The Cult gears up for a new chapter — fresh music in the works

In a recent interview on 89 FM in São Paulo, Brazil frontman Ian Astbury of The Cult was questioned by a Rádio Rock radio station if the band had any intentions to release new music this year as a follow-up to their 2022 album “Under The Midnight Sun.”

Yes, we have some songs. It’s just how we’re gonna release them, because now everything is very different with albums, streaming. Albums are dead, pretty much albums are finished. Albums are dead, the concept of making an album, I like the idea of making — if you have a piece of music and it’s fresh, put it out.

This contrast between new and old was the subject of his next answer.

Many years ago, it was just a different format — different time, different format So you went with the format, and the format was to release albums, tour, radio, that kind of thing, whereas now the format is very different — streaming — and I feel that’s why there’s so many individual artists now or duos who are making music in a much more digital environment, smaller environment. The art of microphoning drum kits, guitar amplifiers is kind of dying because you can get a lot of plugins, if you know anything about recording, that mimic what studio engineers used to be experts at. Digital technology can now mimic that. So we’re seeing the end of these incredible engineers and producers who worked in a very different environment. That’s not to say that what is happening now is not important or relevant in terms of the quality of what’s being made, ’cause there’s some incredible music being made that’s being done outside of large studios, being done in very small environments with digital technology. But I feel that the way that music is made now changes the way that people create. Definitely rock musicians, for the most part — if you’re in a guitar-based band, you like to be in the room together, bass drums, guitars, vocals, unless it’s an artist who makes — for example, some artists is one guy, one girl, they make an album in their bedroom and then they put a band together around it and then they present it like a band, but really it’s one person.