THE ALARM's Mike Peters was joined by THE CULT's Billy Duffy on this week's installment of his streaming series "The Big Night In". Asked if he has been making any new music while in quarantine, Duffy said (see video below): "I've come up with a few riffs. THE CULT, we're in the process of making an album in our own way. We have a producer engaged, and he's in the U.K. And that's ongoing. And I came up with some stuff — probably not as much [as I could have]. "The ideas either come or they don't," he explained. "I don't sit and force myself. I know some writers or music and lyrics [have] a disciplined work schedule — hours spent in front of the typewriter equals output. To me, I just play till I feel it and if I get this energy and out comes a little riff. And it literally is as simple as that. I get the idea — it's almost like an itch that I've got to scratch, and out it pops, and I record it. And it's been like that now for nearly 40 years, so I'm probably, at this age, not gonna change [my ways]." Billy also touched upon THE CULT's songwriting process, saying: "Mine and Ian's [Astbury, vocals] relationship as writers and what we want out of THE CULT, we're both fairly forward thinking and we don't want to try and redo an album from 1986 when we were young men. People often say that: 'Why don't you do an album like that?' It's, like, well, because it'd be a lie. As musicians, you want to evolve and just sort of tell the truth of where you are in your life… Having said that, there are many great bands — AC/DC spring to mind — who try and make the same album over and over and over, and [that worked] brilliantly for them. God bless." Last December, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that THE CULT was planning to work on new music in 2020. "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion," he said. "The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's is an essential part of any creative lifeblood." THE CULT's last collection of new material, "Hidden City", was released in February 2016 via Cooking Vinyl. The follow-up to 2012's "Choice Of Weapon" was written by Astbury and Duffy and was produced by Bob Rock, who has previously worked with METALLICA and MÖTLEY CRÜE. In early May, it was announced that THE CULT had inked a deal with Black Hill Records. THE CULT spent most of last year touring in celebration of the 30th anniversary of its "Sonic Temple" album. The LP catapulted THE CULT into superstar status and remains their most commercially successful release. It has sold over 1.5 million copies in the U.S. alone and was certified platinum in 1990. It made it to No. 10 on the Billboard charts, and several of the album's songs remain rock-radio staples to this day.
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