Blue Oyster Cult. Where Did You Come in?

I must confess, it's a hard read. But at the same time, obviously a brilliant read. I hope I get in the right mood to painstakingly follow along, because he clearly cares enough about them to expend a lot of brain power expressing his high hopes and the equally high level at which they were dashed.

 

I've read somewhere that Debbie Denise was a dog. Makes sense at times, at other times not.

 

Agents of Fortune.

 

True. The track listing is the most useful bit!

 

I can totally see why Mirrors would have been a total turnoff at the time, and its low ratings were why it was the last BOC album I eventually got, but I like it quite a bit. It's something a little different for when I want something lighter and catchier from the band. I always say that Lonely Teardrops is their one yacht rock song, hehe.

 

Interesting. I can see how that might've been a source of initial inspiration for a song like that.. but, as the art of songwriting goes (and certainly in this case if what you read is true) , ideas develop and are transmogrified in the process. A song like Debbie Denise is better served lyrically with a story not just of longing for a bond of companionship but of unrequited love and uneven loyalty. I dawns on me now just how stirring the words are without being overly impassioned.
Great song.

 

Agents of Fortune was my first BOC album, received from Columbia House mail order in 1976. Next I taped a friends Spectres album. When Some Enchanted Evening was released, that became my favorite BOC and ztill is today.

I saw BOC live at a Day on the Green jn Oakland Colisseum, 1978. I was pretty close to Eric Bloom's side of the stage. I thought BOC was the best band that day, better than I expected. The other bands were Cheap Trick, AC/DC, Journey and Ted Nugent. Ted was the headliner, and BOC payed right before Ted.

Those open seat stadium shows, no seats on the field, were a lot of fun for a teenager back in those days...a lot of stuff going on that would not be allowed now.

 

I get why some people don't like it, but its my favorite BOC album. Every track on that record holds a special moment in time for me.

 

Thanks for this. Will read in full when I get time.

 

Moon Crazy is a wickedly tasty little number.

 

It does have a few songs that are hard passes for me, but I love The Great Sun Jester and The Vigil, and really like In Thee, Mirrors and the aforementioned Lonely Teardrops.

 

A better question would be where did you jump off. I came in at the first album, jumped out after Fire If Unknown Origin, and jumped back in for Heaven Forbid and Curse Of The Hidden Mirror.

 

Secret Treaties. In ‘75.

 

They went 14 years without an album of completely new material, between Club Ninja and Heaven Forbid. Imaginos tided us over a bit, but you know that this wasn't quite an all-in BOC production.

I was so desperate that I was even thankful for the Bad Channels soundtrack in 1992, and its 2 new songs, weak though they were, and their instrumental stuff on it.

 

I jumped in at the beginning, they came through town and i went to nearly every show that came through back then. It was a great show and was a standout along with ZZTop among all the shows I saw in town that year. I saw them a couple more times in the period of the first four albums and got off the train after Spectres. I still listen to the first three occasionally. I did give heaven Forbid a listen recently and it's pretty good.

 

Mirrors... then caught them on the Cultosaurus Erectus tour and the Fire of Unknown origin tour. Funny, as soon as I got Mirrors I immediately bought Agents of Fortune then quickly bought everything else. Revolution By Night is still my cutoff album for them but I do own Imaginos.

 

Me too. I heard Tyranny and Mutation when it was first released, don't recall the year but remember how different it was from anything else.

 

Pearlman was great at creating a whole mystique around the band at the very beginning. All that sci-fi,the high concept lyrics about who knows what, all the references to sex and drug use and violence, it was all very pre punk (especially the first 2 albums) and a lot of that came from Pearlman. Of course, without that amazing band who knew how to blend psych/60's punk/heavy noise and San Fran acid guitar it would have amounted to nothing.

 

Metallica do a great acoustic cover version of Veteran Of The Psychic Wars on their new album

 

Of course, one could argue that the whole concept of the band was in place by the time Stalk Forrest Group recorded and Pearlman just helped give it polish, especially when you hear a song like "Arthur Comics" which sounds like an outtake from the first album. I mean, what the hell is the "mustard disaster"?

 

Being that I got into them in the 90's, I never jumped off. I loved Heaven Forbid when that came out and still consider it one of their best five records, and I even listened a ton to Curse... when that came out even though that album is pretty inconsistent. Stone of Love is one of my favorite BOC jams, for sure, though.

 

...and now, 18 years after Curse of the Hidden Mirror, Buck announced they'll have a new album out by the end of the year!

 

Heard their tunes over the radio for years but my first purchase was the excellent Cult Classic re-records, sometime in the mid 90s.

 

I was about to share the same review. Cope's Album of the Month reviews are a fantastic read. They made me re-evaluate several bands whom I had dismissed for their latter day crimes (Alice Cooper, Van Halen, BOC, Bob Seger, Kiss). Not to mention a glorious overview of the rock n roll underground both past & present.

 

Same here saw them first on Black And Blue tour