#64
Post
by Pandemonium » Sun Sep 08, 2013 1:33 am
Saw The Cult tonight at The Wiltern in LA. Much better than last year's Hollywood Palladium show.
I had landed a GA pit ticket in the Ticketmaster release a couple weeks ago and got to the show about 15 minutes before opening band White Hills came on. The pit was pretty sparse and I could go right up to the rail just off to the side and catch their set. White Hills, a three piece, started off really promising, a decent mix of Led Zeppelin and Sonic Youth. The blond on bass was really easy on the eyes. But by about the 4th song, their long, mostly instrumental stoner rock started to wear thin and a few songs later, I was off to the bar.
The Cult came on about 9:45 and played the "Electric" album straight through, only subbing the great B-side cut "Zap City" in place of the (terrible) cover of "Born To Be Wild" which was on the album. They took about a 10 minute break while a dumb video clip played on the projection screen (it included clips from "Conan The Barbarian"...wtf?!?). They came back and played a respectable 2nd set and encore which as far as I know, was the standard set they've been playing this tour.
Good points - a lot of deeper cuts from the Electric album that I've never heard live before, played fairly faithfully. Also, songs that get regular air time most tours like Nirvana, The Phoenix, Rise and Spiritwalker sounded great. The big "hits" like Love Removal Machine and She Sells Sanctuary not played as encore closers as usual is a nice twist although closing with "Sun King" wasn't a perfect alternative.
The band, especially Billy Duffy was solid. No Billy vs guitar tech issues tonight and he seemed pretty happy the entire show. The only song I think really lost the audience was "Embers." The new 2nd guitarist has a pretty easy job from a musicians' standpoint, as anyone who knows The Cult's catalog can attest. I will say he looked uncomfortably like a well dressed Michael Douglas. Ian Astbury sang significantly better than last year's show although he had his downside as mentioned below. Late in the set, Ian tossed a tambourine right to an older guy dead center in the pit who was clearly having a great time rocking out and putting most of the younger fucks to shame.
Bad Points - Mostly Ian's more or less disconnected stage presence. Through the Electric set, he barely addressed the audience and when he did, it was often in a condescending manner. Frankly, he looked bored at times and really didn't seemed fully engaged until the last half dozen songs. Late in the show, he began whining about the audience, often telling them they "need to work, work for it," I guess because the place wasn't going nuts after every song. For the most part, the crowd was pretty into it, especially during much of the 2nd set and encore. It's getting old hearing Astbury bitch about crowd participation when he's the guy onstage who should be getting the (paying) audience into the show.
Setlist:
Wild Flower
Peace Dog
Lil' Devil
Aphrodisiac Jacket
Electric Ocean
Bad Fun
King Contrary Man
Love Removal Machine
Zap City
Outlaw
Memphis Hip Shake
*break*
Rain
Honey From a Knife
Sweet Soul Sister
Lucifer
Embers
The Phoenix
Rise
She Sells Sanctuary
Encore:
Spiritwalker
Nirvana
Sun King
