June 2022 – The Cassandra Complex

June 30, 2022June 30, 2022

Reflections of Darkness rates our show at New Waves Day 9/10

THE CASSANDRA COMPLEX are an electro-gothic-industrial-cyberpunk outfit, with a new album out called ‘The Plague’ in May, which made it to number 1 in the German Alternative Charts. A difference of style now to the previous band, with first song ‘The Invisibles’ – a mix of harsher electronic beats with driving guitars. Fantastic lighting with additional LED stands, adding to the great onslaught of the band’s sound explosion. ‘Bad Faith’ stomped about magnificently, and frontman Rodney, already cheering the crowd while line-checking partly in German, partly in English, really enjoying his stage time, dancing around with abandon. He also gives a shout out to his band member Andy on guitar who couldn’t make it as he had become a dad that day, and introduces band members in a very tongue-in-cheek way.

Stand-out song ‘Old Boys Network’ got the crowd dancing and moving up to the back, no pause until the last song is announced. It is the quite punky and raw – ‘March’ – his first ever written song, the frontman lets us know. Overall it was an awesome and energetic show to remember!
Setlist: 01. The Invisibles / 02. Nightfall / 03. Hotline To Elvis / 04. Bad Faith / 05. Valis / 06. Ground / 07. The Crown Lies Heavy / 08. Old Boys Network / 09. Moscow Idaho / 10. March
Rating: 9 / 10

June 30, 2022June 30, 2022

Hotline to Elvis is Track of the Month at A Model of Control

UK reviews site A Model of Control has picked Hotline to Elvis as one of their Tracks of the Month.

Remarkably the first album from this long-running band for over twenty years, The Plague has turned out to be a hugely enjoyable, and varied album – much as CX have often been (and apologies for not featuring this in the past month or so, as I originally intended to!). A band that don’t really fit into the usual pigeonholes – Rodney Orpheus is happy dipping into industrial, goth, post-punk, darkwave and even lush balladry whenever he feels like it – and this album just rams that sonic wanderlust home. The lead track is for me the pick of the album, a full-throttle electro-rock track where Orpheus pokes fun at claims Elvis is still alive, while doing his own best impressions of The King at points. Who knew a phone number could be such a catchy hook? “1-900-909-ELVIS…”

/Tuesday Ten /495 /Tracks of the Month /Jun-22

June 28, 2022June 28, 2022

#1 again in the German Alternative Chart!

The Plague is yet again #1 this week in the German Alternative Chart! This makes 6 weeks in a row that we have been in the Top 3 position of the chart. Big thanks to all the fans, DJs, and journalists who have helped make this possible.

June 24, 2022June 24, 2022

NWD Review in Monkey Press

Great review of our show at New Waves Day from Monkey Press.

“The Cassandra Complex was much more electronic. The band came with a tailwind, as The Plague, the first album in 22 years, was released just a few weeks before the performance, which received good reviews and recently climbed to number two in the German alternative charts. [Actually it got to #1, but never mind 🙂 ]
Among other things, the title song and the anti-Boris Johnson and Donald Trump single The Crown Lies Heavy On Its King were also part of the setlist. Founder and singer Rodney Orpheus was a bit nervous, as he admitted in one of his interim announcements. The reason being that guitarist Andy Booth was about to give birth to a new generation – with the spontaneous replacement from the band’s environment, it was possible to rehearse exactly once.
However, the jump into cold water was successful. The anthemic Electro-Rock caused a lot of movement in front of the stage. The Northern Irishman Orpheus, who spent many years of his life in Aachen and Hamburg, among other places, apologized for his “not so good German”, only to talk a surprising amount in surprisingly good German between the songs. He was also the only musician who really communicated with the fans during the day – the other bands had almost constant silence between their songs.
We wish Rodney the best for this first regular Cassandra Complex concert since 2019 – and wish this likeable band more performance opportunities in the near future.”