News about Robert Smith

The frontman, 65, says bands are 'hiding behind management' when they say they do not know how much fans are being charged to see them in concert. Talking to The Sunday Times ahead of The Cure's first album release in 16 years, he said he was 'shocked' by how much profit was made and added: 'We don't need all this money.' In an eye-opening accusation, Smith said every artist knows the extortionate amount that tickets are being hiked. 'But most artists hide behind management. "Oh, we didn't know," they say,' he said. 'They all know. If they say they do not, they're either f***ing stupid or lying. It's just driven by greed.'

Brave dogs protect the public and their owners by serving in the police, and often get shot, stabbed and even killed as a result. Many save lives in other ways, cheering up their handlers after a traumatic case. In 2019, seven hero hounds were given an 'animal OBE' for their work clearing the streets after Westminster Bridge and Borough Market terror attacks. The Metropolitan Police also employed the courageous K9s in the summer riots which tore through the country after the tragic Southport stabbings at the end of July. But animal activists say dogs should not be used in efforts to combat crime because they are ending up as collateral damage far too often.

The Cure took to X, formerly Twitter , on Thursday to announce they will be releasing their new album Songs Of A Lost World on November 1, their first in 16 years. The band - whose last album was 2008's 4:13 Dream - recently have been performing their new song 'Alone' during their 90-date world tour. And the single - which is also the opening track of the upcoming LP - is now available to stream as well.

Costco found a way to make customers unintentionally spend more cash at the megastore. The chain's hacks were created by the company in part to trick customers into buying more products.

A series of music artists from Ed Sheeran to Taylor Swift and The Cure to Tom Grennan have refused to use dynamic pricing on tickets - a ticketing method which has caused fury among Oasis fans. Standard tickets for the Manchester band's reunion tour more than doubled from about £150 to £350 on Ticketmaster's website amid a scramble on Saturday. At least 450 people have since submitted official complaints to the advertising watchdog about the issue, and the Government has pledged to look into the use of surge pricing in its forthcoming review of the secondary gig sales market. Ticketmaster claims prices are set by the event organiser, and it has been claimed that Oasis could have rejected the pricing model and kept prices lower for fans. But other bands have previously hit out at dynamic pricing, including The Cure's frontman Robert Smith. He once labelled it a 'greedy scam', adding: 'All artists have the choice not to participate - if no artists participated, it would cease to exist.'

Hundreds of people have now officially complained about how tickets were advertised after prices for the comeback tour soared after going on sale on Saturday. And experts today suggested thousands of people were 'misled' as the Ticketmaster system pushed up the prices due to the huge demand. After some fans were left shocked by standard tickets more than doubling from £148 to £355 on Ticketmaster due to demand, the Culture Secretary pledged to look into the use of surge pricing in a forthcoming Government review of the secondary gig sales market. Many fans also missed out on the reunion tour tickets as they battled with website issues, and being mislabelled as bots, before Oasis announced all 17 shows in the UK and Dublin had sold out.

While Oasis fans spent hours queuing on the Ticketmaster website, many would have been preparing to take a big hit on the credit card to secure their place. But when they finally got to the booking page for the Oasis Live '25 shows, many were horrified to find the ticket price more than doubled from about £150 to £350. The controversial tactic was an example of 'dynamic pricing' which is already widely used by airlines and hotels - and is becoming more common in concert ticket sales, despite criticism from artists such as Tom Grennan and The Cure's Robert Smith. Ticketmaster defended its so-called 'in-demand' prices, pushing the blame onto the event organiser which it said priced the tickets according to their market value. However, the Government has now confirmed the practice will be reviewed as part of its upcoming consultation on consumer protections in ticket sales and resales. And the Advertising Standards Authority revealed today that at least 450 people have now submitted official complaints about how Oasis tickets were advertised.

The Cure's keyboardist Roger O'Donnell has revealed he has been fighting cancer. The musician, 68, has told fans how he was diagnosed with a 'very rare and aggressive form' of lymphoma and has been undergoing treatment for the past year. O'Donnell shared an update on social media to mark Blood Cancer Awareness Month as he urged others not to ignore symptoms, as he had done. 

