In 1989, The Cure's Robert Smith was going to turn thirty years old. His fears and anxieties of age-having not yet written his pinnacle album-caused Smith to embark on the band's undoing with Disintegration. The result was an LP drenched in melancholy sublime, a beautiful decree of breaking down to build anew. From the fame and notoriety of The Cure after their hit, "Just Like Heaven," to the departure of the only other consistent band member, Lol Tolhurst, it's clear that the grisly spiral into the depths of pain is stamped throughout Disintegration.

This book begs the question: why should an album make you feel good? At the time, Melody Maker noted that the Cure's 1989 masterpiece was "about as much fun as losing a limb." Disintegration is special because of how not fun it is-the (intentional and unintentional) tumult of the process, the difficult result-all of it is reflected within the confines of this impossibly perfect LP that became The Cure's highest charting album up to that point.