Blue Öyster Cult. Pioneers in music. Over 14 million albums sold worldwide. The rock band that epitomizes the 70’s arena rock show and continues to influence some of the most prominent rock bands from the 80’s, 90’s and today. They need no introduction as their, pardon the pun, “cult status” is legendary. Steering the ship known as BOC is lead singer Eric Bloom, born and raised in NY, who stepped into the role of lead singer in the early 70’s and gave BOC a signature look, sound and feel.
I had the opportunity to talk with Eric recently and an hour ½ later we finally called the interview to a close. When you get the chance to talk to a legend like Bloom, you pull out all of the stops and pray your cell phone is charged. I also opened the interview up to BOC fans and asked for submissions of “if you could ask Eric Bloom a question, what would it be?”… my email became flooded but I picked a few and so thanks to Beesty, Benjy, and Bruno. (Not sure how that happened!) for your submissions. So sit back, pop in your copy of Agents of Fortune and enjoy the read…
AAM (Kim Thore) With the knowledge that tried and true fans are gunning to hear your hits, how does a band of your stature structure your playlist?
Eric Bloom: Well, it depends on the concert. I personally write the set list about 15 minutes before the show. We do a lot of outdoor shows in the summer-for example, for a biker event we’ll do a high energy set, if it’s a state fair, with all sorts of ages who are there to see something more than the 1000 lb pig (laughing) we’ll play a set that won’t have 
a lot of jamming and concentrate on the more accessible songs. If it’s a hard ticket show then I will dig deeper into album tracks for the hard core fans. Speaking of which, there’s some discussion about doing a fan’s show where we won’t play any of the big hits but concentrate on the hard core deep cuts.
AAM: So this would be a very special show for a special kind of fan?
EB: Yes- Funnily enough some of our former fans are now bank presidents! Some of my favorite gigs are casinos - of course the downside is traveling- you can’t go from A to B like you used to be able to do, but casinos have exploded all over – The Emerald Queen Casino in Tacoma is one of our biggest gigs and its always great playing there.
AAM: Godzilla has been used in commercials; did it bring the band new fans?
EB: Sure and for the band any song that is used in a commercial means cash flow and that’s a wonderful thing! For some reason right now, commercials are digging into classic rock. Take for example, Auto Trader.com, they are using Godzilla!
AAM: How were you approached about the use of your music in ads?
EB: Usually there’s an agency and the creative team thinks it would be a good idea to use a certain song- they then approach Sony who owns our catalog and then it filters to the band.
AAM: Are younger people discovering your music and through what channels?
EB: Absolutely! I get emails on my MySpace account from 14 year old boys wanting to know if I can get them into shows that are 18 or over. Of course I can’t but I think people have picked up on us from the infamous SNL skit, or from classic rock radio, and word of mouth.
AAM: What do you make of the new trend of reunion tours?
EB: I think it’s a good idea - I mean I would pay to see the Police in a heartbeat. I remember one of their shows from years ago and I’ve never seen that many people out of their seats and dancing to a show.
AAM: What’s the difference between life on the road in the 70’s and being on the road now?
EB: Wow, it’s totally different. Like I mentioned before the travel has changed so much and now we don’t have the huge bombastic show. Plus, we cannot take a big, huge show every where since we’re traveling all over the country.
AAM: Can you describe your songwriting process?
EB: There’s no rules to that - sometimes there’s music in your head or sometimes it’s more business like “I’m coming over to your house to write songs” That’s how Buck and I wrote the last two albums. We also do pre-production… sometimes things change with five people in the room. You get a lot of chemistry as ideas are exchanged. At least 3-4 of our records were written ensemble.
AAM: Famous for many things, one is BOC’s flawless production technique, who are some of your favorite current producers and what have you learned from them?
EB: We’ve worked with a lot of great producers over the years and we have self-produced as well. Some don’t really understand what a producer does. What does “produced by” mean? Well, it’s kind of like the 5th Beatle. He tells the engineer what to do, etc.. Todd Rundgren for example is known for his background harmonies - you know what imprint you’re getting from certain producers like Phil Specter. He’s created the wall of sound and made a bazillion dollars. There’s Mutt Lange who’s known for his work with Def Leppard and of course Shania Twain and he sings as well… all of these things are aspects that you must take into consideration.
AAM: Recently you co-anchored a TV gig at NAMM, tell us about that and does this mean a career move?
EB: You know, I was very friendly with the original MTV VJ’s and I always thought it would be something I’d like to do. At NAMM, I thought it would be fun and something different, plus NAMM is the perfect place to run into everybody. Plus as a lead singer, I’m not afraid of a microphone!
AAM: You run a company called Eric Bloom guitars… the guitars match some of BOC’s most famous songs in design… tell us about this.
