There’s a number of performers and groups that I’ve always wanted to see live. Being there in their presence is so much more than any video or CD or vinyl record. There’s that shared experience of being in a crowd of people there for the same thing. Live music is just so much more than the music itself, it’s also the entire experience that comes with it.
For me The Cure was one of those groups that I have wanted to see live for a long time. As a teenager in the 1980s I listened to The Cure with friends. I’m sure some of us had actual records, but I’m fairly sure a lot of the stuff we were listening to was on cassettes and there were definitely bootleg concert recordings. For whatever reason I never got to see them live in the late 80s or early 90s. The closest I got to them was when Robert Smith was in a cordoned off area of a night club I was in around 1993.
This summer The Cure is doing a European tour and I was delighted to get tickets for their Dublin gig at Marlay Park.
The summer of 2026 has been odd so far. We’ve had a year which started with rain that didn’t seem to stop ever and then a heat wave that had temperatures in Ireland competing with Malaga! So the evening of The Cure in Dublin’s Marlay Park was actually sunny and quite hot – I think I got a bit of a sunburn!
The setlist for Dublin was a mix of some of their biggest hits, with some lesser known songs and it was just pure joy to experience it all live, especially once the sun had done down. (Not a complaint I thought I’d ever have for a concert in Dublin, but here we are!)
The energy and vibes were great and they gave us about two hours of wonderful music. It was a great evening of music.
Marlay Park is not a venue I’d ever been to before and overall we were pleased with the experience. The car parks were well signposted and the staff were polite. Unlike getting out of the 3 Arena the exit from the car park was efficient and quick, so I’d have no problems going to a concert there again.
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