Undercover's Tim Cashmere reports:

THE CULT have recently arrived in Australia and are bringing with them their much acclaimed tour in which they’ll play their legendary 1985 goth-rock album, Love.

Shortly after touching down in Sydney, guitarist Billy Duffy picked up the phone and had a chat with me about old Cult, new Cult and all things Cult and the first thing on my mind was “Why Love”?

“Why not?” Duffy bluntly stated. “Love was an interesting point for us. We were still new and while it wasn’t technically our first album, it was our first globally released album and it was probably our truest too, because after that we had commercial success and we became more raucous with Electric and Sonic Temple.

“You have got to remember, we’ve been playing a fair chunk of Love for most of our career. There’d probably be an uprising if we didn’t play ‘She Sells Sanctuary’.”

It’s not that he is ashamed of the band’s commercial rock career. “I have never been afraid of commercial success,” he added. “All of the bands I was listening to like THIN LIZZY had singles in the charts. It wasn’t a bad thing! It wasn’t until years later that I got into the deeper, darker bands.”

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Simon Sweetman of New Zealand's Suff.co.nz recently interviewed The Cult frontman Ian Astubury. The following is an excerpt:

There's a need for Astbury to prove things. It comes out many times in the space of our taut 15-minute chat.

"For a start, I play guitar as well, I've just not felt the need to play guitar on stage with The Cult. I mean, I wrote 'The Witch'! But I have respect for this material; it is the work of the band The Cult. And I don't need to go off and play it when it's not me and Billy and the band."

He then goes on to detail that he did play a handful of songs from The Cult when on the tour with his first significant post-Cult band (during the first breakup), THE HOLY BARBARIANS.

"But again, they were the songs I wrote - so that's fair".

There will be new material from The Cult. Apparently an EP is being readied - part of a series. Just don't go calling it an EP. They have a fancy new name, you see...

"First of all," and it feels like David Brent in performance-review mode here, "check your calendar: it's 2010 mate. 'EP' is old technology that stands for 'elongated play', that's dated. So we're not releasing an EP. We're releasing 'a capsule'."

Astbury explains that this will take the form of new songs and will include "a film aspect, music videos that you can download or purchase on DVD and maybe a T-shirt".

They will also look to release the fancy new capsule on both vinyl - and cassette tape. Yes. Old technology though, isn't it?

"Well yes, but you see this is where the capsule idea comes from - it 'encapsulates' it all. Whatever we decide to release will be available in whatever format for download or over-the-counter purchase. Or to buy at gigs. We need to move with the times."

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As previously reported, The Cult are touring Australia/New Zealand this month and will perform their classic Love album from start to finish.

Love featured the signature hit ‘She Sells Sanctuary’.

"The band is redefining the live album experience with the Love Live Tour; nothing is comparable to witnessing The Cult, fully engaged in the live creation of arguably their seminal album. For fans this will be the greatest tour yet, and for those just discovering The Cult, this staging will envelop them in a pure performance experience," stated Cult manager, Tom Vitorino.

As well as the Love album, the second half of the shows will be Cult classics.

Ian Astbury and Billy Duffy have been recording at the Sunset Marquis Villa Recording Studios in LA. They may throw a new song or two in for a preview was well.

Remaining dates are:

May

6 - Big Top Luna Park - Sydney, Australia
8 - Palais Theatre - Melbourne, Australia
10 - Thebarton Theatre - Adelaide, Australia
12 - Metro City - Perth, Australia