In partnership with Electric Castle
The Cure headlined the final day of Romania’s Electric Castle Festival last night (July 19), performing a mix of rarely-played deep cuts and iconic fan favourites – check out the full setlist below.
Electric Castle kicked off earlier this week (July 16) with performances from Kneecap, Twenty One Pilots, Teddy Swims, Chase & Status, Nothing But Thieves, Sleaford Mods and Yung Lean. The Cure headlined the fourth day of the festival.
During the band’s two hour headline set, The Cure dusted off ‘Secrets’, a rarely-played deep cut from 1980’s ‘Seventeen Seconds’ which has only been performed a handful of times in recent years. The band also found time for ‘alt.end’, a track first featured on their self-titled 2004 album and which has recently found its way back into their live sets.
Fan-favourite tracks ‘Pictures Of You’, ‘Fascination Street’ and ‘Just Like Heaven’ were sprinkled into The Cure’s headline set at Electric Castle, a show that marked only their second-ever appearance in Romania and their first since 2019. Large sections of the show were dedicated to songs from their 1985 album ‘The Head On The Door’ (‘A Night Like This’, ‘In Between Days’ and ‘Push’) as well as 1989’s ‘Disintegration’ (‘Lovesong’ and ‘Lullaby’).
The Cure’s headline slot at Electric Castle concluded with a barrage of hits, starting with ‘Lullaby’ and concluding with a trio of classics in the shape of ‘The Lovecats’, ‘Friday I’m In Love’ and ‘Boys Don’t Cry’.
The Cure’s Electric Castle setlist was:
‘Alone’
‘Pictures Of You’
‘High’
‘A Night Like This’
‘Lovesong’
‘Burn’
‘Fascination Street’
‘alt.end’
‘Push’
‘In Between Days’
‘Just Like Heaven’
‘The Last Day Of Summer’
‘Secrets’
‘Play For Today’
‘A Forest’
‘From The Edge of the Deep Green Sea’
‘Endsong’
‘Lullaby’
‘The Walk’
‘The Lovecats’
‘Friday I’m In Love’
‘Close To Me’
‘Why Can’t I Be You’
‘Boys Don’t Cry’
Last month, Robert Smith revealed The Cure are done with a follow-up to 2024’s ‘Songs For A Lost World’ while another “poppy” album is also being worked on. Smith recently teamed up with Olivia Rodrigo for ‘What’s Wrong With Me’. It came after Smith said he’d “enjoyed a couple of memorable nights in the studio” with Rodrigo earlier this year, following his appearance as part of her headline slot at Glastonbury 2025.
“I can’t believe this song exists with the person that it exists with,” Rodrigo said of the collaboration. “I’m just so fucking over the moon […] I feel like I’m gonna cry. I can’t believe that’s a thing that happened in the real world and not just a figment of my imagination.”
Smith also features on The Rolling Stones’ latest album ‘Foreign Tongues, contributing guitar on ‘Divine Intervention’ and providing synth and backing vocals on ‘Never Wanna Lose You’.
In addition to The Cure, Electric Castle’s final day brought performances from Irish band Just Mustard and Dogstar, who count Hollywood A-lister Keanu Reeves among their members. Wet Leg were scheduled to perform but pulled out through illness. Catch up on all of NME’s coverage from the festival now.
