It’s been eons since far-out classics like “E.T.I. (Extra Terrestrial Intelligence),” but Blue Öyster Cult are still enveloped in the sci-fi dream. At 79, singer and multi-instrumentalist Eric Bloom still plays video games every day. “I’m playing ‘Diablo Immortal,’ ‘Nexus War’ and ‘Return of Shadow,'” he reports over Zoom, at home in Florida, with wall art of Saturnian rings and moons swirling overhead.
Later on, Bloom remembers Allen Lanier, their founding guitarist who passed in 2013, at age 67. “He was probably the brightest guy in Blue Öyster Cult intellect-wise,” Bloom says of his late friend. “He always had a book.” BÖC’s been irresistibly brainy from the jump; they got saddled with the “heavy metal” genre tag, but that never made that style of music, nor fit that macho archetype.
So are the nuances of this cult classic rock band. If you only know the ever-spellbinding “Don’t Fear the Reaper” and cowbell jokes — well, you have a lifetime of entertainment ahead of you. Happily, the band is still forging ahead at full capacity. Their last album of new material, 2020’s The Symbol Remains, was excellent and one of their most consistent. (And, no, that’s not graded on a legacy-act curve.)
Now, they’ve followed it up with Ghost Stories — an album of songs of yore whose recordings were never finished, until now. “It’s for the hardcore BÖC fan,” Bloom admits of this collection of tunes, which could have ended up on 1979’s Mirrors or 1983’s The Revölution by Night if things went in a different direction. (The limit of how much audio could fit on an LP, or cassette, was one factor.) But tracks like “Late Night Street Fight” and “So Supernatural” could make you one.
When you visit BÖC’s homepage, you’re greeted with an emblazoned “On Tour Forever!” — and not for nothing. In a 100+ show-per-year touring schedule that would flatten many bands half their age, Bloom and brother in arms Donald Roeser — that’s Buck Dharma to you and me — carry the flame throughout the small theaters, state fairs and casino resorts of America.
Dharma’s the only original member of the band, back when they were Soft White Underbelly — a paraphrasal of a Winston Churchill comment about Italy’s role in World War II, by their manager, in-house poet and overall impresario, Sandy Pearlman. On Christmas Day, 1968, Bloom moved into the band house in Great Neck on Long Island, as their tour manager. The next year, he was their vocalist.
In 1971, they became Blue Öyster Cult, named from a Pearlman poem about a conspiracy of aliens taking over the world. (To get a handle on the lore, just read the lyrics to their 1988 album Imaginos, all drawn from Pearlman’s bonkers poems and scripts.) And aside from one brief breakup during a rough ’80s, they’ve been powering ahead ever since.
“We’re not dead yet,” Bloom deadpans from behind wraparound shades. But they’re still telling Ghost Stories.
*Eric Bloom performing with Blue Öyster Cult in 1978. Photo: Ed Perlstein/Redferns/Getty Images*
The Symbol Remains did so well that their label, Frontiers Music out of Italy, chomped at the bit for more output. However, they couldn’t make a new album at that juncture; the road dogs had to be on tour. Eventually, the idea came about to return to unfinished material from 1978 to 1983, de-mix them, remix them and complete them.
As the equally boyish and soft-spoken Dharma explains, the Ghost Stories multitracks weren’t recorded in a proper studio, but in a rehearsal hall to eight-track tape. They got the tapes from their original audio engineer, George Geranios, who baked the tapes and, in effect, “pre-produced” the record (Bloom says with air quotes).
Afterward, Geranios sent them to Richie Castellano’s studio and still found deterioration on the vocal of the first single, “So Supernatural.” BÖC leapt at the opportunity to employ cutting-edge technology to complete the music.
“We deconstructed some of them with these AI software tools to separate the individual elements of the ones that weren’t multi-track,” Bloom explains. Original BÖC drummer Albert Bouchard, who left the band in 1981, stepped behind the kit to complete the tunes that weren’t fully tracked. Albert’s brother, their former bassist Joe Bouchard, who left in ’86, followed suit.
