The band continued to churn out high quality material with their third album "Secret Treaties". "Tyranny and Mutation" is probably their hardest rocking record, and just like most of their other '70s albums one of their best.īlue Öyster Cult - "Secret Treaties" (CBS 1974) The more upbeat and quirky "Teen Archer" is also of prime quality, while the closer "Mistress of the Salmon Salt (Qucklime Girl)" shows Blue Öyster Cult's typical thing of combining heavy riffs with a melodic chorus. "Baby Ice Dog" has weirdly muted solos among loud heavy bouncing riffs and a main melody quite typical of Blue Öyster Cult. The doomy and atmospheric "Wings Wetted Down" reveals their melodic qualities very well. The "red side" is a bit slower and less frenetic, but without loosing any of the energy and power. "O.D.'d on Life Itself" has a surprisingly basic blues riff combined with a poppy chorus. The same goes for "Hot Rails to Hell" and the epic "7 Screaming Diz-Busters" that borders on heavy prog. Here the excellent riff finally comes to its full right, and the song stands as one of Blue Öyster Cult's definitive classics. The opening song "The Red and the Black" was a rewritten and STRONGLY improved version of "I'm on the Lamb But I Ain't No Sheep" from the debut. The first side of it was called "The Black" and the second one "The Red" (Queen would use the same idea for their second album a year later). The second album was a heavier and better-produced effort than the debut. With this album, Blue Öyster Cult gave themselves a promising and solid start.īlue Öyster Cult - "Tyranny and Mutation" (CBS 1973) The two guitarists Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser and Eric Bloom were often seen as the main musicians in the group, but the Bouchard brothers and Allen Lanier also made very important contributions to the band. "Stairway to the Stars" speeds along with a fast riff and a catchy chorus that has made it a favourite on stage ever since, while "Redeemed" was an example of the lighter and more pop-oriented songs that they always would have one or two of on each album. But the heaviest and best known song on the album is "Cities on Flame With Rock & Roll" that borrows the riff from Black Sabbath's "The Wizard". The band's melodic sense and sophistication can best be heard on ""Before the Kiss, a Redcap", the two sinister songs "She's Beautiful as a Foot" and "Screams" and the ballad "Then Came the Last Days of May". Despite a weak and muffled production, their self-titled debut did a pretty good job of presenting all these ingredients. They combined a sense for great melodies and heavy riffs with ease, and their lyrics dealt with everything from mysticism, occultism and sci-fi to macabre love stories of the morbid kind. Instead of playing the generic, bluesy and tiresome boogie rock that characterized too many other American hard rock bands, Blue Öyster Cult developed an intelligent style of their own. Blue Öyster Cult - "Blue Öyster Cult" (CBS 1972)īlue Öyster Cult was undoubtedly the best and most sophisticated hard rock band to come from America in the '70s.
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