The Cure unveiled their long-awaited Songs of a Lost World — their first album in 16 years — last week. With the band on his mind, Coheed and Cambria’s Claudio Sanchez covered their monumental pop single “Just Like Heaven.”
Sanchez plays the Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me cut on an acoustic guitar, adding synths, piano, and a beat from a LinnDrum machine (as pointed out by Revolver). Vocally, the Coheed and Cambria bandleader maintains the same romantic delivery as Robert Smith’s 1987 original, who penned the song after an intimate trip to Beachy Head in East Sussex with his partner. He famously described it as a song “about hyperventilating — kissing and fainting to the floor.”
Read more: “I’ve always thought of us as underdogs”: the oral history of Coheed And Cambria
“This song was introduced to me by some friends as a cover done by Dinosaur Jr.,” Sanchez says. “They were skaters, so the reference to ‘tricks’ at the top of the song conjured up ideas of a smitten lover’s curiosity for executing kick-flips and rail slides. At the time, I didn’t know much of the Cure’s discography. The discovery of The Head On The Door led me to Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me and to the original ‘Just Like Heaven.’ It’s a strange but powerful relationship to have with a song when your introduction is someone else’s interpretation of it. I think that’s why I chose [it].”
See his cover of “Just Like Heaven” below.