Summer Heats up w/The Cult (Summer/2012)

They have really faltered in the last few years and now they were here promoting that their gonna release a new LP for the first time in five years. They were in pretty good shape and sounded really decent and driven. The last few times I’ve seen them have been dreadful, but I love them so much its a little irresistible to not go when they were playing a show like this while I’m in town.
In my freshman year at college, I saw them play one of the best shows I’ve still ever seen in my life and the residual value from that show keeps me coming back.
Though some key members are back in the band and everyone looked and sounded great and probably the best I’ve seen them in 15 years – one thing that has remained and will never change is that singer Ian Astbury has the absolute worst between-song banter in the history of performing. You would think that after all this time he would have this down by now, but he consistently comes off as your drunk uncle embarrassing you with some inappropriate speech at your wedding.
The band still kicked ass though and the new songs sounded really good – however the only thing anyone will remember from this show was something very silly, but added spontaneity to the evening was Astbury bringing up Matthew McConaughey to play (unmiked) bongos on a couple of songs.

Besides the obvious this was silly for a number of reasons – they just let him pound away unmiked so not to interfere with the song, also though it was 10pm he kept his dark Aviator Shades on the whole time like a creep, and when his image was shown on the big screens sidestages, it drew the largest applause. Ok, I get it, it was a way to include him and make the evening special, its not like I hate fun.

SET LIST:

Lil’ Devil
Honey From A Knife
Horse Nation
Lucifer
Embers
Nirvana
Wildflower
The Wolf
Spiritwalker
Phoenix
Fire Woman
For the Love of the Animals

Encore:

She Sells Sanctuary
Love Removal Machine

Now as I hate to make fun of the starfuckers in the crowd and then turn into one myself, the thing that I will remember most is this:
As I’m backstage talking to some of my friends and a few of the guys in the Cult, I see this staggeringly gorgeous creature walking by me, back and forth several times. Besides her freakish good looks she just seemed like a normal festival-goer – She was even wearing a SXSW badge around her neck like everyone else. She seemed like she was looking for something and I definitely wanted to talk to her so I approached her and she asked me if I had a lighter, which I did.
As I’m pulling the lighter out I glance at her badge and it reads: ROONEY MARA
No fucking way – now I’m the one drooling (as if I wasn’t already) –
Bill Murray? sure, Matthew McConaughey? expected – but the fucking Girl with the Dragon Tattoo?? This was not in the plans and I was kinda shitting myself. This was perfect timing too because I (and perhaps the world) will never be in love with her again as much as I am right now and I wasn’t meeting her in 10 years at some Comic-Con with a folding table between us.
I had just seen the movie – I didn’t’ know shit about it other than its the book my friends who don’t read are reading this year.
Though the racy scenes in the film of her are not gratuitous, I don’t think that you are supposed to see her as such a babe for the story’s sake – but let me tell you something, every time she was on screen my heart kinda jumped a little and in person she looked flawless.
I managed to not make a dork out of myself and spoke with her briefly and another actor, Gerard Butler.
She was the one that actually gave me the explanation of why I couldn’t come backstage during the show –
They were actually shooting coverage and improvised scenes for an upcoming Terrence Malick film with the members of the Cult!
Nothing to do with the Dragon Tatoo series – another film she’s gonna be in, apparently her character goes to see the Cult in concert etc.
McConaughey was being McConaughey so I let him be – and I would normally never do this but I knew that nobody would believe me – so when this other guy asked to get a pic of Mara, McConaughey, and singer Ian Astbury, when he left I got a shot. They asked if I wanted to be in it, but I wasn’t gonna douche-out that hard:

So I left there feeling pretty good, a great show with an unexpected ending, what a freaking day already eh?

 

 

 

The Cult – July 21st – House of Blues – Dallas, TX

What a night! As I was walking back to my car that was by the House of Blues anyway totally adremanlzed from seeing my heroes in Van Halen, a guy was standing on the sidewalk handing out free tickets to see The Cult who were already on inside House of Blues! –
I will always love the Cult, and they are still responsible for putting on of the best shows I’ve ever seen in 1995 – however if you have followed this blog or know me personally, you know that the have sadly sorely declined over the years. I will go as far as to say that I saw them at this very venue two years prior and it was one of the most pathetic and embarassing performances I have ever seen. How had they sunk that low?

Well thankfully they seem to be on a bit of an upswing, or as much of one as they are capable of at this point as I caught them in Austin earlier this year and the show was leaps and bounds better than the ghaslty show from 2010 but than again that’s not saying much.
The show in Austin was during SXSW and was special as Matthew Mcconaughey joined them for a  few songs and I met actress Roony Mara backstage after the gig.
I’m happy to report that this gig tonight, in support of their excellent new album Choice of Weapon – their first in five years – both are in the same spirit of the upswing that I witnessed in Austin earlier this year – as they were kicking ass and the crowd on fire when I walked into this show – and keep in mind, I had just seen Van Halen.

 

I had missed about the first half of the regualr set but stil got the see the remaing 7 songs and a 3 song encore. I looked over and I see an old friend Chris Young who I hadn’t seen in a long time and he introduced me to Drue, a really cool DJ friend of his.After the show I was on the smoker’s porch contemplating such a great evening – but I did hear/see some strange things tonight –  On the walk over here one guy was seriously confused/dissapointed by the omission of Dreams….. a Sammy Hagar song from the Van Halen show.
Now at the Cult here on the smoker’s porch post-show a (very attractive) girl told me she boycotted the VH show cause of the choice of opening band Kool & The Gang.I told her that her choice/reasons for not going based on that were even stranger.
She & her bf were holding the Cult’s setlist (stage copy) desperately trying to figure out what it was.
Since the song Nirvana was on there they resolved it must be a random list of band names-as in they didnt recognize anything else…at a show they had paid to see. When I told them it was the setlist, it literally blew their minds. Marijuana can be a very powerful drug.