Best Blue Öyster Cult Album

didn't know Jim Carroll wrote the lyrics for "Perfect Water" off Club Ninja! they had the weirdest cast of characters writing lyrics for them: Meltzer, Patti Smith, Michael Moorcock, Jim Carroll, etc...also recently some "cyberpunk author" I hadn't heard of (wrote for Curse and Heaven Forbid)

Aero - there are some gems on Curse I think! esp Pocket and Live for Me

dang, ums. just read carroll's "perfect water" lyrics, and they're a hell of a lot better than i thought they were when i was trying to sort them out on my own. guess i'll have to give that one another try, because it was really only the lyrics that were bugging me (i was hearing them as some kind of overly concerned eco-plea).

oh ok jeez i guess the "cyberpunk" author i mentioned is named John Shirley and is pretty well regarded (most famous for writing The Crow but I guess a big influence on William Gibson?)

Shirley's cyberpunk novels are City Come A-Walkin and the A Song Called Youth trilogy. Avant-slipstream critic Larry McCaffery called him "a postmodern Edgar Allen Poe."[2] Bruce Sterling has cited Shirley's early story collection Heatseeker as being a seminal cyberpunk work in itself. Several stories in Heatseeker were particularly seminal, including Sleepwalkers, which, in just one example, probably provided the inspiration for William Gibson's "meat puppets" in Neuromancer. Gibson acknowledged Shirley's influence in an introduction to Shirley's City Come A-Walkin. Shirley's story collection, made up of increasingly bizarre stories, the whimsically titled Really, Really, Really, Really Weird Stories has developed a cult status.

William Gibson, the author of Neuromancer, collaborated with Shirley on short stories—as did fellow cyberpunks Bruce Sterling and Rudy Rucker. Shirley's lyricism, wealth of ideas and imagination, crossover pioneering, and street-level honesty have been praised by other writers including Clive Barker, Peter Straub, Roger Zelazny, Marc Laidlaw, and A. A. Attanasio. His more surreal work, as in A Splendid Chaos showed how it was possible to describe the indescribable with a paradoxical believability and impeccable internal logic no matter how bizarre the subject matter. Shirley's personal experiences as a recovering drug addict and punk rocker brought real verisimilitude to his darker, urban-tinctured writing.

okay, song's half-decent now that i've gotten over my objection to my misinterpretation of lyrics. not great, long and rather 80s AOR bland, but it's clearly BOC, both in theme and sound. club ninja consists of five proper BOC tunes propped up with four oddball outliers by outside songwriters (counting "perfect water" as one of the propers cuz roeser wrote the music and jim's clearly working in the mythos). sad part is the ringers are generally more musically memorable.

"urban tinctured"

shirley's first novel, from '79, is called transmaniacon. never read it, but full circle lol. remember digging his short stories in mags like F&SF and IASFM during the early-mid 80s.

While I'm thinking about it, all BOC addicts should check out DENIAL OF DEATH by Brain Surgeons (Albert Bouchard, his wife at the time, and the lead guitarist from the Dictators). Came out in 2007 or so. It scratches some of that early 80s subversive MOR BOC itch.

cool will investigate?

jon do you know Buck's solo album from 82? allmusic review is pretty negative, but it's a pretty old review and not super informative

No I've never heard it. I'd like to. His BOC songs are pretty ace on Fire Of Unknown Origin.

turns out the Buck album in on spotify...so far...eh...nothing amazing, very AOR/MOR Aldo Nova type style, Mirrors would be the closest equivalent in BOC terms, but yeah the first song is really corny, so far 2nd one is only marginally better

hey guys

i finished my BOC Spotify Playlist last night!

