I was seventeen and eighteen years old in 1974.
1974 holds an abundance of memories for me. During the winter of '73, I hung out with a band that lived next door to me. Their name escapes me now, but they were fun guys (some of them anyway). Through their guitar player, I was able to pick up some part time work for a well known and highly respected furniture company called Paul Schatz Furniture in the Hollywood district of Portland. I was hired to knock down a wall in the basement to enlarge a storage room. When that task was finished, I helped move furnture for the show rooms. By 1974, I was working full time. My first real job was with a company called Rol-A-Way Truck Manufacturing Company. I was hired in shipping and receiving to basically clean and ship finished industry trucks such as hand trucks, rolling shelves with ladders, clothing racks, and hospital carts. I believe my starting wage was $3.50 or $3.75 an hour. I stayed with Rol-A-Way for three years. Every Christmas we got an extra week's pay, a five pound box of candy, and a ham! You just couldn't beat that at Christmas time! Often, my job duties expanded to grinding sheet metal. This was a bizarre job as I would run long sheets of metal over a grinding belt. They were literal sheets around four feet by five feet square. I had to hold one up, run one edge along the belt, then flip it, catch it, and run the other side. Eventually I ran eight sides across the belt. It was nerve-wracking in the sense that I always half-expected to lose my grip, and the sheet would hit the belt and slice me in half! I hated those grinding days because the sheets came on pallets of about 200-300 sheets. When I finally finished, they'd push over another pallet!
Though the work was both intense and repetitive at the same time, I have extremely fond memories of that sheet metal factory. The characters I worked with, the feel of the place in both winter and summer, plus all the years I spent there are now an important part of my life. I stayed with Rol-A-Way for three years.
On Your Feet, or On Your Knees.
Musically, I was growing and growing. Having hit a sort of "dead zone" for new bands, my best friend's wife told me about a band that she thought was really cool. I was apprehensive because her tastes ran from The Ohio Players, Earth, Wind, & Fire, to Bette Midler. All of these were completely out of my rock network. However, she described this group as being "strange," so I thought I'd give them a try. This was one of the greatest discoveries of my life.
The band was called Blue Oyster Cult. I eventually bought every album they had, and became a true cult aficionado. This love affair lasted, and continues to last to this day. Blue Oyster Cult was at the very core of hard rock. Their spin was the "dark side," or "netherworld" bowing to a dark master. Their lyrics were as strange as any could be, but their songs were great.
Eric Bloom: lead vocals and guitar, Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser: vocals and lead guitar, Albert Bouchard: drums, vocals and guitar, Joe Bouchard: bass, vocals and guitar, & Alan Lanier: keyboards, guitar and backing vocals were the Blue Oyster Cult.
Whips and chains. With the exception guitarist Buck Dharma who wore white, the cult arrived in black leather, chain belts, studded boots, and too much damned energy for their own good.
Songs like "The Red and the Black" and "The Subhuman" were pure standout pieces guaranteed to mystify young cultheads into trying desperately to understand their lyrics. The lyrics were, in a word, strange.
"Career Of Evil"
I plot your rubric scarab, I steal your satellite
I want your wife to be my baby tonight
I choose to steal what you chose to show
And you know I will not apologize
Your mine for the taking
I'm making a career of evil
Pay me I'll be your surgeon, I'd like to pick your brains
Capture you, Inject you, leave you kneeling in the rain
I choose to steal what you chose to show
And you know I will not apologize
Your mine for the taking
I'm making a career of evil
I'd like your blue eyed horseshoe, I'd like your emerald horny toad
I'd like to do it to your daughter on a dirt road
And then I'd spend your ransom money, but still I'd keep your sheep
I'd peel the mask your wearing, and then rob you of your sleep
I choose to steal what you chose to show
And you know I will not apologize
Your mine for the taking
I'm making a career of evil.
Blue Oyster Cult had one outstanding feature that at the time, no other bands had: all five of them were guitarists, and at one point during their shows, they all get up on stage for a five-man guitar blow out. No drums, no keyboards, just all guitar. This was pretty darned impressive. Their live double album titled "On Your Feet, Or On Your Knees" was a hot live album but suffered from its original mastering. Lead guitarist Buck Dharma's guitar wasn't as strong through one channel, and sounded as though it was coming from a distance. Their studio albums I picked up later, and seemed rather strange in comparison. Their second release "Tyranny and Mutation" seemed so unworthy of their then "Heavy Metal" reputation. The album "Secret Treaties" was the album to buy! The songs and performances were great, offering some of their best material. My favorites in order were: "Flaming Telepaths", "Career of Evil", "Dominance and Submission", and "Astronomy."
