SECRET TREATIES

The occult and psychedelic branch of Blue Öyster Cult's prog-tinted heavy rock culminates early on with 1974's 'Secret Treaties', the band's third LP, and one of the most commercially successful and overall most consistent releases of the band; This album takes the adventurous nature of their two preceding albums as well as the group's fascinating psychedelic inclinations, and offers a collection of eight tracks bolstering some stunning riffs and excellent hooks, with many of the songs becoming BÖC classics. Still, it is well-known that the band did not write any of the lyrics and Buck Dharma did not sing on any of the album's songs, which kind of gives 'Secret Treaties' a supernatural aura, almost like the "black sheep" of the catalogue, as the record explores power, politics, and sexuality.

And while this album anticipates the heavy rock explosion of the late 70s with its nasty licks and ferocious energy, there is also the radio-friendly flair that has always been an asset of BÖC's very own branch of rock music. With the sing-along choruses and the Vanilla Fudge-like keyboard leads, 'Secret Treaties' probably owes a lot of its success to the brilliant combination of the occult and the adventurous with the accessible and the memorable, an album that is charged up and driven as well as punctual and polished, there are many qualities to observe and appreciate within this bold 1974 release. The first side is virtually perfect, with classic tunes like 'Career of Evil' and 'Dominance and Submission', together with the moody and elegant 'Subhuman' and the powerful 'ME 262'. At the same time, with the four songs on side two, the album loses some of its steam - tracks like 'Harvester of Eyes' and 'Astronomy' do meander a little, but this surely does not undermine the cult status of the album, which is by any standard one of the great hard rock releases of the early 70s, with its self-aware mixture of commerciality and power.

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