Line #17 Music/Curve


1	English alternative group comprised of singer-songwriter Toni Halliday and guitarist/producer/everything else Dean Garcia. Their music is best categorized as {{Shoegazing}}; their best-known song is likely "Chinese Burn" from their 1998 album ''Come Clean'', which was prominently featured in the ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' episode "Bad Girls" and used as the intro music for the Season 3 DVD menus. Active from 1991 to 1994, and again from 1996 to 2005.
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3	Both Halliday and Garcia have since formed new bands, Chatelaine and SPC ECO, respectively.
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5	Partial discography:
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7	* ''Doppelganger'' (1992)
8	* ''Pubic Fruit'' (1992, EP compilation)
9	* ''Cuckoo'' (1993)
10	* ''Come Clean'' (1998)
11	* ''Open Day at the Hate Fest'' (2001, album-length compilation of new music, online only)[[note]]released to protest Universal Music, who was threatening to shelve their next album, which had at that point been ready for nearly 2 years.[[/note]]
12	* ''Gift'' (2001)[[note]]finally released by Universal's sub-imprints Hip-O in the US, and Artful in the UK.[[/note]]
13	* ''The New Adventures of Curve'' (2002, online only)
14	* ''The Way of Curve'' (2004, GreatestHitsAlbum)
15	* ''Rare & Unreleased'' (2010, a compilation of rare tracks and remixes, via [[http://http://curve.bandcamp.com/album/rare-and-unreleased Bandcamp]])
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17	----
18	!! Tropes associated with Curve include:
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20	* AddledAddict:
21	** "Coast is Clear", from their early ''Pubic Fruit'' EP, seems to be about one:
22	--->''It's just a little too late\
23	It's never enough to swallow those pills\
24	Now I'm sick, always will be''
25	** ''Come Clean'' as a whole has this as its central theme, most prominently on "Dirty High" and "Forgotten Sanity". The latter is a particularly disturbing example:
26	--->''I've forgotten how to write\
27	And I'm giving up on speech\
28	I can't remember how I look\
29	Or the day of the week''
30	* AlbumClosure: "Recovery", the last track on ''Come Clean'', is a SurprisinglyGentleSong about a RecoveredAddict. The effect is enhanced by the speed and volume of the preceding title track, which builds the album to a crescendo before the {{Denouement}} of the final track.
31	* BoleroEffect: Done in miniature during the intro and outro of "Forgotten Sanity", with a repetitive, distorted guitar riff that starts out soft and gradually grows louder and shriller until it sounds like a screaming air-raid siren.
32	* BreakUpSong: ''Cuckoo'' has a few songs that seem to be about failed relationships, with "Turkey Crossing" being the most obvious:
33	-->''I'm finished with you, please be finished with me\
34	I've had it with you, you've had it with me''
35	* CarefulWithThatAxe: The outro of "Split Into Fractions" features a lot of distorted screaming... and then one particularly piercing scream that is ''not'' distorted, and will freak you out if you're not expecting it.
36	* EeriePaleSkinnedBrunette: Toni Halliday.
37	* EpicInstrumentalOpener: The intro for "Chinese Burn" lasts for 58 seconds. Being the first song on ''Come Clean'', it also acts as one for the album as a whole.
38	* TheInsomniac: "Fait Accompli":
39	-->''Every night, sleep wanders on its own\
40	Never once does it kiss me with its chloroform''
41	* IntercourseWithYou: The middle part of "Unreadable Communication" seems to be about particularly rough intercourse, especially when you factor in the ''incredibly'' intense guitar riff that plays over the lyrics:
42	-->''I would like to invite you\
43	To my mother's house, to my bedroom\
44	To play those old records\
45	We all know the words to\
46	And I would like you to kiss me\
47	To crush me, to lick me\
48	'Til I beg you to stop\
49	'Til you drive me crazy''
50	* LastNoteNightmare: Well, more like Last Minute Nightmare, but the final track on ''Gift'', "Bleeding Heart", [[FakeOutFadeOut appears to fade out normally]], then suddenly starts back up again at a ''much'' higher intensity. Amusingly, the first lyric you hear after this happens is "Should've seen it coming".
51	* LimitedLyricsSong: The title track of ''Come Clean'' has its verses assembled from different combinations of the same four or five lines, and a chorus consisting of the same line repeated four times. Between the subject matter, and the loud, frantic delivery, the effect is that of a desperate, pleading attempt to get through to someone.
52	-->''When will you wake up?\
53	When will you wake up?\
54	When will you wake up?\
55	When will you wake up?''
56	* MadnessMantra:
57	** "Forgotten Sanity", quite fittingly, contains a few:
58	--->''I've forgotten how, I've forgotten how...''\
59	''Decay, decay, decay, decay, decay, decay...''\
60	''Put me out of my misery! Let me go for my sanity!''
61	** The end of "Bleeding Heart": "Should've seen it coming, should've done something, should've seen it coming, should've done something..."
62	* NonAppearingTitle: A couple on each album:
63	** "Clipped" from ''Pubic Fruit''.
64	** "Fait Accompli" and "Doppelganger" from ''Doppelganger''.
65	*** In each of the first two examples, the album title itself also counts.
66	** "Unreadable Communication" and "Turkey Crossing" from ''Cuckoo''. Additionally, the first single from the album was called "Blackerthreetracker" - none of the songs on said single are actually called that.
67	** "Sweetback" from ''Come Clean''.
68	* OneWomanWail: In a few of the band's earlier songs. "Horror Head" and "Doppelganger" might be the most prominent examples.
69	* PerishingAltRockVoice: Mostly in the band's early material, but downplayed even then compared to other alt-rock bands of the time. Averted almost entirely from about ''Come Clean'' onwards.
70	* PrecisionFStrike: Possibly the only one in the band's entire repertoire, in the second verse of "Chinese Burn":
71	-->''She gets what she wants, then walks away\
72	And she doesn't give a fuck what you may say''
73	* RecoveredAddict: ''Come Clean'', appropriately, ends with a song called "Recovery" that appears to be about one.
74	* StepUpToTheMicrophone: Their last album's last song, "Joy", is the only one sung by Dean Garcia.
75	* SurprisinglyGentleSong: The final songs on both ''Doppelganger'' ("Sandpit") and ''Come Clean'' ("Recovery") both count. "Unreadable Communication" from ''Cuckoo'' is a subversion, as it starts off gentle and remains that way for about two minutes... and then it ''explodes''.
76	* TakeThat: As noted above, the very existence of ''Open Day at the Hate Fest'' was a TakeThat against their record label for refusing to release their fourth (and ultimately final) album.
77	* TitleOnlyChorus: "It's hell above the water, hell above the water..."

Context Music / Curve