The Cult recently announced “ELECTRIC 13”, a worldwide tour that will visit ten UK cities this October, to help celebrate the tour, musicmuso thought they would step back to the 80's and take a look at the album in more detail.
April 1987, where were you? I was in the 4th year at Teignmouth High School (renamed in recent years to Teignmouth Community College), I was at that age where I didn't really know what was 'cool', I was more into WHAM BARS and SPACE RAIDER crisps than BROS or Rick Astley, had a penchant for U2 and Big Country and other than that, my world was a straight forward kind of affair.
I had yet to discover 'girls', well saying that, I had engaged in my fair share of 'frenchies' at school disco's with the type of girls that your mother warned you of, but other than these, I was quite a shy lad.....
A friend of mine's older brother, I forget his name but one Saturday afternoon, we were messing about at his house when I heard music emanating from the brother's room, I dared to steal a closer listen and was spotted......Rather than receiving a size 8 Doc Martin boot around the head, he invited me in and I duly did as I was told and sat down. He told me of a band called The Cult, the album was 'Electric' and 25 years on, it remains on my playlist.
My friends brother introduced me to the previous works of The Cult, we started off with a dodgy recording on a C90 cassette tape of 'LOVE', whilst I wasn't really able to comment on the style of the then 'Goth Rock' album, I could certainly tell that they had made a shift from this genre to a more harder rock offering in an attempt to compete with the popularity of certain 'hair' metal bands along the lines of KISS, Poison, Tigertailz and older rockers Whitesnake. I also managed to grab a copy (home taping didn't kill music folks) of the bands previous album 'Dreamtime', which was an altogether different beast and a far cry from the heady heights that 'Electric' reached a few years on.
From the opening power chords of 'Wild Flower' through to the pounding beats of Memphis Hip Shake, 'Electric' certainly kept you wondering how they had managed to make such a leap from the offerings on their 1985 album 'Love' , I guess the key ingredient was a certain producer called Rick Rubin who had previously worked alongside Run DMC, Tom Petty, Aerosmith and more recently Adele.
I am excited about the forthcoming shows, I have never seen the band play live and am looking forward to them playing 'Electric' in its entirety prior to knocking out some of their vast catalogue of tracks, as long as they play 'She Sells Sanctuary' and 'Rain' I shall leave a happy man.
Tracklist for 'Electric':
- "Wild Flower" – 3:37
- "Peace Dog" – 3:34
- "Lil' Devil" – 2:44
- "Aphrodisiac Jacket" – 4:11
- "Electric Ocean" – 2:49
- "Bad Fun" – 3:33
- "King Contrary Man" – 3:12
- "Love Removal Machine" – 4:17
- "Born to Be Wild" (Mars Bonfire) – 3:55
- "Outlaw" – 2:52
- "Memphis Hip Shake" – 4:01
Tickets are available from www.kililive.com and www.seetickets.com.
Phone: 0844 871 8803 and venue box offices.
THE CULT, ELECTRIC 13 DATES: OCTOBER 2013
18th - CARDIFF UNIVERSITY GREAT HALL
19th - EXETER GREAT HALL
20th - SOUTHAMPTON GUILDHALL
22nd - NORWICH UEA
23rd - WOLVERHAMPTON CIVIC HALL
25th - MANCHESTER ACADEMY
26th - GLASGOW BARROWLANDS
28th - NOTTINGHAM ROCK CITY
29th - LIVERPOOL 02 ACADEMY
31st - LONDON ROUNDHOUSE
To celebrate the band's return to the live circuit, here is 30 minute video of them playing live at Brixton Academy way back in 1987......