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Mike Watt closes every show with Blue Oyster Cult’s “The Red and the Black”
SUNY at Stony Brook (now known at Stony Brook University) has a long history of great music on campus, from the many concerts that have taken place, the great radio station WUSB and at least one legendary band that assembled on campus – Blue Oyster Cult.
BOC’s classmates/collaborators included their producer Sandy Pearlman, Stony Brook Concerts founder and future record company president Howie Klein and one of the most influential rock critics of all time, Richard Meltzer. I recently proposed that the school honor these great alums and that the Long Island Music Hall of Fame be based at the school.
Nothing happened until yesterday, I received “The Brook,” the school’s alumni review, which featured the tribute “Flashback: The World is Still Their Oyster” on the back cover (below). Stony Brook helped launch mine and other great music careers, even though it is known as a science school From my point of view, this long-overdue recognition for the band.
To quote the article:
‘Even Stony Brook University’s rock ‘n’ roll legacy has a water connection… sort of. In 1967 the band Blue Oyster Cult first came together on the SB campus as Soft White Underbelly through the efforts of students (and later rock critics) Sandy Pearlman and Richard Meltzer. Rumor has it that the band had to keep changing its name because it played on campus so often. More likely the name changes — Stalk-Forrest Group, Oaxaca among them — were a response to changing record labels and band members. The band became Blue Oyster Cult in 1971. Supposedly producer Pearlman got the idea for the name while reading a recipe for Blue Point oysters. Blue Oyster Cult’s self-named debut album, released by Columbia Records in January 1972, made the charts. In his review of the album for the March 30, 1972, issue of Rolling Stone, Lester Bangs noted that while “New York has never been the spawning ground for many good, enduring white rock ‘n’ roll bands… with Blue Oyster Cult, New York has produced its first authentic boogie beast, and with any luck this one should be around for a while.’
Agents of Fortune, released in 1976, yielded the hit single “Don’t Fear the Reaper” and became the band’s first platinum album. Blue Oyster Cult was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2007 and continues to tour and find new audiences for its classic sound.”
Congratulations to my friends and fellow Stony Brook alums Richard Meltzer and Blue Oyster Cult!
Congrats to my fellow Stony Brook’ers! I have been a member of the SBU community since 1969..I’ve known the guys for years…well earned and deserved. I teach media studies at SBU and had the honor of serving as WUSB-FM for 28 years. As a member of LIMHoF Board I was particularly pleased with the BOC inductions. Sandy Pearlman, Albert Bouchard and Eric Bloom have all been speakers in my classes. STONY BROOK ROCKS!