The List of Tim Curry Albums in Order of Release Date

Long before he was the villain you couldn’t stop watching, Tim Curry was a leather-and-fishnet stage sensation turned unlikely rock singer — and this guide to Tim Curry Albums in Order traces exactly how that happened. Born in Grappenhall, Cheshire, England, in 1946, Curry originated the role of Dr. Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Show in 1973, then reprised it on screen in The Rocky Horror Picture Show in 1975. That performance was theatrical enough, and musical enough, to land him a solo recording contract with A&M Records — the launching pad for a short but genuinely fascinating rock discography.

Curry’s studio work never chased chart domination, but it produced a cult favorite in “I Do the Rock” and cemented his reputation as a performer who could sell a song as hard as he sold a scene. Revisiting Tim Curry Albums in Order today means hearing an actor experimenting in real time with glam rock, blue-eyed soul covers, and theatrical hard rock, often alongside heavyweight collaborators like producers Bob Ezrin and Michael Kamen. Fans of theatrical rock contemporaries like Alice Cooper and Meat Loaf will recognize the same showmanship-first sensibility running through these three records.

All Tim Curry Albums Available on: Apple Music

Also See: Alice Cooper Albums in Order

How Many Albums Does Tim Curry Have?

Tim Curry released three studio albums — Read My Lips (1978), Fearless (1979), and Simplicity (1981) — all on A&M Records. Beyond the studio LPs, his catalog includes around a handful of singles pulled from those records and at least one official compilation, The Best of Tim Curry, released in 1989.

The List of Tim Curry Albums in Order of Release Date

Here’s the complete list of Tim Curry albums in order of release.

1. Read My Lips — April 14, 1978
2. Fearless — June 28, 1979
3. Simplicity — 1981

All Tim Curry Albums List in Order

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1. Read My Lips (1978)

Tracks:

1. Birds of a Feather
2. Wake Nicodemus
3. I Will
4. Brontosaurus
5. Alan
6. All I Want
7. Sloe Gin
8. Harlem on My Mind
9. Anyone Who Had a Heart

Curry’s debut arrived on A&M Records on April 14, 1978, produced by Bob Ezrin (fresh off work with Alice Cooper and Kiss) with Michael Kamen serving as associate producer. Rather than write originals, Curry built the album almost entirely from covers, reworking material as varied as a Henry Clay Work 1864 folk hymn, a Beatles deep cut, and a Burt Bacharach standard, which let him show off a genuinely trained, theatrical voice instead of a songwriter’s pen. The barroom ballad “Alan” and a bagpipe-backed “Wake Nicodemus” became early fan favorites for their sheer strangeness. “Sloe Gin” later found a second life when blues guitarist Joe Bonamassa covered it in 2007, a small but telling sign that Curry’s arrangement choices had staying power. It’s an eccentric, theatrical opening statement that plays more like a genre tour than a rock record.

2. Fearless (1979)

Tracks:

1. Right on the Money
2. Hide This Face
3. I Do the Rock
4. S.O.S.
5. Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire
6. Paradise Garage
7. No Love on the Street
8. Something Short of Paradise
9. Charge It

Released June 28, 1979, and recorded at the Hit Factory in New York and Long View Farm in Massachusetts, Fearless is Curry’s commercial high-water mark, peaking at No. 53 on the Billboard 200. The shift in direction is the whole story here: where Read My Lips leaned on covers, this one is almost entirely original material, co-written with producers Michael Kamen and former Lou Reed guitarist Dick Wagner, who also plays lead guitar throughout.

Lead single “I Do the Rock” became Curry’s most successful US single and reportedly grazed the lower reaches of the Billboard Hot 100 (verify exact chart peak), while “Paradise Garage” earned its own 7-inch and 12-inch single releases abroad. A 2017 reissue added four bonus mixes, including an alternate take of “Sloe Gin” carried over from the debut. Critics were divided — The Globe and Mail memorably argued Curry interpreted other writers’ songs better than he wrote his own — but Fearless remains the record most classic-rock collectors reach for first.

3. Simplicity (1981)

Tracks:

1. Working on My Tan
2. She’s Not There
3. Simplicity
4. On a Roll
5. Take Me, I’m Yours
6. Dancing in the Streets
7. Betty Jean
8. Out of Pawn
9. Summer in the City
10. I Put a Spell on You

Curry’s third and, to date, final studio album arrived in 1981, splitting the difference between his first two records with a half-originals, half-covers tracklist. The cover selections are the record’s calling card: a take on the Zombies’ “She’s Not There,” Martha and the Vandellas’ “Dancing in the Streets,” and a version of Squeeze’s then-recent hit “Take Me, I’m Yours” all sit alongside horn-driven originals co-written with Michael Kamen. Lead single “Working on My Tan” was released in select territories backed with “On a Roll,” but neither track charted, and Curry didn’t shoot any promotional videos to support the release. Commercially, Simplicity didn’t come close to matching Fearless, and it’s generally regarded by longtime fans as the softest and most uneven of the trilogy. Even so, tracks like the horn-heavy “I Put a Spell on You” show a singer still willing to take real interpretive risks three albums in.

Conclusion

Taken together, Tim Curry Albums in Order trace a tight, three-album arc: a cover-heavy debut finding its footing, a mostly original sophomore album that became his commercial peak, and a closing record that split the difference between the two. It’s a small discography by rock-star standards, but an unusually theatrical one, built by a stage and screen actor who treated every track like a role. Curry hasn’t returned to the studio for a new album since 1981, focusing instead on the acting and voice work that made him a household name — but for fans discovering Fearless or Read My Lips for the first time, this trilogy still holds up as a genuinely strange, entertaining detour from a career full of them.

Tim Curry FAQs

Did Tim Curry write his own songs? Sometimes. His debut, Read My Lips, was almost all covers, but Fearless was largely original material co-written with producers Michael Kamen and Dick Wagner, and Simplicity split the difference with a mix of both.

What is Tim Curry’s most popular song? “I Do the Rock,” from 1979’s Fearless, is generally considered his most successful and best-remembered single.

Is Tim Curry still making music? Curry hasn’t released a new studio album since Simplicity in 1981; his more recent work has centered on acting, voice acting, and his 2025 memoir, Vagabond.

What genre is Tim Curry’s music? His three albums move across glam rock, hard rock, and blue-eyed soul, often filtered through a theatrical, stage-trained vocal style.

Why did Tim Curry become a singer? His breakout stage and film performances as Dr. Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Show and The Rocky Horror Picture Show led directly to a recording contract with A&M Records.