CD Odyssey Disc 1576: Alice Cooper

I took the day off today and I then loaded it with stuff to do. The various activities are evenly divided between chores and fun. I declare this day half full, because that’s how I roll.

Disc 1576 is…. Detroit Stories

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2021

What’s up with the Cover?  In Gotham, when you need assistance, you flash the image of a bat into the sky. In Detroit, you go with Alice Cooper eyes. In either case expect a vaguely disturbed do-gooder to show up.

How I Came To Know It: I have been an Alice Cooper fan since I counted my years on this earth in single digits. This was just me buying his latest album.

How It Stacks Up: I have 28 Alice Cooper albums, which I think is all of them. Of those 28, “Detroit Stories” is neither the best of them, nor the worst. I rank it at #16, just after “Along Came a Spider” and just before “Zipper Catches Skin”. I don't feel like reproducing the whole list, but if you want to see it (and imagine the change above) just check out my review of “Paranormal” back at Disc 1038.

Ratings: 3 stars

Alice Cooper turned 73 the year “Detroit Stories” came out, and while most rock acts his age are out touring all their old hits, Cooper is out touring his old hits and putting new music into the world that is worthy of his long and storied career. “Detroit Stories” is the latest of these, a COVID-era release with a wide range of songs that covers the many styles Cooper has tried on for size through his 50-year career, tying them loosely to his adoptive home of Detroit City.

My relationship with Alice Cooper is almost as long as his career, first coming to hear his music on a compilation record released in 1974 my brother brought home one day. He’s had good records, and bad ones but he’s never stopped trying for something new and interesting.

As noted in the “stacks up” section above, “Detroit Stories” falls somewhere in the middle, and feels a bit like a retrospective. I guess we were all a little introspective as we were locked in our houses over the last couple of years, but Alice being Alice, he channeled it into music.

The record is mostly originals, but it starts with a cover of the Lou Reed song, “Rock & Roll”. It is hard to mess up this classic, but even so Cooper does some solid work with it, converting it a couple steps further into the thump of the rock world, without losing the visceral quality of the original. Cooper’s vocals are in fine form, showing very little wear and tear over his long career. This is no doubt aided by the many recent decades of sobriety under his belt.

The record shows much love to the various sounds that have emerged from Detroit over the past many decades, giving the record a hard, industrial feel overall. He also works in some Motown influences, most notably on “$1000 High Heeled Shoes”. This song features a funky guitar lick and some backup singers cooing “Shoo Doowop!” with a flair that would make the Supremes proud. Cooper pairs this with a chorus that is pure rock, but the transition from funk to rock is so smooth you hardly notice.

Cooper goes back to his early days with “Our Love Will Change the World” which would be at home on albums like “Muscle of Love” or “Welcome To My Nightmare”. It has that sing-song Broadway musical quality that Cooper loves to throw in on records when he thinks no one is looking.

On “Social Debris” he brings back the old Alice Cooper band. These guys can still play and it is evident they take a good bit of joy in doing it together again. The song has a bit of Cooper’s metal years, but infused with the energy of his old band, and once again the crossover is seamless. The band gathers again later on the record for “I Hate You” where they all get to mock and pretend to hate one another. I expect it was both therapeutic and fun in the studio, but both the lyrics and delivery are awkward and self-absorbed. Stick to “Social Debris” if you enjoy the idea of a reunion.

Near the end of the record, Cooper delivers the equally hokey “Hanging by a Thread” which is a COVID song reminding fans to have hope and not give in to despair. This one, despite its obviousness and a whole lot of Cooper making public service announcements like a congressman with some paid TV time, still ended up being a guilty pleasure for me. I think I just like the chorus, and as a result I’m willing to forgive the more stilted parts. You may feel otherwise.

Overall, this record is Alice Cooper returning to his roots, but in the process he reminds us those are complex roots that spread through multiple styles of music across many generations of evolution with each. Cooper is a key figure across the landscape of musical history, and this record is a fitting homage to his work, while also being a fitting homage to his favourite town.