EB: Yes, it’s EricBloomGuitars.com — it’s a really interesting process, the guitars are handmade and professionally air brushed by a great artist—a buyer will usually reach me by email and I’ll discuss with the artist the design—sketches are shared and then the guitar is stripped and painted. Then it gets sent out to a luthier and its put back together and is set up for playing. Then what I do is I arrange a meeting with the buyer at one of our shows, I personally play the guitar during the song that matches its design, and the buyer gets all the pics, videos, I sign it and give it to the purchaser after the show.
AAM: Wow, that’s quite an experience for the buyer!
EB: Yes, it’s fun and besides being designed to match a song, the guitar also plays beautifully.
AAM: The SNL skit… by now everyone has asked you about it, now, some years later would you consider that episode a repercussion, backlash or a boost?
EB: Oh it’s definitely been a boost! I’ll get on an airplane on my way to a show and if I get asked if I’m in a band and I tell them BOC, invariably they will always say, “oh yeah the cow bell”. For the record my stomach never stuck out as much as Will Ferrell's!
AAM: In the 80s you were involved with Dio for Hear “n” Aid… what was that exp. like and did you feel out of place at the time since the bands were all metal?
EB: It was Ronnie’s idea to raise money for starving children in Africa and this was after Live Aid. I read about it and I had my manager call and let them know that Buck and I wanted to be involved. The day of the show we all got on an English style bus and it was a riot. It was also very well organized. We spent two days rehearsing “We’re Stars”, and we got to hang out with Judas Priest, Twisted Sister, and Rudy Sarzo, who plays with us now, even the Spinal Tap guys were there in costume! It was like a who’s who of bands and I think we were the only East Coast band there- VH1 did a list of the best moments in Heavy Metal and it was rated number one. It was a lot of fun for a good cause.
AAM: Your symbol… explain to us any hidden secret behind it and what it means?
EB: It’s nothing really hidden. We got it from the artist who did the covers of the first two albums. It’s an ancient Greek symbol that means Chaos… So we incorporated it and it became our logo.
AAM: New projects solo or otherwise?
EB: There’s some discussion with labels right now…
AAM: Rumor has it that Don’t Fear the Reaper and Burnin’ For You were in effect suicide songs---can you tell our readers what their real meaning is?
EB: I didn’t write either one but I can tell you that they’re not. Richard Meltzer wrote Burning For You and he lived with us in the band house at the time—it’s basically a love song. With Don’t Fear the Reaper, Buck wrote it and sung it… It’s a song that came out of when he was dealing with some health issues and he began to think about life after death and love transcending life after death…
AAM: What do you think of your guitar hero fame?
EB: I love it! It’s another big plus. There are some of our fans that only know us by that. And I’m a huge game nut! I write for gaming mags like Massive Online Gamer Magazine and I’m a Beta Tester for World of Warcraft.
AAM: You do?!
EB: Yeah, it’s totally addictive! It’s like crack and there are millions of people playing the game.
AAM: You wrote with Michael Moorecock, a series of songs—what was the creative process working with a Sci Fi author and how did that come about?
EB: Well, Michael is a lot more than a sci fi author, he’s written over a 100 books, printed in over 20 countries. I read his books and loved them and I always thought there was a movie in there somewhere. So one day I wrote him a fan boy letter and he wrote back. He came to NY from London and we met and instantly bonded- I actually got the rights to the film but we couldn’t get it done. This was before the Lord of the Rings movies, etc and so no one was willing to bite because of the expense of a movie of that scale - Now I believe Universal has the option… We worked with John Trivers and all songs were about that character—in fact Black Blade is one of my faves.
AAM: Last year you celebrated your 35th anniversary, what was your single greatest highpoint of these three decades?
EB: Well overall it’s been lots of ups and downs just like real life.. Headlining at Chargers Stadium stands out, touring with Rod Stewart and the Black and Blue tour was great. The real secret, if there is one, is the friends you make along the way.
AAM: In the 70’s it was rumored that the average height of BOC was 5”4. What is it nowadays?
EB: Well I’m 5’7”, Buck is shorter than me..So yes, we were never what you call a tall band… (Laughing) but you know what they say if you couldn’t play basketball in school you became a musician!
AAM: What bands do you think rip you off?
EB: I don’t really think any have ripped us off per se, but I feel we have influenced a few. Metallica and the Goo Goo Dolls have covered some of our songs and we’re grateful.
AAM: Any final thoughts for our readers?
EB: Well, I’m a huge Mets fan… and sometimes I’ll delve into sports at a live show just to get the fans worked up! I’m a car nut and I blog quite a bit about it and write for Autoweek.com as well. Tomorrow in fact I am racing a 1938 Ford Hotrod in the Detroit Woodward Dream Drive!
Be sure to check out our info at www.myspace.com/ericbloomblueoystercult , www.ericbloomguitars.com, www.ericbloom.net www.blueoystercult.com
In the meantime we look forward to seeing you at the next show!
Thanks Eric for your time, we’ll see you on the road or perhaps in the World’s End Tavern!!
