The Cambridge Dictionary (that’s the Online Advanced Learner’s edition for all you fact fans) defines ‘cult’ as ‘someone or something that has become very popular with a particular group of people’, and it’s hard to find a mention of American band Big Star without this word sneaking in.
What we generally take cult to mean is that the thing in question isn’t of much interest to the world in general, but thanks to a devoted bunch of obsessives, those who don’t know accept that it must be kind of cool.
Big Star are certainly that, and even if you haven’t heard them directly, you might have come across a cover by artists as varied as The Bangles and Elliott Smith or their song In The Street, used as the theme tune to That ‘70s Show (another cover by fellow 70s rockers Cheap Trick).
Even if you’ve missed all of that you’ll know about some of their supporters. Primal Scream’s Bobby Gillespie recently said “everybody in Primal Scream is a big fan of Big Star”, Wilco and Idlewild featured on a 2006 tribute album, and Teenage Fanclub practically are Big Star, but Scottish.
The reason for their cult status? Well, they made three critically acclaimed albums in the 1970s that nobody bought, original band member Chris Bell was tragically killed in a car accident in 1978, and, as we’ve seen, they’ve influenced more bands than class A drugs.
On top of that there’s the music, and the band’s back catalogue of sun-drenched, nostalgic pop songs is the real reason for tonight’s sell out crowd. The downside of the cult tag and its implied cool is that it attracts the kind of slack-jawed scenesters more at home in Shoreditch, but as Poison might say, every rose has its thorn.
Opening up is fellow resident of the cult files, Robyn Hitchcock, who takes a break from his very British psych pop to announce that this is an evening of the direction music could have gone in, but didn’t. He also claims that he is Carmen the great and his diet is blood roses, but hey, nobody’s perfect.
Big Star start their set with the aforementioned In the Street, as lead singer and writer Alex Chilton (who looks remarkably like Dr Sam Beckett from Quantum Leap) grins his way through the harmonies and hooks.
Chilton is one of only two original members including drummer Jody Stephens, but with sterling work from relative new boys Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow, Big Star are so slick you’d never guess they took a break for nearly 30 years.
At every chance fans call out for their favourite track, and all the hits including Thirteen and September Gurls get an airing, along with I Am The Cosmos from Chris Bell’s solo career. There’s even a bizarre Edward Elgar recital in honour of Chilton’s love of British music.
A closing selection of tracks from the 2005 comeback album is a little muted, but it hardly matters. It has been an evening with heroes for everyone here, and as Big Star return for an encore of The Beach Boys‘ Wouldn’t It be Nice, they’ve proved they deserve to transcend their cult status and take a place alongside the band they’re covering in the rock and roll hall of fame.