My 39th Anniversary

[Chris Baker]

We're within a month of the 40th Anniversary BOC show, and todays is the
39th anniversary of my exposure to the band.  Pasted below is what I posted
on the AOL BOC board on the 25th anniversary.

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Subject: 25 years, 5/8 of my life
Date: Tue, Oct 6, 1998 21:26 EDT
From: Chris Baker
 
I realized that today marks the 25th anniversary of the first live rock and
roll I ever experienced, BOC at NYC's Academy of Music.  I walked in a fan
of headliner Slade, largely on the basis of their live album; I had never
heard a single BOC track.  The first thing I noticed upon entering was the
number of people wearing BOC shirts, plus a lot of home-made Cult symbols on
denim jackets, etc.  I hadn't given much thought to the openers before
seeing all of this - I was dimly aware that they were on their home turf,
but clearly the following they had was pretty fanatical; the Cult-identified
audience members seemed pretty amped up.  (I remember a [Rolling Stone?]
review of the band's New Year's show at this venue that likened the
ticket-holders' line to kids who "looked like they just shot their way out
of a concentration camp").
 
Another phrase I recall from that piece:  the band opening their set "as
though shot from a cannon". It's interesting to read reviews from that era
and see writers struggling to come up with apt analogies for what in
retrospect was clearly a premeditated, unprovoked and unprecedentedly
vicious assault on the senses.  The band opened up with "The Red and the
Black", although of course I didn't know its name (and certainly didn't
glean it from the lyrics);  all I knew was that my ribs were vibrating like
tuning forks in lockstep to some kind of hyperventilating
boogie-riff-gone-psychotic and it felt as though I'd stuck my head into a
windtunnel during a test of a prototype multipercussive jet engine.
 
Evil?  This was beyond evil; this was distilled essence of metallic
propulsion, jacked to the maximum, shorn of all sentiment, emotion, or
reason, and delivered in interlocking / overlapping jackhammer tempos that
imploded on themselves in a shrieking black maelstrom of corrosive rage and
inhuman ferocity.  This ex-altar boy had been waiting all his life for
something that sounded like this, and just hadn't known it!
 
All the clothes and instruments were black and white, it was as though the
unholy wedding of velocity and earshredding volume washing offstage had
sucked the optical spectrum dry, bled it of color╔  Everyone was in leather
except the guitarist, who just stood there, eyes focused out beyond the
lighting rigs on...Mars?  Saturn?  Who knew?  But from the absurdly fast
clip at which his hands and fingers moved, it was clear that he had at least
temporarily given over control of his human husk to some advanced and
sonically-hostile lifeform.
 
Bolle Gregmar claims that this show provided the line about the whip that
ended up on On Your Feet... I don't think he's correct, I don't believe that
the band was recording for that album 18 months before its release.  They
played this same venue almost exactly a year later, which I find more
likely.  However I do remember Albert Bouchard's rap from behind the drum
kit at one point:
 
"So I'm driving along and I pick up this guy hitch-hiking...he sees the BOC
sign on the dashboard and he says "Hey man, are you into the Cult?".  I
said, "I'm not just into them, man, I'm in them...I'm the drummer!"  He
says, "Far out, man!" ...   Then I asked him "So how does our music make you
feel?  Does it make you feel good?...Or does it make you feel bad?"
 
He thinks a minute and says, "Well, it don't make me feel good ...
but then again, it don't make me feel bad...
You know how it makes me feel?
...it makes me feel...(strange chuckle)
...it makes me feel....(ominous low laugh)
...it makes me feel...(certifiably insane cackle)
...IT MAKES ME FEEL.... EVILLLLLLL!!!!"
 
And that's my introduction to "Cities on Flame".
 
I can no longer remember how many days it took before the ringing left my
ears...it was more than a couple, though, and I'd bought "Tyranny and
Mutation" before they cleared up completely.  And I managed to get to
another three shows in the six months after this. I remember there was
always one thing I told people about the band's performances:  "they don't
make any mistakes".  Which wasn't true, of course, but the point is that I
believed it was:  such was the brutal efficiency of the bandss presentation
and the high-wire audacity of their split-second sonic changeups.
 
Thanks to all the current and past band members, who are responsible for a
slew of the best live performances and studio recordings I have ever heard;
and to all the other fans who have shared my enthusiasm over the years.  I
promise to write something shorter in 2023 :-)
 
-Chris Baker
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Two contemporary comments about my reaction to this show: hard to stress
enough how shocked I was at the volume, which seemed like a physical force;
I distinctly remember thinking "is it LEGAL to play this loud at an
audience?".  Of course a lot of that was never having seen a band live - but
I think BOC were unusually extreme. I felt like I could hear everything,
though, which hasn't been the case with frustratingly poor sound at a lot of
shows over the years.

The other was my friend and I talking about how the band didn't seem to have
a "leader" - Eric and Buck were obvious focal points, but Albert was too,
doing a lot of scene-stealing stuff behind the drum kit (sending sticks
repeatedly flying high into the air, etc.)

Seeing the band four months later - as they previewed "Secret Treaties"
tunes on a bill with a self-immolating Iggy and the Stooges, and the
Dictators in their second professional show - was the greatest night of rock
and roll I've ever experienced.  But this show was a close second.

-Chris