IMAGINOS

"Five fingers have I to play them like ten, ten fingers have I to play them again..."

How do I review this thing? For the past few years I've been completely fascinated with Imaginos, both the album and the wider mythology which forms the underpinnings of Blue Öyster Cult as a whole. Lovecraftian cosmic horror, history, conspiracy theories, occultism, and the "power of rock" all blend together into Sandy Pearlman's epic poem turned rock opera about the shapeshifting title character and his alien puppetmasters. Parts of the original poem, "The Soft Doctrines of Imaginos", are scattered throughout the lyrics of the band's "Black and White Trilogy", and a handful of other songs throughout their discography also incorporate elements and themes of the Imaginos mythology. Even on their two dud records from the mid-80s, the band was digging up and reworking Imaginos material. But from a fan's perspective, before 1988, the story was just a bunch of vague whispers and obscured allusions, only briefly rearing its head in full on Secret Treaties.

But can you really review Imaginos? Does the album even exist in a complete state? For an album that name-drops Frankenstein, the 1988 version was certainly stitched together like Frankenstein's monster, assembled from an aborted Albert Bouchard solo album, overdubs by the rest of the classic BÖC lineup, and dozens of session musicians. The storyline was also planned to be much longer, extending past the Great War and telling the story of Imaginos' activities in the 20th century, culminating with the nuclear apocalypse. What we are left with may be incomplete and a total mess in terms of its production, but I love it all the same. The 1988 version of Imaginos somehow the best BÖC album after Fire of Unknown Origin, even if some would contest its status as a BÖC album to begin with. I will try and do it justice the best I can.

Overall, the sound of this album is probably its biggest problem. The songwriting is excellent and on par with the best material from BÖC's golden age, which is fitting, as most of it was written in the mid-late 70s. Sadly, the countless overdubs from both session musicians and the members of the classic lineup, combined with extensive meddling by the label, resulted in what's often described as "overproduction". This, in conjunction with the fact this was all happening in the late 80s, mean that the final album winds up with a very artificial, blown-out, "corporate rock" that's not careful enough with its bombast. Thankfully, the songs are good enough that I can totally get into them even though they've been buried under layers upon layers of the worst production trends of the 80s. I'd kill to hear a version of this done in 1978, or a finished version of the solo album Albert was working on around 1983.

Even if we ignore the dream of what it might've been in a better world, howevever, reviewing the 1988 album runs into a bit of a complication. In a choice completely baffling for a rock opera, the label rearranged the track listing, rendering the already-dense story nearly incomprehensible due to being told out of chronological order. The track sequencing on the released album isn't even that great on a purely musical level, with what I'd consider completely baffling placements for some songs. As a result, I feel it's best to review the songs in isolate, looking at each one on its own in (roughly) chronological order without any commentary on how the tracks flow together or how the album opens and closes. I also do not intend this review to be a primer or analysis of the Imaginos storyline, as others have done far better work on that, but I will summarize the events of each in brief.

"Les Invisibles" serves as kind of a prelude to the story, introducing us to the sinister alien beings whose machinations have secretly driven much of human history. This song features very a prominent example of this album's musical signature: repetitive and ritualistic chanting that adds to the occult and even slightly psychedelic vibe at play here. Here, the chanting is a near-constant "seven, seven, seven, seven, seven, seven, seven", the sacred number of the titular aliens. The instrumental is decent enough despite being very, very "80s", and I'm quite fond of the guitar solo too. The lyrics are as cryptic as always, but a careful reading paired with the liner notes tell us much about the aliens for which it is named. They are Lovecraftian entities with great knowledge of the occult sciences, and there are, of course, seven of them. Humanity has known them through many guises or "masks": the Loa of Haitian Voodoo, the Mesopotamian Apkallu or "Seven Sages", and the gods of Mesoamerican mythology. In ancient times, they operated in the Old World, but had come to reside in the Americas, where the native peoples supplicated them with worship prior to the arrival of the European colonial powers. The conflict between the Old World and the New, is a central theme in Imaginos.

