, even if I misquoted Robert. I didn't think they would play the full bit on air though! I remembered the "HA!" and the "fuck" clearly but it was only later that I got to hear it again and heard his actual comment.

After the Coachella part, Bram asked me to describe the book a little bit, and then thanked me for the interview and asked me what song I would like to request them to play at the end of the interview. Initially, I wanted to choose a song from 4:13 Dream in order to help promote their new album. He wanted me to pick a "deep cut", something that was more unusual and not very well known. So at first I said "The Hungry Ghost" or "Underneath the Stars" or "This. Here and Now. With You." would do fine. Then someone looked for the album and they came back and said that it was not in the studio, so I started trying to think of something else. I kind of doubted that they would have Bloodflowers too, and so I went a bit farther back in the catalog and chose "From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea". I warned him that it was a bit of a longer song, but he said it was fine, no worries. Aren't you glad I didn't say Never Enough? I also overused the word EPIC a bit too much, but it was less than 48 hours after the show itself so I was still a bit excited to have seen such a legendary concert. I was glad that I remembered to say Happy Birthday to Robert before they hung up with me, and that they also aired that part of the interview.

Once I was done with the interview, I went to work and started listening to the Studio Brussel internet stream. I wasn't sure when it would go on but Vicky helped me out a lot by letting me know when it would be coming up. I had also let Craig from Chain of Flowers know about the interview and a lot of our CoF peeps were able to listen in too. Even though I don't speak Dutch, I was very amused to hear my name and "superfan" in the same sentence.

Many thanks again to Vicky for letting me have this great chance, and also thanks to the kind people at Studio Brussel.

My Interview (click on cure-fan in bold type) Andy's MP3 download (thanks Andy!)

Vicky's Interview (click on ZIJ VERTELT in bold type)



The Translation (because almost nobody can understand Dutch) by Vicky

Sam: Vicky, sended a page for the anniversary book, I don't understand it very well so I goanne call her.
Sam: Vicky, Vicky ...Are you there?
Me: Good afternoon Sam.
Sam: Can you tell me more about that anniversary book?
Me: Yes, sure, it's not alone Robert's Birthday today, it's almost 30 years ago that there debutalbum came out. It was May 1979. Because of that fact, they descided in the US to make a fanbook and they asked all the fans arround the world to make a page for this book.

Sam: Oh so beautiful!
Me: Yes, they received arround 50 pages for that book, from everywhere in the world. From Australia, Russia, USA, and many more country's also Belgium.
Sam: And you are in that book?
Me: Yes, I have also a page, I've sended it also!
Sam: So YOU have a page in that great fanbook, THE Anniversary book for The Cure, THE Anniversary Book for Robert Smith!
Me: Yes, indeed, that's correct ! I've maded a page with Calligraphics. I put my thanks on it.
Sam: FANTASTIC!
Me: The book was given last Friday 17/04 in Las Vegas. The Cure was given there a show.
Sam: Send HE (RS) you an email to thank you?
Me: No we haven't received anything yet; who knows maby on the off. site from The Cure a word of thank ...Huh
The nice thing of the book is that it's goanne be published in a printed version. In two sizes, one like the original and one in an smaller format to make it possible for every person!
Sam: Really??
Sam: That's amazing good news !!!!!
I've hearded you are a HUGE fan from The Cure
Me: Ok if they say that, it's goanne be right. Ha. Others say it all the time so I guess it's correct.
Sam: You are celebrating this birthday of course but I've hearded you are also celebrating another Birthday?
Me: That's correct; It's also my husband's Birthday today. His 40th Birthday.
Sam: No, it's not truth, you choose him just for that!
Me: No it's pure coincidence!!
Sam: Yes, Yes, ... pure coincidence ??
Me: So by this, also my Birthday wishes to my husband of course!
Sam: Of course. Also a hip hip hoi for your husband! 40 years can also count ... difficult age ?? But 50 years is much heavier to wear! Still 10 Years to go!
Sam: Please your husband and turn a lot of Cure-Music
Me: Sure; I will do that! Can I say just one thing more ??
Sam: Go on you can tell it.
Me: To all the curefans out there. If you wanna now more about The Cure! Go and visit www.curefans.com. The meeting point for curefans worldwide. a great forum where you can find several things.
Sam: Congratulation about your page in the fanbook for Robert Smith. Have fun today! Bye
Me: Bye

So, I hope everyone can understand me now grin

Later at the evening the called Heron from the US about the Coachella show. She's also the creator of the book.

It was an special experience and I hope you all enjoying this.

Greetings,

Trust...

Other Voices - A Cure Fan Tribute

One week to go! As of today, Wednesday, April 8th, there is officially 1 week left before the pages have to be in. Remember that they have to reach me before the end of the day on April 15th, as we are leaving for Vegas early on the 16th and will not be here for the mail to arrive. Please note that from now forward, all of the pages will be put into the book based strictly on when they arrive in my mailbox. This change is due to the limited time remaining to finish the project and solidify the page numbering. The pages and promises of pages have both been arriving fast and furious, and I am thinking that it looks highly likely that we may have to do a second album for the overflow pages, but we shall see what the next 7 days bring!

There have been some interesting developments in the book project, and I'm really excited to share them with everyone! First, the book officially now has a name. As you may have guessed, I've titled it - Other Voices - A Cure Fan Tribute, which is a much more evocative name than
"30th Anniversary Book". The name was suggested by Sara / Shapes in a brainstorming session, and evokes all of the "voices" represented by all of the different pages and letters in the book.

Second, over the course of the project I have gotten some of the most amazing artwork and heartfelt, beautiful letters from everyone. I thought that there should be some way of preserving these gifts to the Cure, beyond a simple online slideshow. So I decided to create a real, hardcopy version of the book so that any of the contributors or other fans could have one for themselves. The book will be available in a large format, similar to the actual book, and also in a smaller and less expensive version in order to make it available and affordable to everyone.

You can preview the hardcopy book versions here:

Large format 11" x 13" http://www.blurb.com/books/631815 (Don't order these, preview only)
Med. format 8" x 10" http://www.blurb.com/books/631834

I want to assure you right now that I am not making any sort of profit from this book at all. The prices shown on the book pages are the base prices that Blurb charges for the actual production of the book, and have not been "marked up" in any way. The contributors to the book have been asked to sign a publication release, and so the final book may or may not contain all of the pages seen in the online album, based on the individual contributors' wishes.

Once the book has been completed with all of the pages and has been given to the Cure, I will send out an announcement stating that the book is ready to order. Again, I do not do any of the printing, shipping or order fulfillment for these books, they are from the Blurb print-on-demand service and the company there will handle all of the transactions.

Thanks again to all of the awesome Cure fans that have sent in their pages. You have all made this project a joy to work on, and Iam sure that the band will appreciate all of your letters.