Tue 26 November 2024 8:30pm

The Cassandra Complex

at The Facebar, Reading

Passed

This event has been and gone.

If we know of a trusted online shop with tickets available, we will always provide a link to buy from them

Add to your event list

Back in the mid-80s, Irish musician Rodney Orpheus bumped into Paul Dillon in a Leeds nightclub while both were dancing to an early Die Krupps record. They decided to form a band that night, and did their first rehearsal the next day. A journalist called Andy Booth came to interview them and ended up staying to play guitar. They built a studio, made a single called March, and the career of The Cassandra Complex began.

From the beginning the band were fascinated by drum machines, synthesisers, and computerised rhythms, but unlike most other bands of the time, they also wanted distorted guitars over the top. And so industrial rock music was born? When the band released their second single, Moscow Idaho in 1985, it quickly soared to the top of the indie charts all over the world, got played to death on alternative radio stations, and influenced an entire generation of bands to come. They followed the success of Moscow Idaho with a trilogy of classic albums: Grenade, Hello America, and many fans? all-time favorite, Theomania.

Rodney later moved to Hamburg and the band?s lineup changed. In came Juergen Jansen (later to join Project Pitchfork) who helped reinvent the band?s direction on the seminal concept album Cyberpunx; and Volker Zacharias, whom Rodney had met while producing his band Girls Under Glass. Volker soon became a lynchpin of the band?s sound on the band?s most romantic album The War Against Sleep, then the ultra-aggressive hard electro-rock that was Sex & Death, released in 1993, and the Wetware album, released in 2000.

A few years later original member Andy Booth rejoined the lineup, and with the addition of Axel Ermes on keyboards, the band started touring again, playing at festivals and clubs across Europe. In 2022 they released their latest studio album The Plague, which received rave reviews and reached #1 in the German Alternative Charts. They will be playing several shows throughout 2024.

Third House
Post punk greatness featuring David Barbarossa from Adam & The Ants/Bow Wow Wow

The Cassandra Complex

The darkwave unit The Cassandra Complex formed in 1980 with Rodney Orpheus and Paul Dillon, a musically inspired duo in search of playing big music events. Andrew Booth, who was formerly a journalist who interviewed The Cassandra Complex, was asked to join the group and The Cassandra Complex was officially a trio rearing the industrial-dance sounds laid underground during the early '80s. Throughout the '80s, the band was signed to the independent label, Rouska Records. Releasing a set of 12" singles, the Cassandra Complex became a familiar favorite among the goth rock crowd. As the mid-'90s approached, the Cassandra Complex moved to Hamburg, Germany and released a slew of classic releases: Theomania (1988), Satan, Bugs Bunny and Me (1989), Cyberpunx (1990), The War Against Sleep (1991), and Sex & Death (1994). Two years later, the band began working on Wetware, which was released in Fall 2000. After a few years hiatus pursuing other projects, Orpheus & Booth, with the addition of Hamburg musicians Volker Zacharias and Axel Ermes, started playing live concerts again, once more becoming a popular draw at festivals across Europe. In 2020 they released their first new studio single in 20 years The Crown Lies Heavy on the King, followed by their highly anticipated forthcoming new studio album The Plague, recorded during Covid lockdown.

See The Cassandra Complex tour dates