The decision to award former NSW and Kangaroos forward Les Boyd with Hall of Fame status has angered ex-Origin rival Darryl Brohman, who led the outcry against the decision.

Health officials have approved a new blood test to screen for colon cancer, at no cost to patients with insurance. The FDA announced Monday it signed off on Shield, a blood test from California-based Guardant Health. While the test is not meant to replace colonoscopies - the gold standard for screening - doctors believe it could help combat the surge in colorectal cancer cases across the US, particularly in young people. And the tool, which currently retails for almost $900, will likely be covered by most insurance plans, though it's unclear when that coverage will start.

Georgie David was standing for Nigel Farage 's outfit in West Ham & Beckton, but has quit with 'immediate effect'. She became the second Reform candidate to endorse the Tories this week in the wake of a damning series of revelations about its election slate. In the latest, a candidate in Scotland was alleged to have called for ex-First Minister Nicola Sturgeon to 'be shot', calling her a 'b****' in 2016. The remark by Robert Smith, who is running in Orkney and Shetland, reported by the Times, was branded 'absolutely appalling' by chairman Richard Tice.

Emma Ayles (left) was left devastated when she had to close The Caddy Shack cafe and make eight staff redundant following a 'storm in a teacup row'. Local residents around the cafe in Weymouth moaned that the noise from her business caused 'unacceptable harm' to their standard of living. They claimed the sound of clinking teacups and rattling of cutlery in particular was ruining the tranquillity of the area. Dorset Council sided with the residents and forced Ms Ayles, 48, to shut shop last December.

Lydia's mother, 38, died on her fourth birthday when she was shot dead at point-blank range while responding to a raid at Universal Express travel agents in Bradford, West Yorkshire in 2005. PC Beshenivsky's colleague Teresa Milburn was also shot in the chest but survived. Ringleader Piran Ditta Khan, 75, (bottom inset picture) was the seventh and final man to be convicted over the fatal shooting of PC Beshenivsky - almost 20 years after the incident took place. The mastermind behind the botched raid fled to Pakistan after murdering PC Beshenivsky where he had escaped capture for years.

Piran Ditta Khan, 75, had been on the lam for more than a decade after masterminding the robbery that culminated in heroic PC Beshenivsky's shot and killed at 'almost point blank range' in 2005. PC Beshenivsky was shot and killed on November 18 2005 as she and her colleague PC Teresa Milburn responded to a warning of a robbery at Universal Express travel agents in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Following the assassination of Khan, the fugitive has fled to Pakistan, where there is no extradition to the United Kingdom, and he has gone into hiding. After years of court drama, he was finally arrested in Pakistan in 2020 before being taken back to Britain last April to face justice. After 11 jurors deliberated for nearly 19 hours over four days, the 75-year-old mother of three was found guilty by a majority of ten-1. Now, West Yorkshire Police have released a video of Khan being pulled into a police station and imprisoned in a cell at the Elland Road station.

Piran Ditta Khan has been found guilty of the murder of PC Sharon Beshenivsky, 38, at Leeds Crown Court. During an armed robbery in Bradford in 2005, the police officer was shot.

In the first century AD, Romans fired clay bricks into Britain. These bricks were wider and thinner than those of today, and they were used in a variety of ways: as lacing courses in wall of ruins stonemasonry and the design of hypocaust pillars for hypothermia (underground heating systems), used in Roman baths and other public buildings. The Balkerne Gateway in Colchester, Essex, which dates to at least the second century AD, is an early example of Roman brickwork. Burgh Castle in Norfolk, a third-century Roman fort, has alternating courses of flint and brickwork. Numerous examples of Roman hypocaust structures exist, including one at Cilurvum, a Roman fort at Chesters, Northumberland, which is near to Hadrian's Wall. Brick production in the Romans fell by a 600 to 700 year gap since the Romans were ruled out in AD 410. Any buildings were constructed with re-used Roman bricks, for example, the nave of St Albans Cathedral. This building began in the 11th century, using materials from Roman British town Verulamium.

