And how could I leave these gentlemen out; it just wouldn't be right. I saw Blue Oyster Cult once a year from 1979 to 1986, and enjoyed each and every one of those shows. They get dismissed out of hand, I think, by a lot of people. True, they only had two hits, Don't Fear the Reaper and Burnin' For You (and outside the odd Godzilla or Goin' Through the Motions, people might not have even HEARD any of their other songs); true, once you get to their sixth record, Mirrors, the overall quality of the albums starts to dip. True, by the time you hit Club Ninja, maybe their 10th album, you've got a giant steaming bowl of shit in front of you (I wouldn't say it if it wasn't true.) So, when I say that there is a lot to like about their first five albums, well, maybe you'll concede me the point.
And I spent a lot of time listening to these albums in high school. The first three are guitar and drum heavy and tell tales of women burying corpses in quicklime, folks engaged in a variety of dominant and/or submissive activities, drug deals gone wrong in the desert (more corpses, natch); there are titles such as Harvester of Eyes, Career of Evil, Hot Rails to Hell. You know, typical AM fodder. But with Agents of Fortune ("The Reaper Album") in 76 and Specters in 77 they started mixing things up a bit (I think the word is "maturity"), got a few more keyboards front and center, and turned out some very fine slower songs and outright pop ballads (though often with a kink in the lyrics, to be fair).
I could have gone with either Fireworks or Death Valley Nights from Specters, two of my absolute favorites; or with Revenge of Vera Gemini from Agents (with Patti Smith on guest vocals, she co-wrote; this one has my favorite Cult lyric "you have slipped from beneath me/like a false and nervous squid"). However, Debbie Denise is the one I always come back to, the final song on Agents, a song that had a huge emotional impact on me as a kid (and with another Patti Smith co-writing credit, she was girlfriend to Alan Lanier, the Cult's keyboard player, in the early 70s). I thought it was beautiful and sad in high school; I listen now and see no reason to change that assessment...
I could have gone with either Fireworks or Death Valley Nights from Specters, two of my absolute favorites; or with Revenge of Vera Gemini from Agents (with Patti Smith on guest vocals, she co-wrote; this one has my favorite Cult lyric "you have slipped from beneath me/like a false and nervous squid"). However, Debbie Denise is the one I always come back to, the final song on Agents, a song that had a huge emotional impact on me as a kid (and with another Patti Smith co-writing credit, she was girlfriend to Alan Lanier, the Cult's keyboard player, in the early 70s). I thought it was beautiful and sad in high school; I listen now and see no reason to change that assessment...
From 1977 through 1982 I attended more than a dozen Cult concerts- I've yet to see any band more than I did those guys back then. Debbie Denise was the one track off of Agents I could never warm to, in fact I think it's the one clunker on an otherwise magnificent album. Go figure. Those first 4 albums are so underrated- especially Secret Treaties- one of the few albums I listened to in high school that still gives me much pleasure.
ReplyDeleteI have to differ with you though in that I thought the decline began with Spectres, which for every good song (The Golden Age of Leather) there seemed to be a shitty one (R U Ready to Rock).
I also liked parts of Cultosaurus Erectus, though the bloat was really starting to show in that one. I know a guy around our age who still never misses them and speaks highly of their recent material, but I just don't hear it in the one or two albums since the heyday which I've tried to listen to. Just the idea of seeing them now makes me feel sad.
Now I'm going to go listen to Agents.
Let's see, where shall I start -
ReplyDeleteFirst, I'd forgotten about RU Ready to Rock, which is awful. So I'll have to say that, on the basis of that song alone, the decline started on Specters...
Seeing them live, definitely at Long Beach Arena a time or two; at the Sports Arena; at Perkins' Palace in Pasadena with the Soft White Underbelly name in place; some festival somewhere (Rose Bowl?). Oh, the FIRST time I saw them was the Mirrors tour at UCLA...
On Debbie Denise - what are you gonna do? I think it's a great album; when I was younger, I thought Tenderloin and Morning Final were the weak links. I don't think that now (I'm of the "no weak links" school there.) Also how good is True Confessions...?
Parts of Erectus, absolutely; thought I can't think of one song off of it now. I always thought Shooting Shark was pretty fantastic and atypical. Maybe on Revolution by Night?
I went to the Long Beach shows, the Mirrors gig at Pauley, at least one @ the Forum, where Be Bop Deluxe and the god-awful Angel were the openers. I think the Rose Bowl show was actually Anaheim Stadium or the Colosseum. We also took road trips to see them at a Day on the Green in Oakland and a big show in San Diego with Cheap Trick and UFO. We painted a big Cult symbol on my car for the ride.
ReplyDeleteI missed that gig at Perkins Palace, but we did see a SWU show at the Starwood once, which was pretty great.
I've always like the melody of True Confessions (and the line "I lied"), but is one of the weaker tracks. Tenderloin and Morning Final are favorites of mine- always have been.
Still, I think their best song is probably ME 262
Yes, at Pauley Pavilion - exactly. We were in the same building at the same time. The Long Beach tour would have been Cultosaurus Erectus. At Pauley, I want to say Pat Travers opened and also, possibly, Cindy Bullens (sp?)? Also at Pauley I saw Pretenders about three months before Honeyman-Scott died. As for the Cult in Long Beach, the openers escape me completely...
ReplyDeleteOff Agents, Vera Gemini is my favorite, I think. In fact, it might be my all-time favorite, I'm not sure.
You know, a few years ago I was in NYC at the Whitney Museum for one of the Biennials, and there was a piece of art that referenced Vera Gemini, though it was part of a larger group of objects and I couldn't figure out which piece was the piece in question...
In True Confessions the line I always liked was "perfect as strangers/imperfect as love"...
Always liked UFO...
Also, I was looking at some old Be Bop Deluxe footage JUST LAST NIGHT, coincidentally. Now that I've finished the 30 in 30, I still want to post about songs on occasion because I'm really enjoying that, and I wanted to talk about Be Bop Deluxe among others. So I may try to do a couple of those a week.
I saw Angel at some point, too, as part of a group show...
Be Bop Deluxe was a very good band- too interesting to be more than marginally popular. I still listen to Modern Music frequently.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I ever managed to see the Pretenders, which is too bad. I always thought UFO was a great hard rock band, though one without much personality, which I why I think they weren't more successful.
I would imagine at this point we say more than a few of the same shows.
I hope you do keep posting about more songs. This has been quite fun for me.
I will post more songs, yes. I'm interested in trying to figure out if Roxy Music influenced Be Bop Deluxe or vice versa. But it appears to me they BOTH influence David Byrne in a big way just LOOKING at Ferry and (fill in the blank of BBD singer)...
ReplyDelete