The albums listed above are what I consider to be their best years. After that, they got a lot of FM air time due to their monster hits "Godzilla," "Don't Fear the Reaper," and "Burnin' For You", but I felt that their style had been messed with. For the raw and unleashed Blue Oyster Cult, check out the albums mentioned above.Big Stereo, Bigger Sound
Marantz was what it was all about for me in 1974. Using my first big tax refund, I bought a Marantz 1070 amp with a set of Advent speakers. Advent was probably the best speakers on the market at the time, very expensive, and very rich in sound. Big stereos were commonplace in the 70's. I went through a couple of turntables, one being a Pioneer, the other a BSR McDonald. I later added a JVC cassette deck which turned out to be nothing but crap. I love remembering those dinosaur stereo systems. They were big, and they put out bigger!
My Favorite Albums on 1974.
1974 was an awesome year for new music. There were lots of great albums I was into at this time, stuff like Fleetwood Mac's "Future Games" and "Mystery to Me", "Houses of the Holy" by Led Zeppelin, and Mott the Hoople's "All the Young Dudes". I bought the "Live Dates" double album by Wishbone Ash because their studio works to me were too tame. "Live" was a marvelous LP with outstanding concert performances. Guitarist Andy Powell had a way with running powerfully familiar scales in the same manner as my guitar hero David Gilmour. Another series of dynamite discoveries came from Ted Nugent's premiere album and the same from a band called Rush My first intro to Rush was with "Fly by Night". I also became immersed in the likes of Lucifer's Friend, Nektar, and Supertramp. The latter, whose album "Indelibly Stamped" was interesting, but not amazing to me.
Then the clouds lifted and the sun exploded in the form of a hot German band simply called Scorpions I discovered the Scorps from buying their "In Trance" album. I bought it because to me it was (and still is) the sexiest, hottest album cover I'd ever seen. The hot blonde going crazy on an equally sexy guitar--a Fender Stratocaster--was too much to be believed. It was like whatever was coming from that guitar was driving her nuts. Naturally, I had to buy this record! Were my instincts right on! This was one of the best, hardest-hitting heavy metal rock bands of the period. Lead guitarist Uli Jon Roth was amazing. From there, The Scorpions were blazing in the world of rock and metal. The album "Virgin Killer" is probably their hottest, in my opinion, of course.
Next up on the scene was Judas Priest. Rock was now officially heavy metal.
Elektronika and Heavy Metal
Fascinating new musical styles were beginning to stir me with my introduction of a 3-man group from Germany known as "Tangerine Dream." I began my psychological journeys with TD with their album titled "Zeit." All three played synthesizers, but each focused on another instrument as well. Primarily, Edgar Froese was on guitar, Peter Baumann keyboards, and the now legendary composer Christopher Franke was on percussion. 
By 1975, a supergroup had emerged. Their name: Journey. Bear in mind now, that this was the pre-Steve Perry Journey, so the music was much, much different. It was guitar and keyboard driven hard rock of superior quality. The first album is pretty good, and the song "Of a Lifetime" got the most play. The tune "Kahoutek", a hard instrumental, was pretty strong with great Neal Schon guitar wizardry. Though I enjoyed the 80's Journey, there was nothing like their early 70's days.
Rush was living proof that a sublime rock universe lay beyond the valley of six strings and synthesizers. Perhaps one of the most profound forces of hard rock in the 70's, Rush has managed to carve their name in every decade since. Their masterpiece 2112 told the story of a futuristic society that has banned just about every joy that a former civilization had come to know. With this entry, Rush owned the 70's. 2112 was just as beautiful live in concert as it was on record. For a 3-man band, Rush could create a thunderstorm of guitars, and drummer Neal Peart re-defined rock techno-drumming to become one of the most imitated hitters in the biz. Soon, every drummer on the block wanted tuned percussion and roto-toms. Suddenly, hard rock was getting sharper, edgier, tighter, and the sound was heavy, yet clean. It was becoming "Heavy Metal."
For me, there's no way to quickly sum up Deep Purple except to say YES!! The summer of 1974 saw the arrival of one white-hot double live album from them called Made in Japan. Following on the boot heels of their smash album "Machine Head", This LP was Deep Purple at their very best. Like Jane's live double album, they gave us a basic run of "greatest hits live." Monster performances on this album would have to be "Highway Star," "Sweet Child in Time," and "Lazy."
