As a part of their debut album, Get Fucked, Sinner!, Cult Therapy blazes into the alternative rock scene with their debut single, "Therapy & Drugs”. This debut is a powerhouse of catharsis and connection for anyone who has experienced religious trauma, loss, or finding out who they are through recovering from life’s curveballs.
With a 90’s-inspired sound reminiscent of The Toadies and Weezer, "Therapy & Drugs” speaks to the listener about the dissonance of our self-talk and other methods of coping versus the reality of our mental states that is present in so many of us as we heal from trauma, pain, and sorrow.
In the larger themes of recovering from religious trauma found in their upcoming debut album, I found a familiar feeling listening to “Drugs & Therapy” as I had to learn who I was without the “rules” that my religious upbringing had ingrained on me in my everyday life from such an early age. When I left, I had to reframe who and what I was, and develop the coping skills that I had to learn along with that - especially surrounding death and loss. "Therapy & Drugs” spoke to me as I remembered that time in my life, as I struggled with a death in the family and how conflicted I felt about the finality of their death without the religion’s teachings of what happens after death.
Even though I had friends and family surrounding me, supporting me, and giving me anything and everything I needed to cope, I wasn’t really okay - which is a feeling that is expressed in the chorus in “I got people giving me hugs”. But for my family’s sake, I had to tell myself that I was and maybe even convinced myself sometimes that I was because I was in therapy and doing all of the “right” things to heal.
It’s evident that Jason Duncan, lead singer of Cult Therapy, is no stranger to loss, and I think that this single encapsulates the feeling of putting on that happy face for others in a way that we all know too well. If these feelings also resonate with you, you’ll find yourself listening to this track over and over again.
