"Horrorhead" by Curve

Maybe this entry should be subtitled "How Toni Halliday Has Sabatoged Marty Stark's Love Life."

I'm having trouble beginning this entry. I could begin with how Curve is one of those bands that was three years ahead of its time -- Butch Vig, the founder of Garbage, had wanted to produce Curve's third album. That never happened. Instead Garbage released its first album in 1995 to much radio play and success. Curve released its first album, Doppleganger, in 1992 to almost no radio play, no promotion and very little success -- the band would be dropped or entangled in legal troubles with its various record companies for the next decade. Yet if you compare Curve's Doppleganger to Garbage's self-titled album, you would've thought Curve ripped Garbage off if you didn't know Curve put out its album 3 years before Garbage. In fact, when Curve released its third album, Come Clean, in 1998, a lot of the uneducated masses thought Curve was just a Garbage ripoff.

See, I could begin with the whole Curve / Garbage thing, but that's not relevant to why I've spent an inordinate amount of time and money hunting down import EPs and remixes of a band that's only put out four albums in ten years. I guess why I've listed "Horrorhead" is because of sex.

Before you get the wrong idea, this is not a "Marty Stark's First Time" entry. It's more of a "Why Marty Stark Is The Way He Is" entry.

Anyway, so, what were we talking about? Oh yeah, Curve. So you might have an idea of what Curve sounds like since I mentioned Garbage. But Shirley Manson is to Curve as jacking off is to having sex.

So in 1992, I was a sophomore at Duke. One of the local record stores had a row of CD players for customers to preview CDs, which was a bit deal back in 1992 when tapes were still neck and neck with compact discs. I had heard a Curve song, "Galaxy", on a friend of a friend's mix tape. It sounded different enough that the name stuck and I decided to preview Doppleganger when I saw it in the store.

I put on the headphones, and the first track "Already Yours" blew me away. I was hit with a layer upon layer of noise and guitars and beats, all ridden like a surfer on a wave by Toni Halliday's voice, a sexy breathy definitely female voice. When she sang "Voices of angels are in our blood," with her voice agained double layered over that chorus and singing "La da da" in a child-like voice, you felt like you were flying.

However, the second track, "Horror Head", is the one I had on repeat in my headphones. Despite the title, the song isn't a gothic downer at all. It's breezy, it's noisy, it's goddamn sensual and sexy. The song starts with four cooing, petulant, teasing "Hhheeeeeeeeey," and before each "hhheeeeeey," there's a sharp intake of breath. With headphones on, you can almost feel Toni whispering in your ear. Then the guitars and the noise kick in, imitating the "Hhhheeeeeeeey". When Toni starts singing "Fireworks, red and green . . .", she's accompanied by her own voice again, a light "bum bah bah bah bah." The "Hhheeeeeeeeey's" kick back in. When Toni sings, "There's horror in my head When the blanket is gone," she's growling it, she's purring it with a mad hunger.

I fell in love with that voice. See, what Toni can do that Shirley cannot is go from a child-like breathy petulance to a sexy low animalistic growl in a heartbeat. Shirley can't do the petulance, and Butch Vig's clean production leaves Shirley's attempt at sexiness very clinical and formulaic. It's a model's catwalk down the runway instead of a slow seduction.

Since Doppleganger, I've spent hours upon hours searching for everything that Curve has ever released. I bought two of Garbage's album just like a smackhead goes on methadone when he can't get his horse fix. I haven't found any band that's an adequate substitute for Curve - that wall of noise and that sometimes smokey sometimes cooing voice.

So how has Toni Halliday sabatoged my love life? Because what I want in a relationship is something densely layered so I find something new with every meeting, that seduction, that cooing, and I haven't found it yet. When folks do try to set me up, it's with Shirley -- a relationship that almost everyone else is perfectly happy with. I've gone out with a lot of Shirley's on my own as well. And maybe if I didn't know Toni existed, I'd be settled down by now.

Stupid Curve.