‘SNL’ Forced Blue Öyster Cult to Put the Cowbell Back in Their Live Shows

Saturday Night Live gave Blue Öyster Cult’s following a fever.

On April 8, 2000, SNL aired a sketch written by and starring Will Ferrell that would change the course of music history forever — or, at least, it would change the way everyone in the crowd treated Blue Öyster Cult during their tours. With Ferrell, Jimmy Fallon, Chris Kattan, Chris Parnell and Horatio Sanz all playing the psychedelic rock band from Stony Brook, New York and guest host Christopher Walken in the role of a producer who is passionate about a certain percussion part, “More Cowbell” was an immediate hit, and, in the nearly quarter-century since its airing, the sketch has become one of the most over-quoted SNL skits in the show’s long history.

Blue Öyster Cult co-founder Donald “Buck Dharma” Roeser recently spoke to Vulture about the band’s relationship with the sketch, and he revealed that, before “More Cowbell,” the band hadn’t played the cowbell in “(Don’t Fear) the Reaper” live in 20 years. That all changed when Walken wrote them a prescription.

“Sometimes you just get carried along by the culture. You don’t really control it,” Buck Dharma said of the influence “More Cowbell” had on his career. “We’re all riding the worm like in Dune. The worm knows where it’s going.”

Buck Dharma explained that, in the actual recording session for “(Don’t Fear) the Reaper,” there were no explosive fights over the rhythm section, and nobody was “exploring the space” with quite the ferocity of Ferrell. “In reality, the cowbell was an afterthought on the part of David Lucas, who was one of the producers of that record,” Buck Dharma explained of who we assume was Bruce Dickinson’s sidekick. “He thought that the groove in the verses could use a stead-four on the floor accent, because the drum part didn’t sound quite like that. Also, it wasn’t unusual to put a cowbell on a song. It wasn’t an idea that was unique or unheard of.” 

“I’ve never met Will Ferrell, but I would love to ask him how he conceived the idea of the cowbell, because the cowbell has become such an iconic cultural touchstone,” Buck Dharma said, explaining that he’s grateful for the impact the sketch had on BÖC, even if it gets overwhelming. “It just overtook the band in a lot of respects in the same way when people come up to Christopher Walken, who’s had such a storied career, and all they say to him is, ‘I need more cowbell.’ I’m sympathetic to that. I have never contested the basic hilarity of the sketch.”

After “More Cowbell” became a hit, Buck Dharma and BÖC had no choice but to change up their formula. “We began playing the cowbell in ‘(Don’t Fear) The Reaper’ live. For 20-odd years, we didn’t use a live cowbell for our shows and never considered it,” Buck Dharma said of the sketch’s aftermath. “We had to play the cowbell because there was just no getting away from it. I’m grateful that as significant as the sketch is — because after 25 years, it still is — it didn’t kill the song, its original intent or its original mood. It’s still used as a cue in horror movies when you want that mysterious and metaphysically uneasy vibe. So I’m glad the sketch didn’t kill the song and didn’t make it one big joke.”

If anything, “More Cowbell” saved “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” by reminding BÖC that the cowbell was the beating heart of the hit song. Now, they’re all wearing gold-plated diapers.