| Dreamtime | 1984 |
| Love | 1985 |
| Electric | 1987 |
| Sonic Temple | 1989 |
| Ceremony | 1991 |
| The Cult | 1994 |
| High Octane Cult (compilation) | 1996 |
| Beyond Good And Evil | 2001 |
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(reviewed by Nick Karn)
HIGH POINTS: Wild Flower, Love Removal Machine. LOW POINTS: Memphis Hip Shake, Born To Be Wild.
What's the best band to emulate when you're looking to get into an addictive sleazy groove for a whole album? Why, AC/DC of course! The prospect of The Cult doing that same imitation certainly sounds attractive, of course, especially since Ian Astbury's lyrics are more on the uhh... wacky and mystical side than that, not to mention his vocal tone is more easy on the ears for me than Brian Johnson (or even Bon Scott, for that matter). Nevertheless, they just don't have the elements necessary to be able to pull it off for a whole album - only about half of these riffs are memorable, they lack the firepower of the Young brothers' twin guitar attack, and none of them are as catchy or stupidly timeless as "You Shook Me All Night Long"! Not to mention that they also have a problem of sluggish tempos to an even worse extent than that DC band, which produces boring results.
But with that being said, most of this album is enjoyable while it's on. The opening "Wild Flower" is probably the best of the lot - The Cult really do well with fist-pumping anthems as long as their riffs are ear catching and the running time's reasonable, and this certainly has enough catchiness and lacks those weaknesses to be the highlight (especially since they nail down the AC/DC groove perfectly). And as proved by "Bad Fun", they even have the talent for making a potentially dumb song come to life with memorability in an addictive riff, and it helps that the song's the only really fast one here. Even when Astbury has a huge case of oversinging in "Peace Dog", it's actually beneficial to the sound because it makes the lamebrained groove that much more fun (and I like the way he says 'B five two baby, way up in the sky...' during the chorus). They can even make generic 'dark' chord progressions come to life ("Aphrodesiac Jacket").
Of course, the biggest problem of the band in general is all over this album - unmemorability, and outside of maybe minor singalong tendencies in the choruses and vaguely memorable riffs, I can't remember much at all about "Lil' Devil", "Outlaw" or "Electric Ocean", to name a few examples. And like I said before, when they try for really lethargic tempos, it's usually a bore - the closing "Memphis Hip Shake" doesn't make me do anything of the sort, and the already predictable choice of covering "Born To Be Wild" is made worse by the song being slowed down in such a dull way. Damn, this is a hard review - Electric is a fun album while you're listening to it (as the high-quality groove based riffing of the hit single "Love Removal Machine" and the more unconventional "King Contrary Man" can attest), but the next one's more refined approach is more lasting and powerful than this derivative, but still very decent, effort.
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(reviewed by Nick Karn)
HIGH POINTS: Wake Up Time For Freedom, Edie (Ciao Baby), Soldier Blue. LOW POINTS: Automatic Blues, American Horse.
I know I'm not the type to really go into the production values of an album, and I realize Bob Rock is hated by a lot of hard rock listeners for contributing to the process of Metallica 'selling out' with their self-titled effort two years later, but for The Cult, I think the change in the producer's chair made quite a big difference. No longer are the songs strictly trying to imitate AC/DC (though that same approach to groove is still certainly there), but the material goes a bit deeper into the hard rock spectrum, and the booming, majestic mix really helps the riffing and strong anthemic choruses come alive. No wonder the (short-lived) commercial success for the band came here. Sonic Temple's still far from perfect - there's still a good dose of songs that will probably never stick in my head as long as I live, and many of them go on at least one or two minutes longer than they should - but that still doesn't mean it isn't one of their best.
Especially since the songs seem more fleshed out and less monotonous than before. Take the opening "Sun King" and the fine ambience of its' minute long airy buildup of guitar soloing before it crashes into a fine production-heavy anthem. And it definitely adds power to the singalong "Wake Up Time For Freedom", which has one of the most unforgettable refrains they ever wrote, with the booming harmonies working well together. Of course, 'unforgettable' is a really, really relative term for this band, since the vocal melodies are usually not outstanding by any means. There are more exceptions here than either the previous or the next album, though - the Aerosmith derived power ballad vibe of "Edie (Ciao Baby)" is convincingly emotive and flows well with that bombastic melody, and "Sweet Soul Sister"... well, what else is there to say about this one other than the fact that it's catchy and well-produced?
The minimalism also sounds more convincing, too. At over 7 minutes and with really only a single-note pulverizing riff to support it, "Soul Asylum" should bore me to death, but somehow it doesn't. I'm not exactly sure why - maybe it's because there are enough twists on the vocal melody or chiming guitar leads to make it enjoyable for most of that time, even though it's overlong like most of this stuff. And the more raucous material like the glam rock styled "New York City" (which is a definite nod to the early 70's if there ever was one) and especially the hugely entertaining "Soldier Blue" work every bit as well as the other songs, and in the latter's case, even more - the groove this one has is easily as addictive and memorable as anything on Electric, even if the vocal melody isn't the greatest ever.
