Blue Oyster Cult: Tyranny and Mutation

Blue Oyster Cult: Tyranny and Mutation

1973

Columbia Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl and Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. The Red and the Black  2. O.D.'d on Life Itself  3. Hot Rails to Hell  4. 7 Screaming Diz-Busters  5. Baby Ice Dog  6. Wings Wetted Down  7. Teen Archer  8. Mistress of the Salmon Salt (Quicklime Girl)

CD Bonus Tracks: 9. Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll (Live)  10. Buck's Boogie  11. 7 Screaming Diz-Busters (Live)  12. O.D.'d on Life Itself (Live)


The Black and White era continues with the band's second album "Tyranny and Mutation." I flip back and forth over whether I prefer the first album or this one...The band loses the murk and emerge as a hard rock powerhouse, albeit the strangest, jazziest Hard Rock Powerhouse in memory...

 The production is clear, the guitars and drums are beefed up and the songs are more intricately arranged...They also flesh out the bizarre mythology a bit more...There's this elaborate story that threads though the Blue Oyster Cult albums...Something about a shape-shifter named Desdinova who alters the course of history over a couple hundred years...Who knows...Just nod your head knowingly at all the cool-sounding, arcane lyrics...

The album is split into two distinct sides...We'll start with Side One...which is ominously titled: "The Black"...

(See? Cos the labels black...Who says I'm not paying attention!?!?!)

This is the rock side...Every single kicks ass in a big way...If the album opener "The Red and the Black" sounds familiar, it's because it's just a souped-up version of "I'm on the Lamb But I Ain't No Sheep" from last album...But I think the "Red and the Black" version is the clear winner...A big, sweating boogie, it manages to make Mounties sound like the most bad-ass people that ever existed...

The real centerpiece of Side One though, is the mighty, 7 and a half minute "7 Screaming Diz-Busters", which alternates between jazzy sections and the leanest, tightest riffing you've ever heard...After hearing this you still won't know what a Diz-Buster is, but you'll walk away with the knowledge that whatever it is, it can't be good...

Side Two is titled "The Red"...

This side is much moodier, mysterious, and altogether spookier than Side One...On the whole I like Side One better, but if this side has the album's  best song, which is Joe Bouchard's "Wings Wetted Down." It's a haunting rocker with a convincingly menacing atmosphere...When Joe moans "In the Ennnnnd.." he sounds like some sort of ghost trapped inside the cold, black vinyl...Hooray for "Wings Wetter Down"!

The 2001 CD version also has four bonus tracks, 3 of which are recorded live (check out the smokin' 14 minute version of  "7 Screaming Diz-Busters"), but probably the most interesting thing in the extras is the studio version of live favorite "Buck's Boogie." 

So let's check out "Wings Wetted Down" by Blue Oyster Cult." Enjoy...

 

Blue Oyster Cult: Blue Oyster Cult

Blue Oyster Cult: Blue Oyster Cult

1972

Columbia Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl and Compact disc

Track Listing: 1. Transmaniacon MC  2. I'm on the Lamb But I Ain't No Sheep  3. Then Came the Last Days of May  4. Stairway to the Stars  5. Before the Kiss, a Redcap  6. Screams  7.She's as Beautiful as a Foot  8. Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll  9. Workshop of the Telescopes  10. Redeemed  Bonus Tracks (on CD version) 11.Donovan's Monkey  12. What is Quicksand  13. A Fact About Sneakers  14. Betty Lou's Got a New Pair of Shoes


A lot of people I talk to seem to be put off by the fact that Blue Oyster Cult is one of my all-time favorite bands..They usually think I'm joking and make some kind of "More Cowbell!" joke...

Man, fuck "More Cowbell!' Blue Oyster Cult deserves better than that...I'm calling them one of the most underrated bands of all-time and I think they have one of the greatest discographies ever... Hell, look up at the song titles listed above...Don't you just have to know what "I'm on the Lamb But I Ain't No Sheep" sounds like? And how can you live your life without ever hearing "She's As Beautiful As A Foot"?

There's nothing like sitting down in front of your turntable, putting the needle down on that big, black slab of wax, and hearing the spiraling riff of "Transmaniacon MC"  just oozes pure, biker menace out of your speakers while you stare deep into that enigmatic album cover...

"With Satan's hog no pig at all, and the weather getting dry,
We'll head south from Altamont in a cold blooded traveled trance,
So clear the road my bully boys and let some thunder pass,
We're pain, we're steel, a plot of knives,
We're Transmaniacon MC..."

Eric Bloom hisses the lyrics coolly...You just know he's wearing mirrored shades...

It represent everything I love about rock music...It's mysterious, it's humorous, it's dark, it's fun, it's unknowable...