Regarding “So Supernatural,” “Joe Bouchard had to come in, current day, and re-sing it. I believe that’s the only song that had a vocal re-sung,” Bloom says. Neither he nor Dharma had to re-sing anything; he’s not sure that Dharma played anything new, but knows Castellano had to replay elements that were missing. “Some of those older tapes had holes on them where they were abandoned before rhythm guitars were put on them, things like that,” he says.
Overall, “It was a nice collaborative effort with the original band members,” Dharma says. Naturally, as they flip through these Ghost Stories, both Dharma and Bloom’s heads fill with memories of the original sessions. Especially of one very, very critical figure in the band’s history.
“Of course, Allen Lanier is gone now,” Dharma says. “But to hear him play, it makes me feel good to hear him and hear the band as it was at that time period. It’s like a snapshot of what it was.”
Dharma can mentally place himself in the room where this music was made. “It was sort of transitional in the band’s career because ‘Reaper’ had been a hit, and once you have a hit, the record company wants you to get another hit,” he says. “There’s quite a bit of pressure to sustain your level of output and quality. It’s a burden.”
For a white-hot streak in the ’70s and early ’80s, Blue Öyster Cult were as big as your ZZ Tops or Cheap Tricks. In the ’80s, “The Reaper,” “Burnin’ For You,” “Godzilla,” and the like remain staples of classic rock radio.
Still, “It’s not like we were hitmakers in terms of writing or performing or posing or whatever you’re supposed to do to be a hit recording artist,” Dharma says. “We just always thought of ourselves as an album band. And we didn’t mind taking the road less traveled as far as styles and going out on limbs and stuff like that.”
“I think that’s where we did our best stuff, when we just didn’t give a thought about commercial success,” Dharma concludes. “So, it was an odd time for us, but we persevered. And here we are. It’s 2024, for crying out loud.”
According to press materials, Ghost Stories “marks a fitting finale to the recording legacy of one of rock’s most iconic fixtures from the past 50 years.” This notion clearly irks Bloom; he denies it without reservation. “That is record label speech, and my answer to that is never say never,” he says. “There’s no reason why we couldn’t do another project if there was a reason to.”
*Buck Dharma performing with Blue Öyster Cult in 1978. Photo: Ed Perlstein/Redferns/Getty Images*
Beyond having eternal radio staples, Blue Öyster Cult have sneakily resonated with younger generations. Their catalog is vast, and full of treasures, oddities and are-they-or-aren’t-they missteps to argue about; this is a band with a lot to offer to the instant-access Spotify generation.
By the way, Dharma’s not buying the “Spotify is evil” line: “People bitch about the streaming and who gets the money and stuff, but actually streaming is more equitable to the artists than it ever was in the physical product days,” he contends.
Rather, he puts the onus more on the predatory deals with labels: “The split is better, and the bookkeeping is much better, because every listen is logged and no one’s really cheating on that. You may complain about who gets the percentage of what, but if your music is popular, you are making money now.”
Everyone knows the Christopher Walken “more cowbell” skit from SNL, but BÖC heads have been found in many a writer’s room; they’ve been referenced, and played, repeatedly on shows that burrowed into millennials’ heads young, from “The Simpsons” to “That ’70s Show.” They’ve even infiltrated indie, punk and alternative: Bloom being credited as “E. Bloom” led one Dennes Dale Boon from San Pedro, California to become D. Boon.
Neither Dharma or Bloom ever met the Minutemen legend, who was tragically hurled from a van in the Arizona Desert in 1985, marking another member of rock’s “27 Club.” But their camps are close; Bloom has a fond memory of Mike Watt joining BÖC live to perform the blazing “The Red and the Black” — which, Watt has maintained over the years, was the first song he and Boon ever played together.
“I’m grateful for them giving a damn about Blue Öyster Cult, because I certainly appreciate what they did with it,” Dharma says. And, unrelated, Bloom recently caught wind that none other than Dave Grohl’s a huge fan.
“Every time our name comes up, it’s always something positive,” Bloom says. And whether or not Ghost Stories will mark the end of the line, Blue Öyster Cult are not apparitions to be relegated to the past. There’ve been ups and downs galore with this complicated, idiosyncratic, rewarding band — but as agents of fortune, Lady Luck’s been with them indeed.
And to the Reaper — the main character in their greatest song, who will take us and everyone we know eventually — better luck next time.