Basically, this is an album that gets through to me more in the actual sound than the songs, which is why it's a bit hard to make the material seem interesting, since it's really not. I'm not even sure what makes this album any more different than the mid-late 80's conventional hard rock. It's even got attempts at blues (the closing rocker "Medicine Man", complete with harmonica intro, and the awkward as hell "Automatic Blues"), the more conventional anthems like "Fire Woman" don't have enough hooks to really become engraved in my mind for more than a few hours, and there's a weak, unmemorable take on the "She Sells Sanctuary" New Wave pattern in "American Horse". But somehow, the well-produced vibe and generally enjoyable music makes Sonic Temple pleasurable to listen to while it's on, even if the melodies are still a blur.
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(reviewed by Nick Karn)
HIGH POINTS: Indian, Sweet Salvation. LOW POINTS: White, Ceremony, If, Earth Mofo, Full Tilt.
Alright, now this one is a total exercise in boredom. While the amount of catchy melodies and singalong choruses and top-notch majestic arena rock production values made Sonic Temple somewhat worthwhile to listen to despite the songs going on a bit longer than they should, this one makes us sit through one very standard 5 or 6 minute hard rock song after another over the course of an hour plus without even rewarding me with entertaining melodies, interesting musical diversions, or just about anything attention grabbing. Well, not entirely - after awhile, some melodies on here do eventually pop out at me as being quite tuneful and enjoyable while they're on, especially on side two (and the Native American influences in both the music and lyrics occasionally rises out of the murk). I can honestly say the amount of decent material on the second half saves the album from being horrendous, since that opening side just completely puts me to sleep.
Examples? How about the absolute low point of the record? "White" is just an repetitive dirge with a simplistically dull acoustic guitar line and a weak melody as it is, but yet it just drags at over 7 endless minutes, just chasing its' tail forever. The title track doesn't really fare much better - the main riff is already uncomfortably simplistic, the intro is just a pointless waste of space, and the vocal melody is absolutely nothing to write home about, so why drag this pointless 'anthem' to over 6 minutes? Makes no sense to me. Or how about the generic environmental rant "Earth Mofo", or the Cult-by-numbers chiming guitar rock of "Wild-Hearted Son", which just comes off as a low grade Sonic Temple outtake with a boring midtempo groove? And finally, we get the boring Cult piano ballad that turns into boring Cult rocker "If"! Now that's 30 minutes of quality dentist office music!
Alright, forgive me if I use the word boring or related phrases too much in this review, but there's no other word for it. But thankfully, the second half, in terms of better material at least, is more encouraging. It still drags in places - "Full Tilt" is another formulaic AC/DC influenced piece, and you know this band's in dire straits where they have to lift an intro note for note from a 'hair metal ballad' (Skid Row's "I Remember You") on the otherwise decent poppy, slightly rootsy, "Heart Of Soul", but at least there's some nice stuff here. The orchestrated "Indian" is a genuinely beautiful and spare ballad, and by far the most melodically substantial thing here, and coupled with the gospel-ish chorus of "Sweet Salvation", it makes for an uplifting two track stretch. "Bangkok Rain" and "Wonderland", meanwhile, are at least able to use slow tempos without putting me to sleep (though it's clear the only memorable things about these songs are their choruses). Ugh. Okay, I'll use that word again. This is boring. Oh, you're tired of it? How about a different phrase? Don't buy this album.
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(reviewed by Nick Karn)
HIGH POINTS: Nico. LOW POINTS: Take The Power, Ashes And Ghosts.
I think I've come a long way in attempting to review this, since it took me a while to be able to even force myself to sit through it enough times in order to accomplish this monolithic task. Because when I first put on Beyond Good And Evil, my reaction was probably even worse than sitting through the first half of Ceremony. It was something like, "This is their comeback after seven years of inactivity? Totally conventional hard rock songs that have almost nothing going for them at all other than annoying recycled riffs, and no vocal melodies that pop into my head?" But then I read Rolling Stone's review of it, and I realized 'the album rocks, and that alone is good'. Or at least I was able to pick out a few good melodies and ideas so I could have something to say about it as a whole. Maybe describing the sound as something that has a harder edged modern rock flavor than before could be a start.
Now that's started, so I guess I'll mention that lead single "Rise" is yet another rewrite of "She Sells Sanctuary" in its' Eastern-y guitar riff, enough to the point where I can easily get the riff to one and the verse to another caught in my head. At least it's as memorable and energetic as anything else on the album, though, so I can't complain too much. The opening "War (The Process)" might have a bit of a generic grind to it once it gets going, but the vocal melody is good, and that eerie, bubbly intro is a pretty cool feature. "Saint" and "Breathe" have a cool crunching riff and a very memorable 'fifty five thousand flowers for the hero...' chorus respectively, and... ummm.... the side-closing ballad "Nico" actually has a wonderful panoramic atmosphere in its' music (especially in the glorious guitar breaks!) that really takes me over the canyons somewhere, even though the only thing I can remember about the melody is the 'hey Nico!' beginning. Seriously.
The second half, though, I hardly remember anything from after at least four listens, other than the choruses to "American Gothic" (like the generic 'black star white light' alt rock chant), "True Believers" (nice and reflective) and maybe on a good day "Shape The Sky". God, is it that difficult to put interesting things into the songs (the extremely dull slow number "Ashes And Ghosts" sure could have used some kind of spark)? And if you're gonna go the blatant rip off route, could you be any more obvious than on the first half's "Take The Power" stealing the chorus of "American Woman"? I mean, the verse hook's okay, but the song's way too generic to have an identity of its' own. Come to think of it, the album really has no identity other than the usual hard rock and goth stuff that's already been done before, but for the most part since it's okay to listen to, I can give it a mediocre rating. Mission accomplished.
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