Its Full tilt, rock and roll. Its Raw power. It’s the Cult. 

The legs are splayed apart, the strobe lights flickering, the backdrop films playing. And the guitars are loud, and the riffs are even louder, and spiky. Spiky like Billy Duffy’s hair. It’s the same pose you’ve seen on the cover of the classic Sonic Temple. It’s the pose of the rock. And then, the hand goes around. The windmill.Its like Pete Townshend, transplanted into the body of Iggy Pop, energy and fury.

The songs, the songs you probably know. One by one, the time machine takes us back to 1986. The lush, delicate, gothic rock classic of “Love” by The Cult is in full swing ; it’s a classic goth rock album, like “Floodland”, like “Carved in Sand” , like “Disintergration”. On record, it was loud but subtle, like the power finessed into a lush, yet powerful sound. Tonight though, its augmented by a second guitarist who wants to be Mick Jones of the Clash ; the white jeans, the poses, that hat, everything. And live, that subtlety is replaced with pure rock bludegon.

Think of it as like a Jackson Pollock painting ; You could use a paintbrush, or stuff high explosive into a tin of paint and run away to watch from a distance. You’d get the same result, but you'd know which one would be louder, noisier, and a hell of a lot more satisfying.

And that’s what its like. Recreating the entire “Love”album in full, on stage, it’s the Cult. Back in the eighties, they were an Arena filling behemoth. Ragged, wrecked, and running roughshod, their often sparse and nuanced records were transformed on stage into something between a bludgening juggernaut and a trainwreck. Loud, furious, pure raw power. So the songs on stage were a completely different beast. Literally.

Opening with “Nirvana” [here shorn of its alternate, 1992 live arrangement], its fast and paced, energetic. But it takes time for things to connect. A batch of 25 year old album tracks, in order, shorn of deviation, lack the killer opening punch. But once that moment comes, Everything connects.

And that moment is “Rain”. After that, everything makes sense. The crowd just clicks and the band are in full tilt, rock n roll, powered by electric guitar and attitude. “She Sells Sanctuary”  is the classic everyone – hell, everyone – knows. Its the one song where the song transcends and goes mainstream.

Ian Asbury prowls the stage like a man unleashed, caffeinated and aggravated, complete with a juvenile tendency to use a fornicatory expletitve that borders on the illiterate. Billy Duffy has riffs the size of battleships, a guitar sound that is so loud its difficult to believe its only one guitar, and can pull a rock star pose like a professional. This is a man who has “MCFC” on his plectrums, the name of his favorite football team…. But when the Americans try and decipher what it means, they think its means “Mother C—tin' F—kin' cult”. Yes, that’s how rock he is.

After the “Love” portion of the set comes the other oldies. Classic, old school, metal rock N roll riffs.The simplistic and powerful “Wild Flower”.The double barrelled bludgeon of “Rise”. The unexpected surprise that is “Sun King” – possibly my favourite ever Cult song, until I realise that there’s at least a dozen other songs they don’t play tonight equally its equal. And the only song I've ever known where an intro Bass solo is even better than the song itself... because This is where it all began. Sun king, Honey.

And then there’s the eternal, almost beyond parody gleeful joy of “Fire Woman”. Shake it Shake it Shake It baby. Oh lord have Mercy. C’mon little sister. Fire….

Just the name “Love Removal Machine” tells you how good a song that is. The riff is pure Stones – “Start Me Up” – and the lyrics brilliant nonsense. It’s a song so notorious, it was even turned into a injoke in a book I once read, where everyone said that as “Mashayaaaaeen!” in an American accent in tribute to the song itself. And it has the most perfect line of any rock song ever. What else can encapsulate rock n roll as purely as singing the line “baby baby baby baby baby baby!” screaming out at the top of your lungs?

Nothing. Nothing at all. It’s dumber than a box of hammers and twice as loud. Its the most awesome moment I’ve had at a rock gig since the first time I ever saw AC/DC. And you know how Awesome AC/DC are live.

Come the encore – and Billy Duffy tells us to enjoy it, because Ian is in a good mood and that never happens – and ther 1985 line up resurrect themselves for the first time in almost a quarter of a century. Jamie Stewart on bass, looking just every inch the star he was – and previous drummer Mark play together. Under rehearsed, underprepared, but a special moment. Its time to resurrect two songs from “Love” again, which is “Phoenix”, and “She Sells Sanctuary"  both again for the second time. Both special.

Its only rock n roll. And I love it. I really do.It’s a pure nostalgia show, but it’s the Cult.

The Cult - Purveyors of classic rock riffs since 1984. Air guitar has never felt so good.

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