Blue Öyster Cult

This, the first album by the highly underrated Long Island rock band Blue Öyster Cult, kicks off a long-overdue reissue campaign that (finally!) restores these albums to the level of quality that other, less substantial candidates for reissue have received. BÖC’s first four studio titles were remastered with bonus cuts added; rock scribe Lenny Kaye wrote new liner notes. BÖC, released in 1972, introduced themes that would resonate throughout the band’s career: arcane, smart as a whip lyrics, often rife with references to the occult, crypto-fascism and subject matter later explored by Hollywood (e.g., “Then Came the Last Days of May,” about a drug deal gone awry; see also “She’s as Beautiful as a Foot,” “Cities on Flame With Rock and Roll”) and a sonic attack somewhere between the serpentine guitar thickets of early Quicksilver and the plodding jackhammer stomp of Black Sabbath. An auspicious debut.