There were n’t a lot of concentrated sway bands like Living Colour in 1988 . Their booster cable vocalizer was into wear out neon Body Glove wetsuits . Their bad Top 20 pop single name - checked Joseph Stalin and Mahatma Gandhi . Their bass line could be as foul as their guitar riff were sound . And perhaps most jarring — at least to disc executives trying to sell this music to a mass hearing — they were bootleg .
“ One person [ at a recording label ] think I vocalize too much like Ben Vereen , ” Living Colour lead Isaac Merrit Singer Corey GlovertoldSPINin 2008 , referencing the fabled Black singer and level thespian who originated the office of Judas in the Broadway showJesus Christ Superstar . “ Or they say the Sung dynasty did n’t have hooks . But the bottom line was always : ‘ We do n’t eff how to market this . We do n’t know where to put this in a disk memory board . They ’ll put you in the R&B section because they ’ll see your face on the covering . ’ ”
Those recording label execs were awry . On the strength of the blistering “ Cult of Personality”—the song with those aforementioned historical book of facts — the radical ’s 1988 debut album , Vivid , reached No . 6 on the Billboard 200 and went two-fold platinum . Living Colour toured with The Rolling Stones andGuns N ’ Rosesand divulge jillion of impressionable teenagers to song about racism ( “ Funny Vibe ” ) , gentrification ( “ Open Letter [ To a Landlord ] ” ) , dependency ( “ Desperate masses ” ) , and other important way out . Living Colour also wrote plain - honest-to-god love songs . They were never one thing .
Nearly 40 years later , Living Colour are still rocking crowds and defying expectation , and for a variety of reasons — some related to professional wrestling , some tovideo games—“Cult of Personality ” remains extremely relevant . This is a rock’n’roll ‘ n ’ roll account unlike any other .
Made In Brooklyn
Living Colour is the inspiration of virtuoso guitarist Vernon Reid , who was born in the UK to West Indian parents then move to New York City as a young baby and grew up in Brooklyn . He credits his folks with exposing him to all form ofmusic — not just the hooey deemed “ Black music ” by track record companies and radio set programmers at the time of the band ’s rising .
“ It was very eclectic , ” Reidtold Red Bull Academyin 2014 of his musical fostering . “ And the good matter about my parents , they never said this is white music , and this is uncollectible euphony , and we do n’t listen to that kind of euphony . My parents never said that . My mom was really into British invasion bands like The Dave Clark Five . She literally had record of the Dave Clark Five and material like that . ”
Inspired by Carlos Santana andJimi Hendrix , Reid picked up the guitar as a teenager and eventually start out listening to genre - push jazz artists like Ornette Coleman and Sun Ra . These and other sonic voyagers became major influence , though Reid never kibosh whirl his James Brown and Kool & The Gang records . In the early’80s , Reid linked up with avant - garde nothingness drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson and join his fusion ring The Decoding Society .
In 1983 , after provide Jackson ’s crew , Reid forge Living Colour , in an attempt to get hitched with his various divergent influences . “ So punk was affecting me , the avant - garde was affect me , pop was touch me , all these things , and I wanted to find a way to pull it together — pulling all the various uncanny spaces in my head teacher together , ” Reid told Red Bull .
The undermentioned twelvemonth , Reid accompanied his sister to a company and heard a guy tattle “ Happy Birthday . ” The singer was Corey Glover , a multi - gifted Isaac M. Singer and actor from Crown Heights , Brooklyn , who had soaked up the various phone of his neighborhood . Glover narrate Reid , “ What I really want to do is sing in a rock band , ” and the two shortly joined forces . Drummer Will Calhoun and bassist Muzz Skillings rounded out the lineup , and the banding began playing around New York City .
Black Rock Coalition
Around the clip he mould Living Colour , Reid went to see Eye & I , a Modern group started by his bassist buddy Melvin Gibbs . Reid was perplexed and incensed to find nobody in the audience , and that precede him to call his friend Greg Tate , an influential music critic atThe Village Voice .
“ I just got all these people in the way , and I was like , ‘ Is it just me or is there something go on here ? ’Cause I just went to this fishgig , there was nobody there , nobody knew about it . I just wanted to ask you all , am I bugging ? ’ ” Reid say Red Bull .
From these conversations was deliver The Black Rock Coalition ( BRC ) . Tate indite amanifestothat includes the undermentioned dictum : “ The BRC embraces the total spectrum of Black music . The BRC pooh-pooh the arcane perceptions and bastardly demographics that take our appeal is circumscribed . The BRC rejects the need for disastrous artists to tailor their euphony to conform to into the originative straitjackets the industry has designed . ”
Reid became the organization ’s president , and as Tate recollect years after , the care generated by the BRC helped Living Colour civilise its fanbase .
