New Order, Nick Cave and a ‘Til Tuesday reunion rock a rainy Cruel World Festival
As New Order and Nick Cave, Garbage and the Go-Go’s, and more bands with roots in the punk, new wave, and goth scenes of the ’80s thrilled fans at Cruel World Festival on Saturday, May 17, the overarching story of the day was how weird it was to watch your favorite bands in a steady rain.
Yes, rain — did it rain where you were in Southern California on Saturday? It didn’t in Pasadena, according to the weather apps for the festival’s location, but the proof fell down from the low clouds for several hours on the Rose Bowl to the amazement of bands and fans alike.
“I’m sorry we brought with us the British weather,” said singer Alison Moyet during her excellent set of solo material and songs from the duo Yaz.
“I can’t believe you people are standing in the rain to see us,” said singer Aimee Mann, as whose ’80s band ‘Til Tuesday reunited for its first gig in 35 years at Cruel World.
“It’s nice to be here in sunny L.A.,” joked Bernard Sumner, the singer-guitarist of headliners New Order, before apologizing if the wet weather had stowed away with them on their journey from Manchester, England.
Yet despite that small inconvenience, Cruel World went off with almost nary a hitch — Nick Cave might have slipped once while roaming the front of the stage to encounter with fans — and the performances, well, those were sublime, well-suited even to the mood of much of this music.
New Order, for instance, matches soaring synths and persistent rhythms to mostly melancholy lyrics, a balm for the bittersweet in life that everyone shares. “Every time I see you falling, I get down on my knees and pray,” Sumner sang, most of the crowd joining in, on “Bizarre Love Triangle.” “I’m waiting for that final moment, you say the words that I can’t say.”
Their 14-song headlining set matched a trio of songs from its earlier incarnation as Joy Division, with “Transmission” opening the performance and “Love Will Tear Us Apart” finishing it, with New Order faves including “Age of Consent,” “Blue Monday,” and “Temptation.”
The rain had stopped by the time Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds played what was essentially a co-headlining set before New Order, but Cave and his band created their own storm in a performance reminiscent of their 2013 Coachella set done amid a howling desert windstorm.
“Frogs” and “Wild God,” the title track from the band’s 2024 album, opened the set with a moody, gospel feel enhanced by a quartet of backing singers in glittering robes. Older songs including “Tupelo,” a quasi-religious retelling of the Elvis Presley story, and “Jubilee Street” followed.
Unlike his 2022 tour as a duo with longtime bandmate Warren Ellis, which delivered a more somber, subdued Cave, his Cruel World performance saw him in the mode of a wild man prophet, running to the edge of the stage to plead and urge for the audience’s attention as he delivered warnings (“Red Right Hand”) lessons (“The Weeping Song”), and redemption (an epic 10-minute version of “Hollywood,” the first time he’d ever played it with the full band.)
At times, when Cave’s music softened as during “Joy,” a song he joked they’d written “to really bum you out” — which it did — you could hear the Go-Go’s performing on the second stage at the opposite end of the festival grounds. We raced down to catch the end of their set once Cave finished and found a much larger crowd bopping to songs such as “Our Lips Are Sealed” and “We Got the Beat.”
The same contrast between dark and light played out earlier when Garbage took the main stage as Devo played the second stage. Devo had the larger crowd here, with fans in red flower pot hats — excuse me, energy domes — and a remarkable number of middle-aged men doing herky-jerky solo dance moves having a blast to tunes include “Girl U Want,” “Whip It,” and “Uncontrollable Urge.”
While that was happening, Garbage roared through its own performance, which included the hit “Only Happy When It Rains,” which, who knows, might have been the first time they’ve played that in Southern California on an actual rainy day.
Singer Shirley Manson was as engaging, funny and profane as always, getting emotional as she talked about growing up in Scotland in the ’70s when there were few Scottish rock bands to identify with and coming to Cruel World where such personal heroes as Nick Cave, New Order, Madness and more were on the same stage as Garbage.
The band’s new single, “There’s No Future in Optimism,” got its live debut at Cruel World — Garbage’s eighth studio album, “Let All That We Imagine Be the Light,” arrives on May 30 — with other standouts such as a dance-clubby arrangement of “Stupid Girl” and set-closer “Push It” also among the highlights.
Somewhat remarkable for a festival of bands formed mostly in the ’80s or early ’90s where how many of them still perform with their original lineups. Garbage, a younger band at 32, has had the same four members throughout. The Go-Go’s, who formed in 1978, have had different lineups over the years but currently have the classic lineup of five women who broke out to stardom in 1980.
The British ska and pop band Madness, meanwhile, still have all but one of the seven musicians who formed the band in Camden Town in 1976. Their long history together and deep catalogue of material made for one of the most entertaining sets of the day as the humor the band always had and the easy camaraderie shone through the gray skies on the aptly titled “Grey Day” and other hits including “House of Fun,” “Baggy Trousers,” “Our House,” and closer “Night Boat to Cairo.”
Singer Graham “Suggs” McPherson told stories between songs of the band’s origins and joked with his bandmates and the crowd, but saxophonist Lee Thompson stole the show as he upstaged his mates when during “My Girl” and “Grey Day” he stripped down to his black briefs, throwing his shoes into the audience, followed by his shorts and T shirt.
“For those of you who came to see the Chippendales you’re in luck,” McPherson joked as the show went on beside him.
‘Til Tuesday was the biggest surprise when Cruel World announced its lineup, given that singer Aimee Mann had left the new band she’d cofounded around 1990 to begin her solo career. But the festival had inquired about a reunion, and Mann, who lives in Los Angeles, agreed to come with original bandmates guitarist Robert Holmes, keyboardist Joey Pesce, and drummer Michael Hausman. (Her longtime solo band bassist Jon Brion also joined on Saturday.)
The set included songs from all three ‘Til Tuesday albums, opening with “Maybe Monday” and “Love In a Vacuum,” both of which have clear roots in ’80s new wave music, before segueing into other songs by the band such as “Rip in Heaven” and “Looking Over My Shoulder,” which revealed signs of the solo music she’d eventually create.
“The Other End (of the Telescope)” is a Mann-Elvis Costello song done for the band’s 1988 swansong album “Everything’s Different Now.” After mentioning how she’d once worked in a Boston record store frequented by Cars’ singer Ric Ocasek, and describing how the Cars were ‘Til Tuesday’s new wave heroes, the band covered the Cars’ “Drive.”
“We’re just checking how much time we have left,” Mann told the crowd a few songs from the end of the set. “We don’t want them to turn the stage around on us during the last song. [A rotating stage expedited set changeovers on Saturday.] Or maybe we do?”
The last song, of course, was ‘Til Tuesday’s biggest hit, “Voices Carry,” which Mann wryly introduced as “the song that made us recognizable in airports all across America.” It was and remains a terrific tune, played now in a lower key, but just as moving and beautiful as it was when Mann and the band were in heavy rotation on MTV in a video that included those glorious asymmetrical haircuts new bands always had.
And, speaking of rotations, ‘Til Tuesday did play “Voices Carry” until the stage had slow turned to take them backstage. It was perfect.