Blue Oyster Cult are coming to The Space at Westbury on Thanksgiving Eve, November 22nd, 2023. We recently caught up with guitarist Eric Bloom by Zoom to talk about the show. The first question had to be, what is it like when Blue Oyster Cult can come home and play at home on the Island. That prompted Eric to talk about a band house they had in Great Neck. That was going back to around 1967 or 1968. That was one of many band houses BOC had on Long Island.

We also spoke about the set list. Eric shared the fact that he is who writes the set list. He said he will write it about half an hour to 45 minutes before show time. He spoke about having a certain outline he works with. But he also considers what kind of show they are doing. He said Westbury will be fans, hard core fans of the band because it is Long Island. With that in mind Eric said he will “Dig deep and try and come up with some deep tracks for that show.”

The signature BOC sound has to do with Eric’s voice as well as the voice of Buck Dharma. It also has to do with the guitars Eric and Buck are known for. Eric for his Gibson SG and Buck for his Steinberger guitar. Eric assured me he would have his SG at this show. But when speaking of guitars he also mentioned guitarist Richie Castellano who has been with the band about 18 years now, also being up in the mix. The band still very much operates as a band. Eric also made mention of Bassist Danny Miranda and Drummer Jules Radino, also “Long Island guys.” Eric spoke about carrying forward that “Rock, garage band” feeling that they started with in the 60′s.

That’s when Eric spoke about their album “50th Anniversay Live - First Night” coming out December 8th, 2023. He mentioned how the band’s original Drummer Labert Bouchard was a part of the shows that the album came from. Eric talked about Albert being part of the “Nucleus of the founding fathers, shall we say.” Across all that Eric said they two to three genrations of fans. He talked about some original fans coming to shows and some times bringing their children and some times even their grandchildren. He mentioned some younger fans who come to shows after seeing the Saturday Night Live “More cowbell” skit.

With SNL coming up, I had to ask, BOC has never been a musical guest on the show, would they do it? Eric felt that the band would, but they were never asked to, which he then dropped an amusic expletive. I suggested there that we should start a petition and get the band on the show. Eric suggested they do the skit again only using the actual Blue Oyster Cult band members.

We took some time to speak about new music. If the writing is something that he feels compelled to do from inside. Eric said every member of the band seems to always be working on something. In here Eric really spoke about the band’s “Secret ingredient” in Richie Castellano. He mentioned more than a few projects Richie currently has going.

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