Blue Öyster Cult "Secret Treaties"

Secret Treaties is the third studio album by the American hard rock band Blue Öyster Cult, released in 1974 by Columbia Records. The album spent 14 weeks in the US album charts, peaking at No. 53. It was certified gold by the RIAA in 1992.

In 1975, a poll of critics of the British magazine Melody Maker voted Secret Treaties as the "Top Rock Album of All Time". In 2010, Rhapsody called it one of the all-time best "proto-metal" albums.

Many songs from this album found their way into BÖC playlists over the following years, including "Career of Evil", "Subhuman", "Astronomy" and "Harvester of Eyes". It is the only Blue Öyster Cult album that does not feature any track with lead vocals by guitarist Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser. The band also did not write any of the lyrics to the album, handing that duty off to producer Sandy Pearlman, rock critic Richard Meltzer and Patti Smith.

The cover, with art by Ron Lesser, depicts the band standing beside and sitting on a German Me-262 fighter aircraft; this scene is inspired by the song of the same name.


While the LP cover has the band name in red (a darker red on the Japanese LP), on the CD it is in lime green.

Lyrics to the lead-off track "Career of Evil" were written by future punk poet Patti Smith, a longtime contributor to the band (and, at the time, the girlfriend of BÖC keyboardist and rhythm guitarist Allen Lanier).

A few changes were made to "Career of Evil" on the single version. The vocals are different: only Eric Bloom is heard for most of the song, instead of Bloom and Albert Bouchard singing together. Also, one verse was removed ("Pay me..." to "...kneeling in the rain"). Part of the bridge was changed also, presumably to make the song more acceptable to radio: "do it to your daughter" became "do it like you oughtta." The line "I want your wife to be my baby tonight" was changed to "I want your life to be mine, maybe tonight".

"Career of Evil" was the inspiration for the title of the 2015 novel of the same name written by J.K. Rowling under the pen name Robert Galbraith.

The compilation Don't Fear the Reaper: The Best of Blue Öyster Cult contains a version of "Flaming Telepaths" without the music box intro. The original version with the complete sound effects is on the collection Workshop of the Telescopes.


The psychedelic folk group Espers covers "Flaming Telepaths" on their CD, The Weed Tree in 2005.