“ The early audience for Living Colour was definitely a Black BRC interview , ” Tatesaid . “ And it really kept that band ’s name alive and inundated until things really start to happen for them , really even after the release of the book . ”
The BRC was n’t the only thing responsible for break Living Colour . Reid met Mick Jagger while theRolling Stonesfrontman was auditioning musicians for his 1987 solo albumPrimitive Cool , and while Reid ’s trial run was “ terrible ” in his own estimation , something secure came of the session . Jagger told Reid that he ’d heard good things about last Colour , and that he wanted to see them live . Not long after , Jagger accompany guitar god Jeff Beck and music journalist Kurt Loder to catch the band at CBGB , the iconic punk club where Living Colour were regulars .
Jagger loved what he discover and propose to get some demonstration for Living Colour . They recorded two song , “ Which Way to America ” and “ Glamour Boys , ” and that led to some major label interest . Living Colour wind up signing with Epic . In 1988 , they exhaust their debut album , Vivid , farm by Ed Stasium , whose credits includedRamonesandTalking Heads . The LP features Jagger ’s two demos , a Talking Heads cover ( “ Memories Can Wait ” ) , and a sure politically charged hard - rock anthem that would become Living Colour ’s touch song .
Cult of Personality
“ Cult of Personality ” get along together during a single striation rehearsal in Brooklyn . Glover sang a run of line , and when Reid tried to gibe him on guitar , he create a mammoth riff that reminded him of bothLed Zeppelinand the jazz - fusion group Mahavishnu Orchestra . The heavy lap demanded equally heavy language , and as luck would have it , Reid had already written something about world leader and their power to captivate followers . AsReid told Louderin 2016 , the strain is about “ celebrity , but on a political level . ”
“ It inquire what made us come these person who were larger than life yet still human beings , ” Reid said . “ away from their social grandness , Malcolm XandMartin Luther Kingboth face like matinee idols . That was a substantial part of why their messages connected . ”
The lyric mention Joseph Stalin , Benito Mussolini , John F. Kennedy , and Mahatma Gandhi — fourverydifferent gentleman’s gentleman with similar floor of charisma . ( Reid was originally going to name - checkAdolf Hitler , but he decided against it . ) The song samples speeches by Malcolm X , JFK , andFranklin D. Roosevelt , and the title take its name from a 1956 speech by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev .
It was scarce the stuff pop - receiving set dreams are made of , and yet “ Cult of Personality , ” which was released as the LP ’s second single , became a massive hit . The medicine video was all over MTV , and the single hit No . 13 on the Billboard Hot 100 . It also earned the group a Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance . The follow - up , “ Glamour Boys , ” all about shallow dudes who wear designer clothes and party their life aside , also cracked the Top 40 , andVividpeaked at No . 6 on the Billboard 200 .
“ There was a sure amount of , well , we arrived , ” Reid tell Red Bull . “ You know , it felt almost disembody , but of course we worked really severely for it to happen . It was cool , it was weird , it was hard , it was awesome , it was unknown . ”
Living On
live Colour did n’t fare quite as well with their 1990 soph LP , Time ’s Up , another sonically adventurous collection featuring guest spots from Little Richard and rappers Queen Latifah and Doug E. Fresh . It stalled at No . 31 and wangle only gilded sales , though Living Colour did pick up another Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance .
The following year , Living Colour joined Jane ’s Addiction , Siouxsie and the Banshees , Nine Inch Nails , and others on the first Lollapalooza tour , a signpost of the alt - rock era just take underway . Living Colour ’s third album , Stain , make it in 1993 , by which fourth dimension Doug Wimbish had replaced Muzz Skillings on sea bass . Interpersonal return were starting to take their bell , and the radical split up in 1995 .
They reunite in 2000 and have since released three studio apartment album : Collideøscope(2003),The Chain In The Doorway(2009 ) , andShade(2017 ) . The last of those — a “ deconstruction ” of the amobarbital sodium in the band ’s unique style — admit covers of Song dynasty by The Notorious B.I.G. , Robert Johnson , and Marvin Gaye .
As the band proceed touring and creating new music , “ Cult of Personality ” remains a part of popular acculturation . In 2004 , the song turn up on thesoundtrackfor the video gameGrand Theft Auto : San Andreas , and in 2007 , wannabe shredders wailed along to the song inGuitar Hero III : legend of Rock . It ’s since been used in various other games , includingShaun White SnowboardingandNBA 2K16 .
In 2011 , professional wrestler CM Punk used “ Cult of Personality ” as his entranceway music when he made his grand return to WWE’sMonday Night Rawafter a highly publicized contract bridge dispute . As a condition of re - sign with WWE , CM Punk insisted that the ship’s company bear to license the rail , as it was hisLittle League team songin 1989 .
“ wrestle is such a spectacle , and it ’s so ritualized , with these storyline and story about beneficial versus evil , ” Reidtold PopMatters . “ The whole narration of CM Punk taking on ‘ Cult of Personality ’ is a very moving story . We were talking one time , and he suppose , ‘ When I was playing Little League when I was 12 , “ Cult of Personality ” was our get - out - on - the - theatre music . ’ They won their championship that year , and that stayed with him . It ’s interesting to opine of the life of the song . ”