"I'm On the Lamb..." comes next, and it's a bruising boogie that covers that most tried and true of Heavy Metal lyrical concerns...

....Mounties? 

Okay, I'll roll with it...And "Hornswoop me bungo pony, dogsled on Ice..." is just one of the most bizarre lines ever used in a song...And things get even better on the next song...

"Then Came The Last Days of May" is a menacing soft rock track that's as beautiful as it is unnerving...This is also our introduction to guitar hero's Buck Dharma's vocal stylings...He has such a smooth, soothing voice...Perfect for outlining the bloodthirsty tale of a drug deal gone bad...Just a bad, bad trip, man...This ain't the summer of love, indeed...Everything is weird here...When "She's As Beautiful Foot" emerges from the ashes of "Screams" and reveals itself to be a menacing piece of pitch-black Middle-Eastern psychedelia it just gives off this unsettling vibe...But Allen Lanier's chirping organ momentarily takes you out of the horror and suddenly it could almost be The Carpenters...Just unbalanced stuff, and like the cover, all detailed in stark shades of black and white...

And there's no way I can't rave about "Cities on Flame With Rock N' Roll." With one of the best heavy metal riffs ever, it evokes nothing less than a lumbering, stoned brontosaurus lazily laying waste to a city in search of a bag of Doritos...

And to top it all off, after we eventually emerge from the labyrinth that is "Workshop of the Telescopes" we're rewarded to the laid back country rock of "Redeemed." Huh? It's so straightforward...and nice...But wait...What's up with those lyrics?  Just what in the hell is "Sir Rastus Bear"? 

In addition to the vinyl, I also have a CD version of this that has 4 bonus tracks...It shows the band in their embryonic form, they had a bit of a different sound...It seems to have a more pronounced Doors influence, as well as a 60's garage rock vibe...Very much worth checking out... 

Let's freak out and listen to "Transmaniacon MC" by Blue Oyster Cult...Enjoy...

Blitzen Trapper: American Goldwing

Blitzen Trapper: American Goldwing

2011

Sub Pop Records

Format I own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. Might Find It Cheap  2. Fletcher  3. Love the Way You Walk Away  4. Your Crying Eyes  5. My Home Town  6. Girl In a Coat  7. American Goldwing  8. Astronaut  9. Taking It Easy Too Long  10. Street Fighting Sun  11. Stranger In a Strange Land


What an apt title for the album...When you're listening to this ramblin' classic rock, you can easily picture yourself riding a big, fat 1978 Gl-1000 ...

...as the image of the Grand Canyon fades from your rearview mirror...



...Desert dust in your lungs, wind a-blowin' through your hair (Hey! Shouldn't you be wearing a helmet? And aren't Goldwings Japanese bikes? Shouldn't you be riding a Harley or something?)

Somehow this seems even more AOR than "Destroyer of the Void." They've cut back the kitchen -sink eclecticism of their previous albums, and  pump up the hard, southern-fried rock aspect...The lingering indie rock influence is starting to fade, and when I listen to the album opener "Might Find It Cheap" I get the same distinct feeling that I get when when I unearth some long forgotten 70's album from the dollar bin...



Like maybe one of the post-Joe Walsh James Gang records for example...And I love that feeling...

But you may ask yourself? If Blitzen Trapper re-enact 70's album rock so effectively, why don't I just pick up an actual James Gang record? Why buy a Goldwing,when you can buy a Harley?

It's a fair question,...I think these guys always have a good pop hook handy...When you listen to this back to back with an actual 70's rock record, you'll find that they don't often have the big, immaculate choruses and succinct songwriting than Blitzen Trapper has...There's no extended solos or dragging tempos here...It's more similar to a greatest-hits album of a classic rock band...Or maybe more accurately, a power-pop re-imagination of classic rock...

Although in the end I still  prefer "Destroyer of the Void" to this, just because that album had stickier songs, but it's still a fine effort by today's greatest 70's re-enactors...

Blitzen Trapper: Destroyer of the Void

Blitzen Trapper: Destroyer of the Void

2010

Sub Pop Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1.  Destroyer of the Void  2. Laughing Lover  3. Below the Hurricane  4. The Man Who Would Speak True  5. Love and Hate  6. Heaven and Earth  7. Dragon's Song  8. The Tree  9. Evening Star  10. Lover Leave Me Drowning  11. The Tailor  12. Sadie


I like that album cover...There's something so oddly human about that four-eyed bull...He seems like a really good dude for some reason...

I feel like he's a relative of the bull-with-a -vaguely-human-ass from the Blink 182 "Dude Ranch" cover...



