Scene: 1980-something, a white-faced, stringy-haired teenager sulks in his bedroom listening to “Boys Don’t Cry” and says to himself, “I can do this!” Flash forward to 2005 and, mission accomplished. Enter stellastarr*, gracing the 9:30 Club’s stage last night.

It’s not that stellastarr* (yes, the asterisk is part of their name) put on a bad show. They were energetic, deft with their instruments, engaging, and had organized a hell of a light show. It’s not even that their music wasn’t listenable. But there was indeed something about their show that stopped us from enjoying it from their opening notes. Every single sound we heard — every riff, every chorus, every drum lick — was a direct quotation of The Cure. Not “inspired by” or a “modern take on,” but completely and totally derivative. We actually made a game of figuring out which Cure song each Stellastarr* song was originally, and singing the Cure lyrics instead. We think their version of “Pictures of You” was our favorite, although, that’s our favorite Cure song too.