BD : Yeah , yeah — I understand . And I lived through that in the UK , and it was easier to do in Britain because , as you know , you can fit Britain three times in

of car your parents are gonna buy you when you ’ re 16 . You know what I mean ? So it ’ s not a judgment thing . I just believe I ’ ve come to understand it , having lived through it all , that ’ s all . It meant different things to different people . And it burned out really quickly anyway in the UK , but it was ironic that the Pistols ’ last tour was ‘ round the States . But that was a common feature . And Mike Peters was in punk bands when he started , and we ’ ve been through that punk thing together . But I think in England , if you look at the bands who formed around ’ 79 , ’ 80 , a lot of them were like , “ Yeah , great — I saw the Pistols , saw The Damned , saw the Banshees , loved all that , but what are WE gonna do ?

Billy Duffy

California . It ’ s geographically small , so things happen really quickly . If a thing becomes ‘ A Thing ’ in the UK , it ’ s quick , immediate . All you have to do is go on one national TV show . Whereas in the States , things developed more regionally and slowly because America is essentially a continent . So there were actually real , pragmatic , boring reasons why . And secondly , in general , Britain in the ‘ 70s was an economic train wreck , so there was a lot of disaffected , unemployable youth like myself . And at that time , I know America had the oil crisis and this and that , but in essence , it looked a bit more of an affluent country . So it ’ s a little bit more difficult to be angry and annoyed if the worst thing you ’ ve got to complain about is what kind

What ’ s MY new band gonna do ? Because I ain ’ t gonna sound like that !” And that ’ s when people started exploring , with all sorts of things — haircuts , guitars , effects , sounds .

IE : Where and how did you first meet Mike ? And what was your first impression ? BD : Well , that ’ s a really good question , because I know I had run into some members of The Alarm in London in the ’ 80s when both our bands were doing well , but we never played together . The Cult went down more of a heavier rock path , so the gigs we were doing weren ’ t the same as what The Alarm was doing — they went down a more folky U2-Neil Young kind of

road , so our paths didn ’ t cross in terms of gigs . And in the UK , we ’ d all do our own gigs anyway because the bands were big enough . So I ran into Mike in the ‘ 90s . Cut to : ’ 95 , The Cult are broken up , I don ’ t know what to do with myself , because we split up while touring and just left the band , and I was left hanging , so I went back to England . And in ’ 95 , ’ 96 in England , I kept running into Mike Peters at all these rock festivals , where you would go and see all these exciting bands coming up , such as Oasis , The Verve , Supergrass , The Charlatans , The Inspiral

Carpets . There were dozens of ‘ em . And I was from Manchester . I hadn ’ t lived there in a while , but my family were there and are still there , and I ’ m still connected in a lot of ways to Manchester . But there was all this exciting new music , and there were alot of festivals , and there was kind of a new government coming in England in ’ 97 — there was like a change and a freshness , and it just seemed to be a cool place to be . And I just was gravitating there . I ’ d done several years of pretty much living in the States , and it just seemed like an organic , normal thing to do for me - to ‘ return

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