Smith has said that he was expelled from St Wilfrid's as an "undesirable influence" after his band Malice's second live performance shortly before Christmas 1976, which took place at the school and allegedly caused a riot: "I got taken back 1977 but they never acknowledged that I was there [...] I did three A levels – failed biology miserably, scraped through French and got a 'B' in English. Then I spent eight or nine months on social security until they stopped my money, so I thought, 'Now's the time to make a demo and see what people think.'" According to Dave Bowler and Bryan Dray, biographers of The Cure, the school expelled ex-Malice co-founder Marc Ceccagno along with Smith, whose new band Amulet played the December school show. Smith has given conflicting accounts of his alleged expulsion, elsewhere saying that he was merely suspended and that it was because he did not get along with the school headmaster, and on another occasion saying he was suspended because his "attitude towards religion was considered wrong".