Best tracks: Rock & Roll, Our Love Will Change the World, Social Debris, $1000 High Heel Shoes, Hanging by a Thread

CD Odyssey Disc 1038: Alice Cooper

There’s nothing better than waking up on a Sunday and realizing that you are only mid-way through your long weekend.

After a fruitless day of shopping for my dream car (so close…) last night I got to spend some quality time with friends listening to music, which made it all better. I wanted to get a song off this next album onto one of my playlists but couldn’t quite manage it.

Disc 1038 is…Paranormal

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2017

What’s up with the Cover? A two-headed Alice Cooper. Alice probably thinks this cover is cool, but it is actually silly and a little dated. The booklet features a bunch more pictures from this ill-fated photo shoot, where Alice tries to look edgy and scary. Thankfully the music makes up for the bad cover art.

How I Came To Know It: I’ve known and loved Alice Cooper all my life, and this was just me buying his latest album. I purchased it the day it came out after a day of fretting the music store wouldn’t have it in yet. They did.

How It Stacks Up:  I have all 27 of Alice Cooper’s studio albums (plus one weird compilation album I’ve since sold). “Paranormal” comes in at a solid #13 on that list.

When I reviewed Dirty Diamonds back at Disc 1003 I ranked all the albums, not realizing he was about to break his six year studio silence. That’s OK – here’s the list again for those of you who missed it – now with “Paranormal” bumping “Dirty Diamonds” down one spot, along with everything beneath it:

1. Billion Dollar Babies: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 228)
2. Love it to Death: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 604)
3. From the Inside: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 99)
4. Welcome To My Nightmare: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 449)
5. Killer: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 429)
6. Muscle of Love: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 357)
7. Alice Cooper Goes to Hell: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 447)
8. Da Da: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 18)
9. School’s Out: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 406)
10. Lace and Whiskey: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 180)
11. The Last Temptation: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 710)
12. Dragontown: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 950)
13. Paranormal: 3 stars (reviewed right here)
14. Dirty Diamonds: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 1003)
15. Along Came a Spider: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 164)
16. Zipper Catches Skin: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 355)
17. Flush the Fashion: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 264)
18. Special Forces: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 354)
19. Constrictor: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 89)
20. Raise Your Fist and Yell: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 286)
21. Easy Action: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 444)
22. Pretties for You: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 152)
23. Hey Stoopid: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 345)
24. Trash: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 343)
25. Welcome 2 My Nightmare: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 956)
26. Brutal Planet: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 833)
27. The Eyes of Alice Cooper: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 439)
28. Science Fiction: 1 star (reviewed at Disc 661)

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

“Paranormal” features two songs co-written and performed with the original Alice Cooper band, which is fitting given how this album bridges the gap between Cooper’s early work and his more recent sound.

The record has the clean post-metal production that Cooper has preferred on his last three or four records, crossed with some of the hard rock weirdness of his early career. Producer Bob Ezrin (who was the mastermind behind that early sound) returns to steer the production again. Ezrin’s previous record, 2011’s “Welcome 2 My Nightmare” fell a little short, but here he seems to get exactly how to take a more mature Alice Cooper and make him creepy again.

The title track starts things off well, with an unsettling guitar riff crossed played quietly, then juxtaposed against a flourish of sound. It is a song that is triumphant in the way a group of cultists would cheer bringing Cthulhu into the world: exultant but more than a little wrong.

Cooper is now almost 70 years old, but his voice on “Paranormal” sound as good as anything he’s done in the past 15 years. It is amazing what not drinking or smoking can do for the survival of your vocal chords.

The next track, “Dead Flies” keeps up that throwback feel, with a song that feels like it could have easily appeared on the original “Welcome to My Nightmare” released back in 1975.

After that, Cooper goes into a metal mood, with “Fireball,” an apocalyptic vision with a pounding beat that demands to be heard while driving (but which will have to wait, while my car search continues).

