Blue Öyster Cult are less of a band and more of a heavy music institution in 2024 — being active for over 50 years is a distinction that very few bands can lay claim to. With 15 studio albums prior to the release of the interesting and new Ghost Stories, BÖC truly have no reason to provide us with new music, so they didn’t. What I mean by that is that Ghost Stories is less an album and more of a collection of forgotten pre-production tracks from 1977-1984 (Spectres through The Revölution by Night) as well as another cover from 2016. In other words, this is new old music and not new new music. [Editor’s Note: If you haven’t listened to their last record, The Symbol Remains, you should.]
I spoke to founding guitarist Donald “Buck Dharma” Roeser about what went into this album, specifically the historical aspect of the music, what it was like to listen to these tracks again and what the journey was like to get these to album quality. The band also used AI to deconstruct these songs and properly master them from some original and deteriorating studio tapes. We talked about some of the cover songs being played live, being a touring band and some of their favorite tourmates including Thin Lizzy and The Pat Travers Band, and being viewed as elder statesmen by the rock masses, including appearances at festivals where they “were definitely the oldest band”.
Read on below and take in some history from a first-person perspective. If you are a BÖC devotee, give Ghost Stories a proper spin, out now on Frontiers.
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When I listened to Ghost Stories for the first time, I was curious as to how you were able to use modern musical conventions to resurrect these long dormant tracks. How did it all go down?
Buck Dharma: The original recordings were from the original album periods, pre-production takes from the late ‘70s and early ‘80s from the records at that time. These songs didn’t make the original albums due to the restrictions with vinyl in general as you could only have about 17-18 minutes a side, if it was the CD era they would have all been on there. When you get to a new record, all these new songs are competing for slots on the album and a lot of these songs get forgotten. The tapes existed in pre-production and our sound mixer at the time had them; I had forgotten abouCt them and he was putting them up on YouTube. Frontiers had been clamoring for some new material and we said, what about these songs? We decided to bring them up to recording quality and they said to go ahead and do it.
Was it more about the songs being forgotten at the time or did they not fit the vibe of the next album when it came around?
Dharma: It was more that we literally had forgotten about them. We probably weren’t that organized or conscious of it at the time and we were constantly writing too.
Is there any truth to some of these songs popping up in live sets? Which ones made the cut for that?
Dharma: The cover songs we had played live, “Kick Out The Jams” we had played a lot and “We Gotta Get Out Of This Place” is on live record from us.
They are an interesting two songs to choose from, even though they both originate from the same era.
Dharma: We played The Animals cover back when we were a club band so we have some history with it too. Eric really liked “Kick Out The Jam” and we learned it and we played it, even though I’m not sure how many times we played it.
It only makes sense to play “Kick Out The Jams” live, since the most famous version of it is the live one.
Dharma: You look back at the MC5 now and they were a really important band. If you ever get to see any live recordings of them, they were really good.
It was really amazing to see what Wayne Kramer was doing back then and sadly we just lost him too. A super important person in rock music.
Dharma: I totally agree.
So why the name Ghost Stories for the album?
Dharma: If you think about it, the band is a little ghostly now. Allen Lanier passed away and the Bouchard brothers are not members of the band at this time and I thought it was apt.
If you have a keen ear, you can really get a good sense as to what albums you were recording when writing these songs as they have a distinct flavor to them.
Dharma: When I listen to Ghost Stories it is more of a nostalgic feeling that brings me back to particular stages of my life.
Were these all recorded in the same space or were they from different venues?
Dharma: I believe it was from 2 or 3 different studios. We made a couple of records at the New York Record Plant One, the first 3 records were at a jingles studio and a few in Columbia’s space in NYC and then a few on Long Island. The Martin Birch records were recorded at Kingdom Sound on Long Island. We did a few at the LA Record Plant and the San Francisco Automat. We worked at a lot of different places and had different producers. I really just like different recording studios.
Since you mentioned his name in particular, what was it like working with Martin Birch for those few albums?
Dharma: Martin was great, a great personality and a talented fellow. He was a producer and an engineer. As a producer he wasn’t dictatorial, but he definitely had opinions about how it should all go. He was very generous with his knowledge; we had just gotten the first multi-track recorders and we had been recording at home. He taught me a lot about recording at home. We miss him but his legacy lives on with what he was able to do with bands like us, Iron Maiden and Deep Purple.
Was there an album in particular that made you want to hire him to work with you on those 2 records?
Dharma: Well, he had just gotten done working with Black Sabbath on Heaven & Hell so there’s that.
If that record isn’t a testament to what he could do, then I don’t know what is.
Dharma: It was great and we were happy to have him.
Yeah, he worked on one of my favorites, Fire of Unknown Origin.
Dharma: Yep, that and Cultosaurus, they were a great time for BÖC.
One of the real positives of the internet era is the ability to look up histories of pretty much anything and it is particularly helpful for the intricacies of music.
Dharma: I have been pretty blown away with some people’s focus on music from a historical standpoint.
A song that stands out on the record is “If I Fell” because of when you recorded it because of when you recorded it. What’s the story behind that song?
Dharma: We did a Direct TV special which was for the 40th anniversary of Agents of Fortune. There was a video we did with Eric Bloom, Albert Bouchard, Richie Castellano, Kasim Sulton and Jules Radino at the time. We did it in the dressing room as an acoustic, but it wasn’t aired due to a rights thing since it is a Beatles song. It just laid around and we decided to put it on the record.
Why was “So Supernatural” the lead single off this album?
Dharma: Frontiers decided to go with that. It had the most recent refurbishment of some of the tracks in general. It had some of the most contemporary input.
AI is a hot button issue in the music world now in terms of being used to create artwork or even to create music. How did you use it for Ghost Stories?
Dharma: It was primarily used to deconstruct stereo mixes, you can now control the individual elements, the drums, the bass, the guitars and the vocals. There are tools that can do that now, with pretty good results; it’s some kind of voodoo what these programs can do.
It’s almost as if the program is able to listen to music in the same way that some people do, by compartmentalizing the pieces as it is programmed to do. After listening to it, I wouldn’t have known that there was an AI element to the recordings unless I was told otherwise. It feels like a compilation since the time periods continue to vary.
Dharma: The finished project to me sounds like a forgotten Blue Öyster Cult record. All of a sudden it is resurrected, and now people can hear it again.
Any other news coming from the band?
Dharma: We are doing 20 and 30 shows this year, and we usually do 75 dates which we haven’t done since 2022, our 50th anniversary. I have a song coming out in a couple of months, during the summer.
What’s it like where you are playing with these newer bands like when you played Maryland Deathfest’s Days of Darkness back in 2018?
Dharma: It’s great, we were the oldest band there. I’m glad that people give a damn about us at this point.
More people should, if they think of you as a one song band, then they really haven’t been paying attention. I say that all the time about bands like Thin Lizzy.
Dharma: I miss Phil and that band, we had great times touring with them. We probably played together with them about 3 or 4 times. Our truck broke down and they let us use their gear in Pittsburgh. Really sweet people. I hope more of these older bands get things recorded including interviews with Rick Beato, he does great stuff on YouTube. You can really go down a rabbit hole there.
Were there any bands that you really loved to tour with?
Dharma: We had a great tour with Pat Travers in the Northwest. When he had Tommy Aldridge on drums and Pat Thrall and Mars Cowling, it was a great band.
Any other parting words?
Dharma: No, but thank you and we will see you out on the road.
