THE CULT Plays Seattle Theater Group's Moore Theatre 8/26

Seattle Theatre Group (STG) presents The Cult on Wednesday, August 26, 2009 at 7:30pm at the Moore Theatre.

At its highest level, rock music is both fresh and aged. With no exceptions, the truly great bands of the last fifty years have all leaned on the music of the past while keeping a keen ear on the activities of their contemporaries. By tossing in their own personal guilt, joy, fixations and obsessive desires, they delivered an effective and consequently magical updating of rock's age-old and undeniable tribal stomp. By these criteria, The Cult, born out of the musical and social upheaval of the late Seventies, were Britain's premier rock band of the Eighties and early Nineties - no argument.

Based on the fiery partnership of vocalist IAN ASTBURY and guitarist BILLY DUFFY, The Cult were blessed with an impressive pedigree. Duffy had paid his dues in The Nosebleeds (with the fledgling Morrissey), then the infamous Slaughter & The Dogs and the magnificently dramatic Theatre Of Hate. Astbury, having spent his early teens in Canada, got laid and flayed on the punk hotbeds of Belfast and Glasgow before coming to public attention in Southern Death Cult.

Duffy and Astbury first called themselves Death Cult, before resorting to the snappier and simpler Cult. They immediately leapt to the forefront of what was known as Positive Punk and, though Astbury would vociferously protest at the label, it turned out to be pretty accurate (if a tad limiting). From the outset, The Cult were kick-ass rockers, bloodymindedly and unashamedly set on their own idiosyncratic path, and in Astbury they possessed a spokesman of boundless optimism with a bent for the spiritual heavily marked by the plight of Canada's Native Americans, which he had of course viewed at first hand. Some called Astbury naive, others called him a visionary. He was both - remorselessly positive.

The Cult's debut LP, DREAMTIME (an appropriately earthy and religious title), made their intentions clear, with Astbury's grunting, panting, howling performances underlaid by Duffy's soaring, pulverising guitars and a thundering rhythm section that crossed the strut of Glam with an aggressive, pounding wardance. Success came rapidly, with the follow up album, LOVE, which featured the stand-out and still resonant singles "SHE SELLS SANCTUARY" and "RAIN".

With the Native Americans' battle for compensation with the US Government now front page news, history was being rewritten in their favour. Beyond this, the merciless yuppie culture spawned by Reagan and Thatcher had seen millions begin to experiment with "religions" old and new in an attempt to find the togetherness clearly missing in Western society. This made The Cult perhaps the most contemporary band in the world, but that wasn't enough for Astbury whose love of cutting edge music is legendary throughout the industry. So in came Rick Rubin, the hotshot Def Jam supremo behind the raging success of Run DMC and The Beastie Boys. The result was ELECTRIC, a caustic melange of Duffy's killer riffing, Astbury's lupine shriek and Rubin's murderously hip rhythms. The singles - "LOVE REMOVAL MACHINE", "WILD FLOWER" and "LIL' DEVIL" - were literally monstrous.

Astbury's indulgences and excesses were drawing him ever further from his songwriting partner - Duffy now a straight edge fitness freak - yet the pair remained on a creative high. Next came the swirling, bludgeoning, Bob Rock-produced SONIC TEMPLE (only Bob was Rock enough), featuring the exceptional "FIRE WOMAN" and "SWEET SOUL SISTER". Astbury now took the opportunity to put his money where his mouth was and organised the massive Gathering Of The Tribes, a huge two-day festival in California that deliberately brought together some crazily varying genres. Starring Soundgarden, Ice-T, Iggy Pop, The Charlatans and Public Enemy, it was an inspired mix and an obvious influence on Lollapalooza which began the next year.

Sonic Temple was the artistic high tide mark but The Cult fought on. CEREMONY gave us the tremendous "HEART OF SOUL" and "WILD HEARTED SON", while the Best Of collection PURE CULT powered straight to Number One in the UK. Astbury, ever abreast of the times, hacked off his famous locks and, though staying true to his spiritual leanings, led the band in a harder, brasher direction, with THE CULT album adding a grungy snarl to their pumping rock. The critics were now on their side, but the internal divisions were too wide; Duffy and Astbury were crossing that thin line far too often. The band dissolved when Astbury left suddenly during their 1995 US tour.

It took years for the relationship between Duffy and Astbury to reach a bearable temperature, but reach one it did. 1999 saw the opening of Act Two (which Astbury himself terms 'Cult Rising') as the band reformed for a US tour. The release of the updated PURE CULT singles album the following year further served to whet the appetite of the world. Astbury went solo, with SPIRIT LIGHT SPEED, his debut album and own unique take on a traditional hard rock and modern electronic fusion. In addition, the band managed to find time to record "PAINTED ON MY HEART", the DiAnne Warren-penned main theme to action movie, Gone In 60 Seconds.

With a career spanning over a decade, the band had amassed an impressive collection of rare recordings, out-takes, radio sessions and demos. The RARE CULT releases issued last year (6CD box set and single CD) brought together this wealth of material that had previously been unavailable on any of the official albums. This, however, did not signify the end of The Cult, rather just another chapter in an ongoing story. Their enduring appeal and passion for making music led this year to a new deal with Atlantic, the release of their seventh album and a world tour that proved the band could still rock along with the best of them.

Tickets: $39.50 & $29.50, not including applicable fees. Tickets are on sale Saturday, May 30 at 10am at Tickets.com, in person at the Paramount Theatre box offices, 24-hour kiosks located outside The Paramount & Moore Theatres, charge by phone at 877-STG-4TIX, or online at STGPresents.org.

 

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