“Paranoic Personality” is a bit too Nu Metal for me, and worse reminded me strongly of that old In Living Colour song “Cult of Personality” only not as good, making the Cooper song stale by comparison.

Disc One ends with “The Sound of A” which is a soft and atmospheric number that is a throwback to Cooper’s early work, and just as good.  Never have I felt more unsettled by a song about a musical note. I was unsurprised to find that original bassist Dennis Dunaway co-wrote and played on the song.

“Paranormal” is a two-disc affair, and Cooper makes some odd decisions on how to divide things up. Disc One features 10 new songs, and Disc Two has two new songs (both performed with his old band) and then six classic tracks performed live at a 2016 show in Columbus. I would have preferred all 12 new songs on one disc, and the live disc as a separate feature.

The two news on Disc Two are two of the better tracks. “Genuine American Girl” is another Cooper song that blurs the lines on sexual identity in the same spirit as previous efforts like “Mary Ann,” “The Saga of Jesse Jane”, “No Man’s Land” and “Prettiest Cop on the Block” among others.

“You and All of Your Friends” features a bit of a muddier seventies sound, fueled again, in large part by having the original band add their talents to the mix. Long-time fans of Alice Cooper who have been waiting impatiently for this reunion will not be disappointed.

When I saw six live tracks of his classic hits I cringed a little, not wanting another version of songs like “Under My Wheels”, “No More Mr. Nice Guy” and “Only Women Bleed” that I’ve heard a hundred times before. I was wrong, however. Cooper nails every single one of these. Even “Feed My Frankenstein” sounds great, with Cooper in full throat and his current band going all out. These tracks reminded me how great Alice Cooper is live, even here in the latter stages of his career. They also reminded me how good his current backing band is.

“Paranormal” may come forty-eight years after Alice Cooper’s first album, but it shows he’s lost nothing over the years. The influences of his old band and producer serve to rejuvenate his sound, and capture some of the early magic, while avoiding becoming pale imitations in the process. In short, Alice Cooper is back, and we’re still not worthy.

Best tracks: Paranormal, Private Public Breakdown, The Sound of A, Genuine American Girl, You and all of Your Friends

CD Odyssey Disc 1003: Alice Cooper

For those who have been waiting to discover which artist I have the most albums by, it is time for the reveal – it’s Alice Cooper.

I’ve been a fan of Alice Cooper since the tender age of five, and while this next album came out when I was 35, time has not reduced my zeal for his music - then or now.

Disc 1003 is…Dirty Diamonds

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2005

What’s up with the Cover? This is now the fourth Giant Head cover in a row. On this cover, Alice Cooper’s head is so large that only the eyes show up. Also, a really large and hard to read font gets in the way. Are those diamonds in your eyes, Alice, or are you just glad to see me?

How I Came To Know It: “Dirty Diamonds” came out around the time I was rediscovering the joy of Alice Cooper after losing track with his new material in the late nineties and early oughts. I believe I bought this one when it came out, but my memory is hazy.

How It Stacks Up:  I have all 26 of Alice Cooper’s studio albums, and once even had a weird early import of live and rare tracks (“Science Fiction”) before I parted company with it. “Dirty Diamonds” holds its own well in that large company, coming in at #13.

Unless Cooper releases a new album (something he hasn’t done since 2011) this will be my last review of him. Here’s the full recap of how everything stacked up at the final tally:

