2008 release, the 13th studio longplayer from the legendary Goth rockers led by Robert Smith. Now down to a quartet (Smith, Simon Gallup, Porl Thompson and Jason Cooper), the band continue to musically evolve while dealing with subjects like relationships, the material world, politics and religion. The songs on 4:13 Dream are stripped down and 'in your face' while also sounding very much like The Cure. Includes the singles 'The Only One', 'Freakshow', 'Sleep When I'm Dead' and 'The Perfect Boy.'

2008-12-02 -- 4/5:: good album
I was pretty excited when I picked up this album. Of course, if you've followed this band, ever album including 'Wish' was their last album. So I guess it makes everyone after that special. It's not quite as good as Disintegration, in terms of moodiness, but it does sport some really good songs. I think it's a few notches above their last self titled album.

2008-12-01 -- 5/5:: Sleep when you're dead
a truly hypnotic and dreamy soundscape that pulls you in delightfully and does not let you go until the end. I place this one in the league of Pornography and Disintegration (but then it goes so far beyond both): a sumptuous and fufilling epic journey that entertains and satisfies deeply.

The diverse songs are a nice combination of upbeat, surreal, dark/macabre, and enlightening. The songwriting is strong and there is newfound energy that excites dramatically well. Anyone who caught their recent tour bore witness to the fact that Smith and company are as fresh as anything being performed in arenas worldwide. They remain at the cutting edge!

The Cure tap into a seemingly infinite creative wellspring and mine those miraculous, golden aural gems to which your eager brain has been waiting intensely to merge.

Hypnagogic, indeed.

2008-11-30 -- 5/5:: A cure for the ages
With the cure framework beautifully in place this stripped-down, elegantly executed album is the best in many years from this band. Their previous couple of albums had Robert Smith in top artistic form but the density washed out the execution to some extent. Bloodflowers was great but the beauty of a Cure song has always been in its simplicity and top to bottom every song on 4:13 is pure pop goth beautiful.

Incredible and wonderful that ever since 1976 Robert Smith has been able to keep this band still moving forward.

jh
A Bottle of Rain
Nowhere Near the Sea of Cortez

2008-11-26 -- 5/5:: 4:13 Dream
Excellent album!!! Top favorites are: This. Here And Now. With You., It's Over, Sirensong, and Scream. I would highly recommend album!!!

2008-11-25 -- 3/5:: Fat Bob phones one in...
Finally, an album that makes 'Wild Mood Swings' seem like a masterpiece.
While there are some tracks that are somewhat strong, i.e. "Underneath the Stars" , the album is lackluster and dull..the magic is gone. The production is flat, the vocals somewhat off-key and the notable absence of synthesizers doesn't do anything positive for the album. Nothing moves you in a way as much as say "Jupiter Crash" or jolts you like "Want", which I use as examples from what is considered to be one of their "worst" albums.

To it's credit however, it is not an offensive album in the least. All the tracks are certainly listenable and the album flows consistenly. I do applaud their use of the steel guitar in "Siren Song" More of this type of experimentation would have been nice. "Sleep When I'm Dead" is also somewhat effective as a real "Cure" song...but ironically was written 20 years ago. "It's Over" is a thunderous closer, and about the most excitement you get on the album, though for some reason it feels a little contrived.

Overall, I'm really not negative about the album, but give me "Wild Mood Swings" or "Bloodflowers" over "4:13 Dream" anyday..not even taking into account the AMAZING stuff they did in the 80s..WOW Is this the same band that wrote Disintegration? Unbelievably so. Give me a Pepsi Free, Camelot Music and a Cassette Deck and I will lay back and dream of better days...