After announcing plans to reopen 100 yards away, a neighbor who had complaints regarding the smell of bacon and clinking teacups prompted a local cafe to close. In December, the Caddy Shack in Weymouth, Dorset, suffered after three people complained that the odour and noise emanating from the building was causing "unacceptable harm" to their quality of life. Emma Ayles (left) was determined to solve the problem by submitting a planning request to move the cafe, which is located 100 yards from nearby houses, hoping that it would be out of earshot of locals.

A cruel family was sentenced to prison for arranging a marriage ceremony in a vegetative state by 'doing her with chemicals' and 'force-feeding her pills.'

The trial heard Piran Ditta Khan, 75, had planned the raid at Bradford's travel agency, planning a scouting trip from his home in Ilford, North London, five days before the company was closed. Khan was reportedly sat in the passenger seat of a Mercedes car that was in the area while the raid was underway. A gunman fired 'indiscriminately' in the street, killing PC Sharon Beshenivsky (right) and injuring her colleague PC Teresa Milburn as the burglars fled the scene. The men were found with £5,400 in cash from the search.

The family, who left an arranged marriage ceremony in a vegetative state by 'dousing her with chemicals' and "force-feeding her pills,' will be convicted today. Khalid Sheikh, 55, and Shabnam, 53, as well as their son Asgar, will be convicted at Leeds Crown Court for the assault of Ambreen Fatima Sheikh. Ambreen, a 38-year-old woman, was flown to the United Kingdom from Pakistan in 2014 after an arrange marriage in Asgar, which is now 31 years old. However, she suffered with persistent physical abuse during this period, leaving her with 'irrable' brain damage, so she no longer has an understanding of the world around her.

She was so lonely, a neighbor of the family who left an arranged marriage wedding in a vegetative state by'force feeding' her pills that they didn't know she was there. After an arranged marriage to Asgar Sheikh, now 31 years old, Ambreen Fatima Sheikh was flown to the United Kingdom from Pakistan. However, the bride has been in a persistent vegetative state for eight years after the sinister physical assault behind closed doors. Ambreen, a 38-year-old girl from Huddersfield, spoke little English when she first stepped foot inside a four-bedroom terraced home. She barely left the house when she first took place. Neighbours told the court how they had no idea she was even living there and weren't aware Asgar was married.

Since suffering 'irretrievable' brain injury, Ambreen Fatima Sheikh has been in a vegetative state for eight years. She can breathe unaided, but she has no idea of the world around her. The court heard that the most possible explanation for the 38-year-old's illness was that she had unwillingly swallowed tablets prescribed to her diabetic mother-in-law, resulting in a hypoglycaemic attack. These tablets are highly toxic if taken by non-diabetics, and small children have been dubbed 'one pill killers'. The tablets were not taken voluntarily, and by then, the socially isolated and vulnerable Ambreen had suffered a 'pattern of violence" behind the closed doors of her terraced house in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, where she shared with her husband, father-in-law, and sister-in-law. In the days before Ambreen was rushed to the hospital in an unconscious state, a large black hole on her lower back was believed to have been caused by a caustic chemical substance. According to the court, the chemical probably caused an injury to her ear.

Blue Origin, a Jeff Bezos-owned spaceflight firm, denied safety issues and retaliated against a senior worker who sparked questions, triggering an explosive lawsuit. According to the former worker, the employer retaliated against him for whistleblowing.

Despite the ongoing court trouble surrounding Benn's two failed drug tests, a deal for Conor Benn's tense fight with Chris Eubank Jr is set to be finalized this week. Last October, Benn and Eubank had been contracted to battle before the showdown was called off when Benn's two promising tests for clomifene emerged. However, the 27-year-old was cleared by UKAD in September and was reportedly told that he was allowed to fight in the United Kingdom once more.