The Cure's Simon Gallup announces departure with "slightly heavy heart"

The Cure bassist Simon Gallup has parted ways with the iconic goth rock band more than 42 years after he first joined.

"With a slightly heavy heart I am no longer a member of the Cure!" Gallup wrote in a statement over the weekend via Facebook. "Good luck to them all."

The band has yet to comment on Gallup's departure. When asked by Rolling Stone if the decision was health-related, Gallup said he "just got fed up of betrayal."

The same day that Gallup made his announcement, The Cure's longtime keyboardist Roger O'Donnell quipped via Twitter, "A friend just told me they saw Lol in the Guitar Centre buying a bass???????" a reference to the band's former drummer-keyboardist Lol Tolhurst, who left the band in 1989.

Gallup initially joined The Cure in 1979 and left the band in 1982 after a bar fight with frontman Robert Smith. He returned to the band in 1984 and remained with the group through this year.

A key member throughout his tenure, Smith asserted in a 2018 interview with The Irish Times that the band "wouldn't be called the Cure" should Gallup leave again.

While The Cure have no new tour dates on the horizon, the band has been working on a new album — their first studio effort since 2008. Smith has strongly suggested that it will be the band's last album.