The title track properly introduces our protagonist, telling us of his youth and discovery of his strange powers of shapeshifting and foresight. It features a guest vocalist, Jon Rogers, who while competent, isn't quite as good as Eric or Buck. Nevertheless, it's got a really catchy chorus and a sing-along outro. Even here, there's a bit of the signature repetitive chanting, with "ooooh, Imaginos" throughout, and "last chance!" in the outro. It's just a really fun rock song, drenched in overproduction though it might be. Guitar solo's pretty decent too, though the session guitarist gives quite a different feel from any of Buck's work.

"Del Rio's Song" sees Imaginos, guided by mysterious visions of buried treasure, traveling to Mexico by ship. The coolest thing here is a spoken-word bridge, where Imaginos' inner monologue is directly narrated to us. It's just kind of a cool effect, though lyrically it's just as cryptic and loaded with vague imagery as the rest of the record. The chorus has a fun call-and-response thing going on ("Del Rio's song", "oh, Del Rio!") and while I'm not the biggest fan of the guitars here, I like how they bookend the spoken word section.

The self-titled "Blue Öyster Cult" is technically a remake of Secret Treaties' "Subhuman", but it has almost nothing in common with that song musically outside of reusing its lyrics. Even those are greatly expanded here, giving us MUCH more context around Imaginos' death and rebirth as the earthly agent of Les Invisibles. This is probably the "proggiest" song on the 1988 album, and it's my favorite track here too. In spite of everything going on behind the scenes, the instrumental here shows remarkable restraint, with more focus on creating atmosphere than the loud bombast that most of this album goes for. A comparison between this and the demo recording of Albert's solo version, you can tell the label didn't muck with it too much outside of adding the typical 80s glaze the whole album is covered in. As usual, we've got plenty of ritualistic chanting, with the vocals in the song's second half being nothing but a back-and-forth between "we understand, we understand, we understand" and "Blue Öyster Cult".

"I Am the One You Warned Me Of" was placed as the opening track when the album's tracklist was muddled up by the label. It may, however, have been an in-media-res opener to even the original version of the record, as it's a good opener that serves as a kind of "overture" to the storyline, introducing Imaginos (or as he's now known, Desdinova) and his mission of sowing chaos in Europe for his otherworldly patrons. Like them, he wears many masks, taking on different identities with his power to shapeshift and manipulating people to provoke wars and conflicts. He is reminiscent both of semi-mythical figures such as the Count Saint-Germain and Cagliostro, as well as Lovecraft's own Nyarlathotep, an immortal alien horror in human guise who beguiles the courts of Europe for mysterious and siniser ends. This song, especially its guitar tone and backing vocals, is EXTREMELY bombastic in the most irritating way, and I should hate it?but it's just so damn catchy that I don't care! I can't help but sing along with it, especially the bridge section, every time I listen to it. I even like the little guitar solo at the end. It's just plain fun, that's all I can say.

"The Siege and Investiture of Baron von Frankenstein's Castle at Weisseria". That's certainly a mouthful of a title, and it's quite fitting, as this song is probably the worst offender when it comes to the overblown and overproduced sound of this album. The fact that Joe Satriani of all people is the session musician credited with this song's lead guitar parts should tell you all you need to know about how it sounds. It's not nearly as catchy as I Am the One is either, and to top things off, we've got another guest vocalist who gets a little grating at times. All of that said, though?this song really goes heavy on the chanting, which I love. First the call-and-response of "imagine he was me, and I was called" and "Frankenstein!", then "Carpe Diem!", and finally "World Without End!" It also plays an interesting role in the story, with Imaginos taking on the role of the "Baron von Frankenstein" and distributing an alchemical miracle drug, "World Without End", to soldiers during (what's implied to be) the Franco-Prussian war. Imaginos guides and accelerates the development of human technology along destructive lines, serving as a "modern Prometheus" in the same manner as the titular doctor in the novel from which he takes this alias.

