Why Can't I Be You?

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This article is about the song. For the TV series, see Why Can't I Be You? (TV series).
"Why Can't I Be You?"
Whycantibeyou.jpg
Single by The Cure
from the album Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me
B-side"A Japanese Dream"
ReleasedApril 14, 1987[1]
Genre
Length3:14
LabelFiction
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s)
The Cure singles chronology
"Boys Don't Cry (New Voice)"
(1986) 		"Why Can't I Be You?"
(1987) 		"Catch"
(1987)
Music video
"Why Can't I Be You" (TopPop, 1987) on YouTube

"Why Can't I Be You?" is a song by the English rock band The Cure, released as the lead single from their 1987 album Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me.

History[]

"Why Can't I Be You?" was the first single released from the album Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me—the band's seventh LP. In 14 April 1987, it peaked at number 21 on UK Singles Chart.[4] In the United States that same year, the song reached number 54 on the Billboard Hot 100, while a remix of the track charted at numbers eight and 27 on the Hot Dance Music/Maxi-Singles Sales and the Dance Music/Club Play Singles charts, respectively.[5]

The video for "Why Can't I Be You?" was filmed in early 1987, in between rehearsals for The Cure's first South American tour. It was directed by Tim Pope, a past video collaborator of the group's. Filmed in a Ardmore Studios in Bray, County Wicklow, Ireland,[6][7] the video featured the band members performing what biographer Jeff Apter referred to as "some of the most poorly choreographed dancing ever seen on MTV". All five band members wore costumes: Robert Smith dressed as a bear and as school-girl in a pinafore dress, Simon Gallup was costume as both a crow and a Morris dancer, Porl Thompson was a Scotsman as well as cross-dressed, Boris Williams was a schoolgirl & a vampire and Lol Tolhurst wore blackface and then a bumblebee costume. Pope referred to the clip as "the video I've always wanted to make".[8]

Reception[]

In the NME's review of the single, writer Donald McRae singled out Smith's voice as the sole element of the song that "doesn't shout 'TEEN FUN'". Nonetheless, he praised the band, and concluded, "Shameless and cheap enough to steal Wham's 'Young Guns' riff, this ditty will soon be another Top of the Pops cracker".[9]

Stewart Mason of Allmusic described the song as having "the remarkable ability to be simultaneously incredibly catchy and frankly rather annoying", noting it as an " antic, herky-jerky" successor to previous singles such as "Let's Go to Bed" and "The Lovecats".[2] Stephen Thomas Erlewine, also of Allmusic, called it "deceptively bouncy" and noted it as a high point of the album and helps make it "one of the group's very best".[10]

A Long Term Effect: Tim Pope On Four Decades Of Work With The Cure - Tim Pope responds to the use of blackface in the video in a 2019 interview: "I think [Lol Tolhurst's blackface] was a very inappropriate choice. That is now a given. I guess that was probably, a reference to The Black And White Minstrel Show [note: a now extremely notorious 1958 to 1978 BBC light entertainment show]. Quite shocking in the more enlightened times we live in. And how insidiously bad was that idea? It's not a thing I feel great about retrospectively. On Lol's part, I think it probably came from a sort of more thoughtless place. I remember the band members were endlessly coming out in different costumes. I didn't specifically know what the costumes would be.. he said, rubbing the problem away from himself. And I just remember Lol appearing like that and we filmed it. We shouldn't have done it. That was inappropriate and wrong. It was not good.[11]

Track listing[]

7"
Fiction / Fics 25 (UK)
  1. "Why Can't I Be You?" (3:12)
  2. "A Japanese Dream" (3:27)
2x7"
Fiction / Ficsg 25 (UK)
  1. "Why Can't I Be You?" (3:13)
  2. "A Japanese Dream" (3:30)
  3. "Six Different Ways (Live)" (3:32)
  4. "Push (Live)" (4:42)

Live tracks taken from the concert film The Cure in Orange

12"
Fiction / Ficsx 25 (UK)
  1. "Why Can't I Be You? (12" Remix)" (7:58)
  2. "A Japanese Dream (12" Remix)" (5:42)

Remixed by François Kevorkian and Ron St. Germain

CD Video / 080 184-2 (UK)
  1. "Why Can't I Be You? (12" Remix)" (8:10)
  2. "A Japanese Dream (12" Remix)" (5:52)
  3. "Hey You!!!" (2:23)
  4. "Why Can't I Be You? (Video)" (3:31)

Video directed by Tim Pope

Personnel[]

Cover versions[]

In June 2021 the female-fronted band Berlin Banter released a Trip Hop remake of "Why Can't I Be You?".

References[]

  • Apter, Jeff. Never Enough: The Story of The Cure. Omnibus Press, 2005. ISBN 1-84449-827-1.

Notes[]

  1. ^ http://www.thecure.com/discography/why-cant-i-be-you/
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b Mason, Stewart. "Why Can't I Be You?" Allmusic.com. Retrieved on 22 January 2013.
  3. ^ Ramirez, AJ (13 December 2011). "Snubbed!: Why the Cure Deserves to Be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame". PopMatters. Retrieved 15 June 2016.
  4. ^ Cure. OfficialCharts.com. Retrieved on 22 January 2013.
  5. ^ The Cure - Awards. Allmusic.com. Retrieved on 22 January 2013.
  6. ^ Paul Nolan - Disintegration Once Again. Hot Press/Pressreader.com. Retrieved on 21 April 2021.
  7. ^ Éamon Sweeney - What does a seaside Irish town and three of the biggest bands of all time have in common?. Medium.com. Retrieved on 21 April 2021.
  8. ^ Apter, p. 226–227
  9. ^ McRae, Donald. "Why Can't I Be You?" single review. NME. 18 April 1987.
  10. ^ Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me (review). Allmusic.com. Retrieved on 22 January 2013.
  11. ^ "The Quietus | Features | A Quietus Interview | A Long Term Effect: Tim Pope On Four Decades Of Work With The Cure". The Quietus. Retrieved 2020-08-14.

External links[]

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