The Head on the Door
1985 studio album by The Cure
The Head on the Door is the sixth studio album by the English rock band the Cure. It was released on 30 August 1985 by Fiction Records. Preceded by the single "In Between Days" which had reached No. 15 on the UK Singles Chart, The Head on the Door was described by Melody Maker as "a collection of pop songs". With its variety of styles, it allowed the group to reach a wider audience in both Europe and North America. In the United Kingdom it became their most successful album to date, entering the albums chart at No. 7 on 7 September.
The album is the first to feature drummer Boris Williams, while bassist Simon Gallup and guitarist Porl Thompson both returned to the band after several years' absence. The Head on the Door is the first Cure album where all the songs were composed solely by singer and guitarist Robert Smith.
History and music
This album marks the return of Simon Gallup in the group; he had performed and composed with Robert Smith and Lol Tolhurst on the dark trilogy Seventeen Seconds, Faith and Pornography.
The public source identifies “The Head on the Door” as 1985 studio album by The Cure. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Head, Door and studio.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1931734. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1985.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Head on the Door” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.