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At its very best, rock music is both fresh and hoary. The truly great bands of the last 50 years have all borrowed heavily from the past as well as from their contemporaries, then sent these familiar sounds through a personal filter that produced a music at once idiosyncratic, unashamedly truthful and culturally relevant. As kids growing up with the musical melting pot of the 1970's, The Cult - in the mid 1980s probably the UK's most vibrant and courageous rock band - were both a product of, and soundtrack to, violently changing times.

Formed in Spring 1983, around the songwriting partnership of vocalist Ian Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, Death Cult (they'd pare the name down to The Cult early the following year) sprang from a post-punk crucible that was bubbling wildly. Duffy had played in a late incarnation of Ed Banger And The Nosebleeds with the young Morrissey, then moved through the infamous Slaughter & The Dogs to the triumphal and purposefully blasphemous Theatre Of Hate. Having recently returned from a six-year emigration to Canada and a disastrous month-long stint in the army, a dispossessed Astbury passed through the punk hot spots of Belfast and Glasgow before settling in Bradford and making a name for himself in The Southern Death Cult, whose ferocious, tribalist Fatman caused a major stir in the UK's hugely influential music press. The pair teamed up and made their plans at Duffy's flat in Coldharbour Mansions in Brixton, South London, an area that, just months earlier, had been the flaming heart of major race riots and was now, unsurprisingly, the spiritual and physical home of Positive Punk. Astbury's experiences in Canada had influenced him deeply, and he'd been particularly moved by the lifestyle, religion and historical problems of the Native Americans on the Six Nations Reservation. This brought to his lyrics a sense of mysticism and eco-consciousness clearly evident in early Cult anthems like Horse Nation and the Independent Number One hit Spiritwalker. Astbury's preoccupation with ethnic spiritualism, coupled with Duffy's shimmering and increasingly rock-orientated riffing, immediately made The Cult the darlings of the nascent Goth scene - which proved both a boon and a bane. Though it brought a large and devoted audience, it also led outsiders to assume The Cult dealt in the schlock theatrics, cod-Orientalism and Hammer horror tactics of traditional Goth.

Astbury's simplistic, genuinely earthy lyrics, Duffy's sky-surfing guitar and their thunderous rhythm section made The Cult - in America and beyond - ideal soundtrackers of their time. The breakthrough was inevitable and came with the blistering singles She Sells Sanctuary and Rain, two tracks still on the airwaves today and both taken from the band's first unarguable artistic success, Love. That album became The Cult's first big triumph, going Top Five in the UK. Its title was aggressive and unashamed, love and ultimate togetherness being the absolute root of Astbury's world-view - something that caused much cynical barracking from the press.

It was predictable that the band would now delve deeper into old school Americana. Their sound and concerns were, after all, more American than those of most American outfits. It was also predictable, given Astbury's lifelong and near-rabid interest in new music, that they would remain violently contemporary. Having recorded a follow-up to Love (provocatively entitled Peace), but unhappy with the direction the music had taken, they departed for New York where they would write and rewrite material to be produced by Rick Rubin, the young Def Jam supremo whose heavy-duty mixing of rap and rock had driven Run DMC to stardom and was about to send The Beastie Boys higher still.

Splitting with their UK management and relocating to Los Angeles, the band threw themselves into the recording of their next LP, as well as the extra-curricular shenanigans for which they became legendary. By 1989, they were riding high and, promoted by the brilliant Fire Woman single, their latest album went US Top Ten. This was the monstrous Sonic Temple, produced by the mightily renowned Bob Rock and featuring on its cover a bare-chested, leather-clad Duffy in the throes of a windmill axe attack. Despite its intensely rocky sleeve though, the album was a sweet melange of Electric's pounding, staccato riffola and the sweeping soundscapes of Love. Sweet Soul Sister and Edie (Ciao Baby) were also taken as singles, while the likes of American Horse, Soldier Blue and Wake Up Time For Freedom showed that Astbury remained solid and unswerving in his convictions.

Sonic Temple was The Cult's financial and artistic highpoint, but its success belied the band's internal problems. As nearly a year of gruelling touring, darkness and confusion brought the curtain down on "Act one", Duffy was busy rebuilding mind and body after years of abuse, bassist Jamie Stewart, the third original member, quit the band and Astbury was out on a limb; his lifestyle was remorselessly self destructive and pulled him far away from his now straight-edged songwriting partner. Despite this, his soulful drive towards improving the planet and drawing people together (The Cult would always have actors, artists and poets backstage at their shows) led him to organise The Gathering Of The Tribes, his response to "the apathy and corporate infiltration of the music industry and as an attempt for music lovers to find a common ground with one another". The two-day, cross cultural festival in California, involving the disparate likes of Ice-T, Soundgarden, The Charlatans, Iggy Pop and Public Enemy was to become the spiritual parent of the Lollapalooza tours.

Nevertheless, 1991's Ceremony LP, including the hits Heart Of Soul and Wild Hearted Son, was together enough to chart high once more. Though the band were playing sell-out shows on their successful European and American tours, the personal pressures grew too great. There was now an artistic chasm between the down-to-Earth Duffy and head-in-the-clouds Astbury. Nothing short of re-invention would do.

The public were ready, as was evinced by the band's 1993 Greatest Hits collection Pure Cult going straight to UK Number One. Re-employing producer Bob Rock, The Cult stripped down their sound and rebuilt; rediscovering the spirit of the Love / Electric period but adding a punky snarl pertinent to those grungey times, they remained true to their own musical beginnings while lyrically, Astbury re-examined and reaffirmed his spiritual stance with Star and Sacred Life.

The rebirth was a false start. Though the critics were (by and large) now on their side, though the fans were starved and new tracks like the mean, crushing, Bob Rock-produced In The Clouds were ready to go, the band dissolved when a tormented Astbury jumped ship during an American tour in 1995.

However, there was no doubt that, following the intermission, The Cult would return, stronger than ever, with a second act - "Cult Rising". The reformed, re-energised band hit the road for a USA tour in late 1999 and, with plans for a new album, the insurrection continues. These days it just takes longer for the fiery feuds between Duffy and Astbury to cool. That's love power, baby.

- Dominic Wills

Link to Official Cult site for latest news

Link to Canadian Cult site.

Link to European Cult site

Link to Ian Astbury

Link to Billy Duffy's band Coloursound