The Playlist of 1,000 Psychic Wars:

http://open.spotify.com/user/matthelgeson/playlist/46Ccxmnl1IErLlsdE0C3hM

just FYI, Imaginos isn't on Spotify so no tracks off that, but every other album

\Blue Oyster Cult – Hot Rails To Hell
Blue Oyster Cult – Burnin' For You
Blue Oyster Cult – Transmaniacon MC
Blue Oyster Cult – ME 262
Blue Oyster Cult – I Love The Night
Blue Oyster Cult – (Then Came The) Last Of May - Live Version
Blue Oyster Cult – The Red & The Black
Blue Oyster Cult – Dominance And Submission
Blue Oyster Cult – Joan Crawford
Blue Oyster Cult – Cities On Flame With Rock And Roll
Blue Oyster Cult – Veins
Blue Oyster Cult – She's As Beautiful As A Foot
Blue Oyster Cult – Morning Final
Blue Oyster Cult – 7 Screaming Diz-Busters
Blue Oyster Cult – Godzilla - Live
Blue Oyster Cult – Pocket
Blue Oyster Cult – Wings Wetted Down
Blue Oyster Cult – Flaming Telepaths
Blue Oyster Cult – Buck's Boogie - Live Version
Blue Oyster Cult – Celestial The Queen
Blue Oyster Cult – (Don't Fear) The Reaper
Blue Oyster Cult – Career Of Evil
Blue Oyster Cult – Kick Out The Jams - Live
Blue Oyster Cult – Unknown Tongue
Blue Oyster Cult – O.D.'d On Life Itself
Blue Oyster Cult – Monsters
Blue Oyster Cult – In Thee
Blue Oyster Cult – Dancin' In The Ruins
Blue Oyster Cult – The Subhuman - Live Version
Blue Oyster Cult – Harvest Moon
Blue Oyster Cult – Ginger Snaps - Original
Blue Oyster Cult – This Ain't The Summer Of Love
Blue Oyster Cult – Death Valley Nights
Blue Oyster Cult – Shooting Shark
Blue Oyster Cult – Veteran Of The Psychic Wars
Blue Oyster Cult – Live For Me
Blue Oyster Cult – Teen Archer
Blue Oyster Cult – Perfect Water
Blue Oyster Cult – Golden Age Of Leather
Blue Oyster Cult – Black Blade
Blue Oyster Cult – Tenderloin
Blue Oyster Cult – I Just Like To Be Bad
Blue Oyster Cult – Madness To The Method
Blue Oyster Cult – Lips In The Hills
Blue Oyster Cult – E.T.I. (Extra Terrestrial Intelligence)
Blue Oyster Cult – Deadline
Blue Oyster Cult – Astronomy

Very very nice work there!

Fkin righteous, M@tt! Now I have to figure out how to use Spotify...

should be easy i think you just download the app now and get up and running

not sure if anything from Imaginos would have made the list anyway but i was kinda sad it wasn't on...just you know, if you're going to listen to Revolution By Night and Mirrors and Some Enchanted Evening like 3 times through to make a dumb list you might as well listen to Imaginos

One thing I learned about doing this:

Blue Oyster Cult might not be the best band of all time. But...they are capable of doing pretty much anything a great band can do, so remarkably diverse and skilled and talented.

Also, they are the weirdest fucking band ever.

like their evolution from a proggy mash-up of the Doors and Steppenwolf to a gleaming, sinister AOR pop rock band is just odd on so many levels

more fire clown garbage.

funnier than "more cowbell" A+

Off Imaginos... maybe "Del Rio's Song". Or "Siege and Investiture..." for LOLs. But yeah no big loss.

I do want to advocate for a couple of the bonus tracks from the Columbia/Legacy remasters-- namely "Boorman The Chauffeur" off Secret Treaties and "Please Hold" off Spectres.

Also, they are the weirdest fucking band ever.

OTM x 100,000. They stay in the mind and are infinitely chewable because they cannot ever be fully digested.

never got "boorman the chauffeur". it's just "boris the spider" with different lyrics, right? among the spectres bonus tracks, i do love "the night flyer". mentioned it a ways upthread.