1. Billion Dollar Babies: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 228)
2. Love it to Death: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 604)
3. From the Inside: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 99)
4. Welcome To My Nightmare: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 449)
5. Killer: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 429)
6. Muscle of Love: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 357)
7. Alice Cooper Goes to Hell: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 447)
8. Da Da: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 18)
9. School’s Out: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 406)
10. Lace and Whiskey: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 180)
11. The Last Temptation: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 710)
12. Dragontown: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 950)
13. Dirty Diamonds: 3 stars (reviewed right here)
14. Along Came a Spider: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 164)
15. Zipper Catches Skin: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 355)
16. Flush the Fashion: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 264)
17. Special Forces: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 354)
18. Constrictor: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 89)
19. Raise Your Fist and Yell: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 286)
20. Easy Action: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 444)
21. Pretties for You: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 152)
22. Hey Stoopid: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 345)
23. Trash: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 343)
24. Welcome 2 My Nightmare: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 956)
25. Brutal Planet: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 833)
26. The Eyes of Alice Cooper: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 439)
27. Science Fiction: 1 star (reviewed at Disc 661)

Ratings: 3 stars

After starting out the decade with three heavy metal albums, in 2005 Alice Cooper returned to his roots on “Dirty Diamonds”; catchy but heavy rock riffs with clever lyrics designed to both shock and amuse.

It is clear that the return agreed with Cooper, who delivers a tight little album that borrows from pop, boogie woogie, blues, metal and even rap, constructing songs that are both catchy and edgy. Like he did with the original Alice Cooper Band, Cooper shares songwriting duties with his band-mates and the collaborative approach does wonders to rejuvenate his sound, while still remaining Alice Cooper at the core.

All that praise aside, I admit it took a while for this album to grow on me. The preceding records (“Brutal Planet”, “Dragontown” and “The Eyes of Alice Cooper”) put my ear in a very heavy mood, and this record can seem almost flippant in comparison. However, after a few listens you tune in to what Cooper is trying to do, as he mixes all the lessons he learned from eighties metal and even dalliances with hair and nu metal, and bend those genres to his will.

Like most acts that endure as long as he has, Cooper knows how to adapt. He is a chameleon, able to connect with the sound of the time, without ever losing his inner lizard. After a lot of angry records preceding it, Cooper seems almost giddy here as he sings about the perils of pretty girls, fame and riches, and cross-dressing truck drivers. It is delightfully over the top, sometimes too much so, but if anyone can shamelessly stand in the glare of too much kitsch and make it work, it's Cooper.

The album launches with “Woman of Mass Distraction” a pelvic thrust of a song, dirty guitar riffs and ominous beats growing into a chorus that is basically a strained pun that Cooper makes work. It is corny and catchy in equal measure.

Other standouts include the neo-nu metal “Dirty Diamonds” a track about the empty lives of the rich and famous. Cooper is one of the most down to earth rock gods that currently walk the earth, and his mockery of the wealthy manages to ring true where in lesser hands it could have come off as hypocritical.

“Sunset Babies (All Got Rabies)” is a song about bad girls walking the strip looking for trouble, and it the way Cooper sings “I don’t know if it’s safe to pet one” makes it clear he’d like to find out. This song also has a sweet little guitar solo that is restrained and well-placed.

My favourite track on the record is “The Saga of Jesse Jane” the tale of a cross-dressing trucker who runs afoul of some rednecks at a truck stop and ends up murdering the lot of them. Cooper is a natural storyteller, drawing you in instantly with this opening:

“I’m in jail in a Texas town

In my sister’s wedding gown

I drive a truck all night long

Listening to Judy Garland songs.”

The song is done in a haunting murder ballad style that would make the Handsome Family proud, as Cooper exchanges his usual raspy vocals for something halfway between Nick Cave and young Elvis.

The album ends with “Stand Up” featuring rapper Xzibit, but even that awkward crossover with rap is kind of fun.

Cooper’s joy in making this album is clear, and years later “Woman of Mass Distraction” and “Dirty Diamonds” are both common songs in his concert setlists, where many other albums from this era are completely ignored. As a devoted fan, I always wish Cooper would pull something off other records from around this time, but there is no denying that it would be hard to replace some of the great material available on “Dirty Diamonds.”

