The Cult performs at The Warfield in San Francisco on Nov. 17, 2022. Nate McKinley/STAFF.

SAN FRANCISCO — As Ian Astbury, the iconic lead vocalist of the classic English rock band The Cult, left the stage at The Warfield Thursday night, he told the crowd “I want to do something really special for you when we come back.” True to his word, upon returning for the encore, Astbury led the band through “VENDETTA X,” a song from the band’s latest album, Under the Midnight Sun, that it had never before preformed live.

Astbury’s legendary voice, which combines the vibrato and power of Broadway belter Ethel Merman with the destructive urgency of a bandsaw, sliced through the band’s thunderous wall of sound for the entirety of the 90-minute performance. His voice was as full and rich as ever. Emerging at the beginning of the set in a fuzzy hat and long jacket, Astbury prowled the stage, often adding an enthusiastic tambourine or shakers to the sonic maelstrom. With a bank of powerful lights directed at the audience and augmented by elaborate color combinations that swirled on stage, the musicians appeared as dark, shadowy figures.

The Cult guitarist Billy Duffy, the other permanent member offered up a buffet of tasty guitar tones over the course of the evening. From the delay-soaked riffs that comprise the intro to “She Sells Sanctuary,” from 1985 album Love, to the stripped-down power chords of “Wild Flower,” from 1987’s Electric, to the sharply sinister slickness that propels “Mirror,” off the band’s latest, Duffy delivered it all with a rock and roll swagger, clad in denim and looking a bit like Ewan McGregor’s Obi Wan Kenobi after several additional years of “Trainspotting.”

The Cult performs at The Warfield in San Francisco on Nov. 17, 2022.

Astbury removed the fuzzy hat, revealing an elaborate scarf tied around his head, looking a bit like a cool, older aunt. The band played a spate of stripped-down songs from Electric in the middle of its set, including “Aphrodisiac Jacket” and “Lil’ Devil.” Duffy’s huge-sounding chords and stabs of silence evoked comparisons to AC/DC’s Angus Young.

The grizzled crowd, which — like this reporter — are likely surprised by the recent influx of AARP ads into our newsfeeds, cheered loudly for set closers “Rain” and “She Sells Sanctuary” before whipping out their phones and filming. During ballad “Edie (Ciao Baby),” off of 1989’s Sonic Temple, the crowd swayed and sang along.

At one point, Astbury informed the sound techs that he was having trouble with an echo in his in-ear monitors. At points, Astbury seemed to struggle with his timing and during the encore, he ripped his monitors out and handed them to a roadie.

The Cult performs at The Warfield in San Francisco on Nov. 17, 2022.

Between songs, Astbury expressed a fondness for the Bay Area, reminiscing about a show the band played at The I-Beam in 1984.

“San Francisco is my kind of town,” Astbury said, before asking, likely with the layoffs at Twitter, Meta and others on his mind, “Are there any tech bros in the house? “I feel sorry for you.”

Later in the show Astbury listed a number of Bay Area cities and San Francisco neighborhoods, concluding with a mention of the Tenderloin—”Where we used to cop back in the day,” he admitted.

King Woman performs at The Warfield in San Francisco on Nov. 17, 2022.

The show ended with a raucous rendition of “Love Removal Machine” from Electric. At the song’s conclusion, as Astbury introduced the band and said goodnight, someone threw a large black bra onto the stage.

“That’s the first one of those in over a decade,” Astbury said before walking off.

Earlier in the evening San Francisco’s King Woman delivered a powerful opening set of loud, moody rock and roll. Slipping musically between the shoegaze of My Bloody Valentine, the harmonic grit of The Savages and the overdriven theatric power of Jane’s Addiction, the sextet churned out a sonic maelstrom as tall and slender vocalist Kristina Esfandiari drew the crowd’s attention with her powerful stage presence.

Follow writer David Gill at Twitter.com/saxum_paternus. Follow photographer Nathan McKinley at Instagram.com/memories.by.mckinley.