The fashion for bands playing “complete album” live shows presents a double edged sword. On the negative side, this robs fans of the excitement and mystery of what the night’s setlist might bring. On the plus side, such a practice means that long neglected gems are given a live airing. In the case of Blue Öyster Cult’s ‘45th Anniversary: Live In London’ the latter definitely applies. Not only is their debut record is a stone cold classic, but it features several tunes that aren’t necessarily regular fixtures in their live sets, which lends this recording an instant vitality.
Tag Archives: classic rock
BLUE ÖYSTER CULT – iHeart Radio Theater N.Y.C. 2012
In 2012, Blue Öyster Cult released ‘The Columbia Albums Collection’, a seventeen disc set rounding up their output for the label between 1973 and 1988. It was a set that was worth picking up even for those that owned some of the albums previously, as it also included a couple of discs of rarities. For a limited time, owners could even access four previously unreleased live shows via the BÖC website, which was a definite sweetener for those who’d bought ‘Agents of Fortune’, ‘Spectres’ and ‘Some Enchanted Evening’ a couple of times over already.
To promote the box set, the band held a one-off concert in New York. Finally released as ‘Iheart Radio 2012’ in the summer of 2020, when heard retrospectively, it isn’t a perfect set by any means, though it has enough to recommend it. Capturing the band in front of a select audience of 200 fans, the recording could have had a similarly flat atmosphere to ‘Agents of Fortune – 2016’ (released via Frontiers Records in early 2020), but due to not being tied to such a rigid setlist, founders Donald “Buck Dharma” Roeser and Eric Bloom, along with bassist Kasim Sulton, guitarist Richie Castallano and drummer Jules Radino, sound much less like a band going through the motions (no pun intended).
BLUE ÖYSTER CULT – 40th Anniversary Agents Of Fortune: Live 2016
A new deal with signed with Frontiers Records in the summer of 2019 quickly brought a bounty of archive treats for Blue Öyster Cult’s legion of followers. In January 2020, a welcome reissue of the very hard to find ‘Cult Classic’ disc of re-recordings made its way into the world, along with ‘Hard Rock Live – Cleveland 2016’, a double live gonzo that was well received by fans and press alike. Barely six weeks later, the equally elusive ‘Heaven Forbid’ album (originally released on the CMC label back in 1998) was given a timely reissue and the vaults were raided for yet another live set, this time focusing on their career defining ‘Agents of Fortune’ album.
LONERIDER – Attitude
LoneRider is a supergroup of sorts, as it brings together a few well known faces from the world of melodic rock. Another musical union between FM vocalist Steve Overland and Heartland guitarist Steve Morris, the band already has a great pedigree since both musicians released some fine music under the Shadowman name as well as with their main recording acts. For fans of both parties, expectations for a new project were already high, but LoneRider’s debut ‘Attitude’ exceeds everything Shadowman had released to date…and at least half of FM’s own work.
Cherry Red Records Pre-Christmas Sale: Plenty of classic rock and prog rock titles available at discounted prices!
In the run up to Christmas, the folks at Cherry Red Records are running a mega sale on selected box set and vinyl items.
As with their Black Friday weekend sale, the discounts are applied to a selection of superb progressive rock titles and classic rock items, some of which are not to be missed.