Best tracks: Woman of Mass Distraction, Dirty Diamonds, The Saga of Jesse Jane, Sunset Babies (All Got Rabies)

CD Odyssey Disc 956: Alice Cooper

Last night Sheila and I went to see Dwight Yoakam. We were pretty excited that he returned after cancelling last year (also, he apologized and explained what happened, which was appreciated).

The show itself was a disappointment, although no fault of Dwight’s. The sound was so terrible you could hardly distinguish song from song. It was a reminder of the dangers of arena rock. Also, here’s a hint to concert goers: your camera flash doesn’t work beyond a few feet. Please turn it off!

Anyway, from a show that was well below my expectations, let’s turn to an album that exceeded them.

Disc 956 is….Welcome 2 My Nightmare

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2011

What’s up with the Cover? It’s an homage to the original “Welcome To My Nightmare” album from 1975 (reviewed back at Disc 449). Alice is looking a bit rougher 35 years later, and now writes his name in blood instead of art deco lettering. Hey, times change.

How I Came To Know It: I am a huge Alice Cooper fan (I’m writing this wearing one of my three Alice Cooper t-shirts), so this was me buying his latest release. Alice has done a couple live albums since this record was released, but no new studio albums, which is a bit of a bummer.

How It Stacks Up:  I have 26 Alice Cooper studio albums. I had originally reserved space for “Welcome 2 My Nightmare” at the bottom of that list, but after giving it a couple of listens, I was pleasantly surprised. That said, Alice Cooper has made a lot of great records, so I can only put it in at #24, slightly edging out “Brutal Planet” (reviewed at Disc 883).

Ratings: 2 stars

If you are long-lived and prolific enough you can start to reference your own mythology. After almost 50 years of making music, Alice Cooper has earned the right to do that, and the material to back it up. “Welcome 2 My Nightmare” isn’t perfect, but it is an album that only Alice Cooper could make. No one else has the right combination of staying power, depth of understanding of what makes hard rock hard, and a willingness to try new things even well into his sixties.

Like the cover art would suggest, the entire album is set up as a long-awaited sequel to Cooper’s first solo album, 1975’s “Welcome To My Nightmare.” My negative reaction when I first heard it was based in making comparisons with that record, a rock masterpiece that has been in my life since I was five years old.

However, on revisiting the record I realized that while Cooper’s attempt at a sequel falls well short of the original, most sequels not titled “The Empire Strikes Back” tend to do that. The very act of making the attempt is intriguing, and it allows Cooper to further develop themes on the original album, while also speaking of his own journey as a performer through the intervening years.

The best example of this (and best song on the record) is the opening track, “I Am Made of You”. The song works lyrically on three levels.

First, as Alice Cooper talking to his other self (Vince Furnier) about how he is not truly a different person (as Cooper sometimes characterizes his alter ego in interviews) but rather a creation he developed himself from his darker parts. As Cooper puts it:

“In the beginning

There was only night…

I was shattered, left in pieces

And I felt so cold inside

But I called you from the darkness

Where I hide.”

A concept many performers wrestle with, but none so creatively or openly as Cooper has over the years (often leading to his self-destructive relationship with substance abuse). Here, an older Cooper looks back at the nightmare he has created, and takes ownership.

Second, the song can be taken as a conversation between Cooper and his audience. A reminder that all those dark things we thrilled to listen to him sing about were the manifestations of our own id, and our own troubled tortured darker selves. “Alice Cooper” the character is empowered as much by our adulation as by the divisionary thoughts of the artist he inhabits.

And third, obviously Cooper is noting that this new record was born out of the nightmares of the original. Throughout, the song has the signature Cooper sound of somewhere between creepy and anthemic, both in just the right proportions.

While the tracks that follow aren’t as strong they do show Cooper gamely pulling in all of the influences he’s absorbed over a half century of making music. The frenetic “Caffeine” hearkens back to his early eighties rock/new wave crossover sound. “The Congregation” feels like his late eighties anthem metal crossed with early Cooper band influences. On “Disco Bloodbath Boogie Fever” he even works in disco beats not heard since “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell” with a healthy dose of musical theatre.

