The Cure debuted another new song from their long-awaited new album ‘Songs Of A Lost World‘, airing ‘I Could Never Say Goodbye’ at a show in Kraków, Poland tonight (Thursday October 20). Check it out below.

The icons are in the midst of a lengthy European stadium tour with their now-regular touring partners and one of frontman Robert Smith’s favourite bands The Twilight Sad, having kicked off the run of shows in Latvia at the start of this month where they premiered the two new songs ‘Alone’ and ‘Endsong‘, as well as welcoming guitarist and keyboardist Perry Bamonte back to the band.

Having later debuted another new song ‘And Nothing Is Forever‘ a couple of weeks ago, now Robert Smith and co have shared ‘I Could Never Say Goodbye’ – an aching guitar and piano led track in that sees the frontman warn: “Something wicked this way comes, to steal away my brother’s life“.

The lyrics seem to relate to Smith’s comments about new material being shaped by a number of family losses adding to the “darkness” of the material.

“It’s very much on the darker side of the spectrum. I lost my mother and my father and my brother recently, and obviously it had an effect on me,” he said back in 2019. “It’s not relentlessly doom and gloom. It has soundscapes on it, like ‘Disintegration’, I suppose. I was trying to create a big palette, a big wash of sound.”

• READ MORE: Exclusive: Robert Smith on the cover: The past, present and future of The Cure

Having long teased the band’s long-awaited “merciless” new record – after telling us that two new albums were on the way back at the last NME Awards back in 2020 – Smith revealed to NME earlier this year that one of them would be “real very soon” and would be called ‘Songs Of A Lost World’.

Then in May, the frontman offered that the album was almost complete, hoping that new material would be out by the tour kicking off in October.

Then in May, the frontman offered that the album was almost complete, hoping that new material would be out by the tour kicking off in October.

“Essentially it’s a 12 track album,” he told NME. “It’s there, it’s kind of half-mixed and half-finished. It’s a weird thing. It’s kind of evolved over the last two years. It hasn’t always been a good thing to have been left alone with it. You pick at it, like picking at seams, and everything falls apart.

Smith continued: “It’ll be worth the wait. I think it’s the best thing we’ve done, but then I would say that. I’m not doing an Oasis when I say that, ‘IT’S THE BEST FOOKIN’ ALBUM’. A lot of the songs are difficult to sing, and that’s why it’s taken me a while.”

Discussing the themes and character of the long-awaited follow-up to 2008’s ‘4:13 Dream‘, Smith said that the album “doesn’t have very much light on it” and that it sounds “more like ‘Disintegration’ than ‘Head On The Door’.”

“It’s pretty relentless, which will appeal to the hardcore of our audience, but I don’t think we’ll be getting any Number One singles off it or anything like that!” he laughed. “It’s been quite harrowing, like it has for everyone else.

“I’ve been more privileged than most, but lockdown and COVID has affected me in as much as I’ve lost an entire generation of aunts and uncles in under a year. It’s things like that which have informed the way I’ve been with the record.”

Smith added: “Essentially we recorded two albums in 2019. I’ve been trying to finish two at the same time, which is pretty much impossible. One is nearly ready to go.”

The band also recently reissued their classic 1992 album ‘Wish‘ with 24 previously unreleased tracks.

The Cure’s 2022 European tour continues. They return to the UK and Ireland for a run of shows in December. Visit here for tickets and more information.