Of course, you can't have Imaginos without some version of "Astronomy". Like with Subhuman and its new rendition, the lyrics are basically the only thing this song shares in common with its counterpart on Secret Treaties. Unlike with that song, though, this is a bit of a step down from the 1974 original. It certainly has its own appeal to it, but the atmosphere and mystique of the original has been replaced with more of a driving, propulsive conventional rock song. I couldn't really see the original Astronomy getting radio play, but I definitely can imagine that for this version. There is still a kind of "mystical" feel here, aided by Buck's vocals (which are the one element of this version I prefer), and the "Hey!" chants are the one musical element of the original that this new rendition carries over from the original. It's got a cool guitar solo too, one of the better ones on this album. The placement of this song in the Imaginos story, I should note, is very ambiguous. It definitely takes place after the self-titled track, but it's otherwise not fixed to any particular point in the narrative. The lyrics are, of course, highly abstract, with the only clear events being a rendezvous between Desdinova and the equally enigmatic recurring character of "Suzy" under the cover of darkness. Their meeting occurs on the beach, matching the aquatic imagery of Les Invisibles as well as Sandy's childhood home in Long Island, and the symbolic "Four Winds Bar" referenced in the lyrics seems to represent the Earth as a whole.

"In the Presence of Another World" is much like Astronomy in that its narrative role is somewhat chronologically ambiguous. I feel it makes sense here, though. Like the self-titled track, this song pleasantly surprises with less bombast and more atmosphere. There's certainly a lot of blaring guitars and loud production, sure, but they're worked into the song in a way that contrasts well with the quiet, piano-driven parts. After four minutes, this song gives way to a lengthy outro which is easily one of the coolest moments on the whole album. It's here we find the peak of the chanting motifs, with male and female backing vocalists alternating between and overlapping with one another to recite a poem (or incantation) about the unnatural birth, occult knowledge, and secret alien nature of Imaginos. "Seven years of labor for the instruments of time" and the closer of "the buried city in the stars!" are particularly memorable. This song is also one of the few for which an earlier demo, recorded in 1978, has been unearthed by one of the band's engineers and unofficially released online. While this demo is superior to the final version in most respects, it unfortunately completely lacks the chanted outro, which gives this final product quite a bit of an edge over it.

"Magna of Illusion" is the final part of the album's narrative, and works pretty well as a closing track musically as well. The story here concerns Imaginos, using the identity of a sea captain in Cornwall, returning to Mexico once again in search of treasure. This time, however, it's an Aztec obsidian mirror through which Les Invisibles can corrupt the minds of Europe's rulers directly. With his actions as Desdinova putting all the dominoes in place, the mirror serves to push things over, igniting the Great War. This song mirrors Del Rio's Song not just narratively, but musically as well, featuring a similar spoken-word section. This time, however, the spoken word is blended with third-person narration, and depicts Imaginos as a gloriously hammy and theatrical character. It's just really fun! Buck's vocals here are almost talk-sung in places as well, and this song is far and away the most focused on storytelling more than it is on the music. The backing vocals are cool, though, and I like the outro where the final word, "lust", is drawn out as long as possible.

Albert Bouchard has certainly attempted to reconstruct and "finish" Imaginos, but his acoustic rendition of the original album and its sequels (themselves a kind of loose "outline" of the story done partly through recontextualized covers of other BÖC songs) leave a lot to be desired for. His rendition of the album also bafflingly changes many plot points, such as making the Baron a separate character from Imaginos himself. Of course, Sandy frequently went back and forth making huge changes to the story (at one point, he had Imaginos and Desdinova as separate characters!), so that's nothing new. It's likely we will never see a single, coherent, "final" version of Imaginos, but what we have in the 1988 album is still quite fascinating. In spite of the garish and overblown 80s production, there's still a lot to love here, and the story at least is conveyed in an interesting way if you line up the tracks chronologically. By all means I shouldn't be giving this a perfect score, given all the issues with the production, the overdubs, and the sound, but I am regardless. It's just such a unique record, one that's so endearing to me. I can't say it's quite as good as Secret Treaties or Fire of Unknown Origin, but Imaginos finds itself occupying a very strange place among BÖC's best.

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