Not surprisingly, the strongest influences related back to the original “Nightmare” album, featuring direct musical lines pulled from classics like “Stephen” “The Black Widow” and others. When I first heard these, it irked me, but now I see Cooper is taking old musical arrangements and marrying them to a new sound to create something different.

The album features a fair bit of modern pop influences, and I think I heard some voice modulation effects at one point that felt very out of step with the record. There is even a duet with Ke$ha called “What Baby Wants” which is a marriage between radio pop and Cooper shock rock. I really wanted to not like this song, but damn it’s catchy. I’m filing it under guilty pleasure.

The record is produced by long-time Cooper collaborator, Bob Ezrin. Ezrin just gets Cooper’s crazy brilliance like no one else, and the combination is always magical. The songs on this record aren’t the classics of yesteryear, but they are strong melodically and Ezrin understands that they work better when you take risks with them.

Near the end of the album on “I Gotta Get Outta Here”, Cooper fully reveals his theme; the man in 1975’s nightmare has died. He thinks he’s in a dream, but he’s actually in the afterlife. Maybe it is Cooper’s way of saying that he’s killed the Alice Cooper character, and subsumed it back into himself in a more health pairing. Maybe it is just him thinking this would be a cool way to make the sequel bigger, better and creepier.

The song ends with a chorus singing a catchy little ditty of “what part of dead don’t you get?” and Cooper doing his signature theatre as the incredulous artist trying to talk his way out of the situation. Then an “Underture” which incorporates musical themes from the original album and this one and…we’re out!

Or we should be. My disc has four more bonus tracks (mostly live) that add over 17 minutes of material and push the album over 70 minutes total. It makes the whole thing feel bloated, so I prefer to stop listening at “Underture”, when the CD Odyssey rules aren’t compelling me otherwise.

A quick note on the actual physical CD. Even though we live in a digital age, Cooper continues to give fans a great CD booklet, with lyrics, high production values and lots of creepy art. Thanks for taking care of the little things, Alice.

Best tracks: I Am Made of You, The Congregation, When Hell Comes Home, What Baby Wants, I Gotta Get Outta Here

CD Odyssey Disc 950: Alice Cooper

Another late night, but the Odyssey rolls on, with a return to an oft-visited favourite.

Disc 950 is….Dragontown

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2001

What’s up with the Cover? Alice looks tense, like he’s about to…sai. Get it? Get it?

Man I crack myself up.

How I Came To Know It: I stopped buying Alice Cooper albums for a few years and it took me a while before I got into his later catalogue. I believe someone bought me this album as a gift, but I’m embarrassed to say I can’t remember who. Whoever it was it helped kick start my interest in his more recent catalogue, so thank you!

How It Stacks Up:  I have 26 Alice Cooper albums. “Dragontown” isn’t top tier, but it holds its own. I’ll rank it 12^th.

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

“Dragontown” is the final entry in Alice Cooper’s terrifying vision of the future, with the titular location a town on a brutal planet of sin and terror.

The album is Alice at his heaviest phase, embracing the loudness of the early oughts, sometimes to good effect, and sometimes overdoing it a bit (as a lot of metal artists did at the same time). The songs crunch along and tend toward aggressive guitar riffs and rough subjects. Cooper’s voice has even more snarl to it than usual, and sometimes suffers from being given too many treatments in production. He doesn’t need these, as he can still belt out a tune, but on “Dragontown” he is more interested in his trademark rasp than showing off his vocal range.

The title track and “I Just Wanna Be God” are particularly heavy and delivered with both majesty and crunch in equal measure. These are songs about the power brokers of Alice Cooper’s new world order, each of them doomed but unrepentant.

The album is an exploration of bad people and the evil places they congregate (Dragontown being the most obvious). Alice flows freely from the excesses of the present into the decay of a near-future dystopia drawing connections on how we get there.