As for the music...Oh, I love this one...For me, this beats the pants off of "Furr." They took their indie-roots sound, added a bit of prog here and there,  and actually come out with something that feels like an honest-to-God FM-ready classic rock record...It's hard to believe I didn't grow up with these songs...On "Furr" it often  felt like; This is obviously a Neil young-style song, this is obviously a Bob Dylan-style song...but they seem to blend their influences more evenly here...

The album opens with the epic, six and a half minute title track that will give you flashbacks of every great 70's album that you've ever listened to...Oooo, that Led Zeppelin section at about the 3:40 minute mark hits the spot...

So much cool stuff to hear on this record...Every single song has something fantastic about it...In particular, I dig "Heaven and Earth." It's really just vocals, piano and some strings but it sounds so massive...So important...and best of all, it stays stuck in your head all day..."The Tree" is another must-hear song...In the same style as "Furr",  it's a sweet, acoustic, psychedelic campfire tale that sounds like a dream...Is it basically just a re-write of "Mr Tambourine Man"? Yes. But what a re-write!

 "Dragon's Song" gives us a glimpse of what Wilco would sound like if they could loosen up and have some fun....I also believe that classic rock radio needs to update their playlists to included the album-closer "Sadie." I know it's only from 2010, but it's hard to think of another song that makes me so nostalgic for the 70's...Perfect piano pop...

Holy four-eyed cow, I can't recommend this album enough...Let's check out this cool live version of "Sadie" by Blitzen Trapper...Enjoy...

Blitzen Trapper: Furr

Blitzen Trapper: Furr

2008

Sub Pop Records

Format I Own it On: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. Sleepytime in the Western World  2. Gold for Bread  3. Furr  4.God & Suicide
 5. Fire & Fast Bullets  6. Saturday Nite  7. Black River Killer  8. Not Your Lover  9. Love U  10. War on Machines  11. Stolen Shoes & A Rifle  12. Echo/Always On/EZ Con  13. Lady on the Water



I guess I came in pretty late to these guys...I totally spaced their highly acclaimed "Wild Mountain Nation" album...

 

I started listening to them with 2008's "Furr" after being impressed by watching the video for the title track on MTV...

(I think I originally saw it on "Subterranean" which is the program 120 minutes morphed into...)

Anyway, I can recall watching the "Furr" video and being taken aback by its unabashed Dylan-ness...I usually have a pretty low tolerance for fake Dylan, but these guys just happened to nail not just the sound, but the spirit, of it...The folksy melody and the bizarre story about a guy who joins a pack of wild dogs convinced me I just had to check it out...

I eventually picked up a copy at the Zia Records in Tucson, AZ (pictured above). The album was a lot more diverse than I was expecting, yet for all its range it always seems to stick to a slightly-spacey, yet convincingly woodsy country-rock sound...Which helped me realize how rangy the genre actually is..They go from  the lonesome piano pop of "Not Your Lover" which wouldn't sound out of place on Neil Young's "After the Gold Rush", to the shambling backwoods lo-fi of  "Love U" to "War on Machines" which is a dead ringer for "Being There" era Wilco...

I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's all over the map, but the map never leaves the country...They even come up with some interesting new combinations like "Black River Killer" which seems to connect the dots between dust bowl murder ballad and 90's gangsta rap...



I actually hadn't heard this album in a long time...See, shortly after I got it, it became one of my wife's favorites and she kind of played it into the ground for me...So the mere intro to "Sleepytime in the Western World'  made me cringe a little...(So, I guess if you're looking for a good record to pick up for your wife or girlfriend, this might not be a bad choice....)...But I got to take a big break from it and I can again appreciate what a cool record this is...

So let's check out "Furr" by Blitzen Trapper...

Blink 182: Neighborhoods

Blink 182: Neighborhoods

2011

DGC/Interscope Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. Ghost on the Dance Floor  2. Natives  3. Up All Night  4. After Midnight  5. Heart's All Gone   6. Wishing Well  7. Kaleidoscope  8. This Is Home  9. MH 4.18.2011  10. Love Is Dangerous


Blink 182's 2011 reunion album...Their first record since 2003's self-titled album... I really didn't follow the careers of Blink 182's members after the breakup...I heard Tom DeLonge's Angels and Airwaves once or twice...The only thing I remember about it was how U2 it sounded...



(I do like that album cover...It always made me laugh because it reminded me of the old Phantom Menace videotape I used to have...)

(Holy shit! I just googled it and found out the same guy did both...)



 I know Mark Hoppus and Travis Barker had a band called +44, but I still haven't heard it to this day...So I didn't really know what to expect with this record...

