CULTÖSAURUS ERECTUS

I've noticed that the most common critical view of the mighty BOC holds that Secret Treaties was their masterpiece, Agents of Fortune and Spectres were commercial sellout, Mirrors was the collapse, and Cultosaurus was some sort of musical redemption. In a word---poppycock. My admittedly in-the-minority assessment is that Agents of Fortune is their true masterpiece, Spectres was wonderful, Mirrors, while more commercially-oriented and radio-friendly, was at least still fun, Cultosaurus was the collapse, and Unknown Origin/Revolution by Night were the musical redemption of the First Nine albums.

Cultosaurus is one of the greatest examples of a band completely out of creative gas, a title it would hold for just over five years until Club Ninja wrestled that title away from it. Club Ninja and Cultosaurus have tons in common, actually, despite their surface-level differences in production and sound-sheen: both are stacked front to back with lifeless, monotonous, utter-generic template hard rock numbers that begged me to martyr them as "parking lot" albums (an immature outcome we subjected vinyls to as teenagers when we were displeased with their content---essentially a contest to see who could launch them highest over the empty church parking lot by my friend's house and then produce the most glorious results on impact. Immature, for sure, but at the time, hilarious late-summer-night drinking antics.) For Martin Birch, bless his heart, this was not a collection of material he was going to save with a producer's magic.

The jazz interlude in "Monsters" was a welcome parlor trick that harkened the sense of playfulness this band used to possess, but it's a brief respite. "Divine Wind" is anything but divine, five minutes of relentlessly repetitive plodding. While Buck Dharma could be counted on for a surprise mid-inning stand-up triple as on "I Love the Night" or "The Vigil" elsewhere, here that at-bat would be "Deadline," and he goes down swinging as well. "The Marshall Plan," oh dear, where is that skip button? "Hungry Boys" sounds like a Joe Jackson throwaway. "Fallen Angel" is a nice break from Eric Bloom with Joe B delivering a solid vocal. If I had to come up with one song from this album to place on a BOC retrospective, it would ironically be the last number, "Unknown Tongue," rather than everybody's sweetheart, "Black Blade." "Tongue" has a sinister and playful vibe that would have been right at home on Agents of Fortune, and it has some fine piano playing (by Lanier, I assume.) It has been noted elsewhere that Allen was largely absent from creative input on this album, perhaps another clue into the band dynamic of the moment.

But far too much of Cultosaurus is utterly forgettable, repetitive, and with a sad, performative passion as opposed to music that truly moves you or surprises you. Yes, they are certainly heavier and harder-rocking songs than Mirrors, but you'd never convince me that they're more interesting or ear-pleasing in any way. Members of BOC were trying to find their way back to their first three albums, a spiritual home in their mind, but they lacked the basic quality material and the "early band magic" to pull off such a trick at this point. Mind you, few will agree with my assessment of Cultosaurus, so you'd best check it out yourself. Although, actually, there is one prominent BOC insider who did happen to agree with me, the late great Sandy Pearlman, who noted, "Cultosaurus, I don't like it; some people do. I just don't like it. It doesn't do much for me."

A final point before I exit my soap box is to consider how poorly this album compares to peer albums from other legacy rock acts of the same era---does anyone seriously contend with a straight face that Cultosaurus can stand up to Permanent Waves or Heaven and Hell? Fortunately for our beloved Cult, a more convincingly authentic musical redemption was just around the corner, the one-two punch of Fire of Unknown Origin and The Revolution by Night.

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