Yeah, "Night Flyer" is sweet too. Goddammit if they never finish the remaster series. I want Cultosaurus and Unknown Origin outtakes!

HOLY SHIT

http://www.concertposterstore.com/inc/sdetail/224/259

the original Mahavishnu lineup + Clarence White Byrds + BOC

fucking A

found out about this in this interview with Bloom from the 90s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Onwq8cVNiI4&feature=related

says Mahavishnu blew them off the stage every night

also he talks about a new album forthcoming in 92!!! heaven forbid wasn't until 98...hmmm

oops

http://o.b5z.net/i/u/10023017/i/byrdsbluetc.jpg

Jesus!

M@tt and contendo let's get one of those british dad rock mags like Uncut or w/e to commission a long BOC article from us so we can go KIW Eric, Buck and Allen for a few days.

god that would be amazing

btw i've been googling and googling and i CANNOT find an interview with sandy pearlman re: BOC at all

I may have told this story here before (on a different thread), so I apologize for the repetition.

A few years ago, a guy came into my workplace and noticed my Clash t-shirt. He said, "Hey, you know their record Give 'Em Enough Rope? My partner produced that." I said, "You know Sandy Pearlman?" "Yep, we used to work together; we did a lot of the Blue Oyster Cult stuff." Realizing that I was talking to Murr4y Krugm4nn -- and thinking of a particular song he co-produced -- I said, "So...you worked on 'Don't Fear The Reaper'..." That was all I had to say. He looked down, sighed, and said, "Yeah...yeah. I think I'm the only person on earth who doesn't think that sketch is funny."

That is so awesome

lol, yeah, i've read that somewhere else, but it's great. and hell yeah, xps. :D

i CANNOT find an interview with sandy pearlman re: BOC at all

yeah, this is disappointing. appears to be some stuff archived @ rock's back pages, but i'm not a member.

^ 3 yeahs

= the Beatles.

namely "Boorman The Chauffeur" off Secret Treaties

^great tune

Just went on Martin Popoff's site and was delighted to find he offers a bunch of his books, including Blue Oyster Cult: Secrets Revealed, as $9 ebooks. I've been putting off buying the book for a long time 'cause of its 30-40 dollar price tag. Also seems he expanded it in 2009.

It purportedly has at least a little bit of Pearlman interview, along with the other folks you'd expect.

Just found some inane Pealman interview on youtube, some eejit interviewer goes on and on about the SNL sketch, can't even face linking it but search his name and you'll find it.

wau Pearlman was the founding VP of eMusic?

He was also Sabbath's manager for a short amount of time in the Dio era.

Yeah that stupid sketch makes it even harder to find good info on an already under reported band, watched that one matt 2 was talking abt

A steadfast young bro goes through the discography track by track. Many quotables. I like him, he's got heart:

http://www.hotrails.co.uk/blueskybag/features/jacobkoehler/index.htm

holy crap that's a lot of cultwork. impressive, though a bit overwhelming.

Check out the intricate detail on the skull; it looks as if it is saying "Yes young man....come and follow me to worlds unknown...". I took the ride and have not regretted it one bit.

Otm

I love that guy. His favorite BOC album is "Tyranny..." which is the right answer. Plus he looks like early '70s Joe Bouchard.

Yeah I'm sad he quit before doing the whole catalog :(

picked up a really nice copy of On Your Feet Or On Your Knees on saturday for $5! :)

i honestly don't have a desire to listen to any other music right now

On Your Feet would be a good candidate for those remastering jobs they were doing a few years back.

this vinyl pressing sounds pretty great, so much better than what i was listening to on computer

yeah, OYFOOYK is great. one of the last cult albums i got around to, as i'd heard from someone that it wasn't all that great. lies! better than the album versions in some cases ("harvester of eyes" <3). always struck by the super-sharp division in sound between the tracks off the first and third albums and the T&M tracks. makes sense that studio albums might have a different vibe, but they almost sound like a different band on "hot rails to hell" and "the red & the black".