"Ghost on the Dance Floor" kicks off the record, and the first thing that strikes me is how much Tom's voice has changed...He just sounds really odd and overly affected now...Again, it was probably a gradual thing and I wasn't paying attention...

On the other hand, Mark sounds great, but unfortunately, he's doesn't do much of the vocals, for some reason...He co-sings some of them...

But really, there's bigger problems than the vocals... I've listened to this album about 20 times now and I just can't get the hang of it...There's really nothing great here, but there's not anything particularly bad either...Picking out high points or low points is really hard...Nothing seems to gel enough to stir any particular emotion...I can't hear anything except for big, blocks of processed sound...

I do enjoy "Heart's All Gone" it took a few listens but I finally learned to love that song....

If Blink 182 wasn't always overly insightful, at least they had their wit and sharp hooks to keep it interesting...But they seem to have lost both assets...I understand why the humor was downplayed, It sucks having to be the guy pushing 40 and having to continue to bust out the dick jokes...But oddly enough, they had a much larger emotional range when they seemed emotionally stunted...Listen to "Dammit" again...There's a few levels there...But everything on here, seems to be delivered in the same, straight manner...So, hooray...It's very easy to take it seriously, but I'm struggling to find a reason to listen to it in the first place..



They put out an ep called  "Dogs Eating Dogs" in 2012, but somehow I completely missed even hearing about...I'm hoping I'll enjoy that one a bit more...I'm still holding out that they'll be able to pull out some of the old magic and crank out another great record...

Let's check out "Heart's All Gone" by Blink 182...

Blink 182: Blink 182

Blink 182: Blink 182

2003

MCA Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. Feeling This  2. Obvious  3. I Miss You  4.Violence  5. Stockholm Syndrome  6. Down  7. The Fallen Interlude  8. Go  9. Asthenia  10. Always  11. Easy Target  12. All of This  13. Here's Your Letter  14. I'm Lost Without You

Woah, you might want to sit down or hold onto your hat or something when I tell you this...but this is a Blink 182 album without a single joke on it... No farts, Ben Wah Balls, or dog-fucking...Not even in the bonus tracks...Just 14 tracks of lost love, loneliness and isolation...And what's even more surprising, it is the fact that the album doesn't fall flat on its face...For the most part it's pretty enjoyable...

It's very experimental for a pop-punk record...All kinds of crazy new sounds and song structures....Piano interludes...people reading letters...you name it...To be honest it takes me a bit to get into this though...To this day I still don't like album opener/first single "Feeling This." It sounds like the punk Blink 182 of yore, but for some reason there's a joylessness to it that's somewhat unappealing to me...Kind of like "Well, we have to do a pop-punk track, so let's get it out of the way..." I do have to hand it to the massed vocals on the accapella outro, though...That section is cool as hell...



Although, if I'm remembering things correctly. all music released in the immediate wake of 9/11 was similarly joyless...Even the pop music became robotic and android-like...It talked about fun and parties but any actual emotion was sucked out of it...I could hear the word "fun" being used but  it was hard to hear any actual fun being had...An affliction that still haunts the genre to this day...But the rock genre in particular, struggled with this...There was a pervasive feeling that if you were holding a guitar and standing in front of a microphone, you were going to get in trouble for using any emotional content that wasn't despair, quiet strength or just plain lack of emotion... And I guess that's right...How well would Blink 182 have fared if they faced this frightening new world of terror alerts armed only with their usual fart jokes and tales of careless teenage fun? They probably would have been seen as hopelessly trivial...

And like "Feeling This" I have a hard time getting too excited over most of the first half of this album..."I Miss You" is alright, but it's a bit too VH-1 for me...And the verses of "Violence" are a complete waste of time....But once we get to the slamming and catchy "Go", things pick up for me..."Asthenia" manages to convey loneliness while keeping it melodic, and "Always" is a successful melding of Emo and 80's pop... And best of all "All of This" has Robert Smith of the Cure taking over on lead vocals...You successfully forget you're even listening to a Blink 182 CD until you get to the chorus...This was unthinkable just an album ago....



For how much I enjoy it while I'm playing it, I don't reach for it too often, really...If I'm in the mood for some Blink 182  I usually reach for "Cheshire Cat" or "Take Off your Pants and Jacket", but I don't think that diminishes their achievement at all...I think it was the right move at the time...They stretched themselves a bit and managed to get themselves taken seriously for a change...Although, I don't think they had to try so hard to prove it to us...Their hardcore fans always knew there was more to these guys than they often let on...Unfortunately, these guys went on an almost decade-long hiatus after this album, leaving the album feeling like an oddity in their discography...They did eventually get back together, but we'll get to that tomorrow...

So let's check out "Go" by Blink 182...