The record doesn’t just talk about those in charge of the world’s collapse, but also those who empower them. The best of these is “Sex, Death and Money” which despite straying dangerously close to Nu-Metal shows Cooper’s talent for showing hypocrisy even as he plays the villain for our general amusement. Cooper’s character feigns disgusted as he sings:

“When I go to the show

All I see on the screen

Is a stream of pure vulgarity

I wrote down a note

Complained for a day

To the House of Representatives”

And proves his outrage later with:

“I was so offended

As I sat for three hours

It was mental cruelty

I was so shocked”

So terrible, but it took three hours just to be sure. We get the entertainment we secretly desire, and Cooper is happy to be the deranged cheerleader pointing it out. He’s been making songs like this for years, and it continues to amaze me that people are outraged by him, even as they prove his point.

“Fantasy Man” explores the same character from the other side; someone who is perfectly comfortable acknowledging their lack of standards and morals. Both songs are fun and walk a fine line between anthem and hard rock protest. In Cooper’s world, they are fundamentally the same thing.

On “Disgraceland” Cooper even takes a shot at the King, summing up Elvis’ last moments as:

“He ate his weight in country ham,

Killed on pills and woke in disgraceland”

Half the song is sung in a hilarious Elvis impersonator voice, presumably because just singing it straight wouldn’t offend enough people.

The songs don’t show a lot of range in terms of their structure, but they are played with energy and power and there aren’t any true stinkers. “Every Woman Has a Name” comes closest, being a pale imitation of “Only Women Bleed.” Think what you will of “Only Women Bleed” it is a rock classic. Even though “Every Woman Has a Name” is an alright tune, it feels unnecessary and derivative.

While the album is mostly metal in flavour, there are some pure rock crooners as well, and one of my favourite tracks, “It’s Much Too Late” is one of these. Telling the story of the same type of character we meet earlier on “Sex, Death and Money” we hear him now surprised to find himself in hell, still unclear what he’s done wrong. The song has an effortless and memorable melody and could be a pop ballad with a different treatment. The chorus is so infectious I found myself singing along like an idiot on my walk home. Thankfully it was nice and dark, and traffic was light.

My version of “Dragontown” is the “bonus CD” version which contains an extra song (the remarkably good “Clowns Will Eat Me” and live versions and remixes of earlier Cooper tracks “Go To Hell”, “Ballad of Dwight Fry” and “Brutal Planet” all of which are OK, but none of which are indispensable.

“Dragontown” beats you over the head a bit with its message, but the music is solid and it’s funny and troubling in the right proportions. It could use a bit of restraint in the production room, but it’s a good record from rock’s greatest jester; scolding us and thrilling us in equal measure.

Best tracks: Dragontown, Sex Death and Money, Fantasy Man, Disgraceland, I Just Wanna Be God, Much Too Late

CD Odyssey Disc 833: Alice Cooper

Once again I am home late and tonight I have company coming over at eight. Hopefully I can squeeze in this next review so I don’t have to listen to this album for another day.

Disc 833 is….Brutal Planet

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 2000

What’s up with the Cover? This is a weird one, in that this is not the correct cover. This is some special edition import that looks very hastily thrown together (the booklet is a very quick history of Alice Cooper’s career clearly written for someone who has never heard of him). Part of me likes having this version, cheesy viper animation and all. Part of me wishes I had the original, which looks like this:

Meh. Neither one is that great, I suppose.

How I Came To Know It: I just buy all of Alice Cooper’s stuff. For a while I had given up, so I probably bought “Brutal Planet” about seven years after it came out, which would coincide with the date stamped on this re-issue.

How It Stacks Up:  I expected more from this album, and had left a spot for it at #14 out of my 26 Alice Cooper albums. Instead, it fell all the way down to lowly 24^th out of 26 total Alice Cooper albums in my collection. Sorry, Alice. As a result everything already rated between #15 and #24 got a one slot boost.

Ratings: 2 stars

“Brutal Planet” is the middle album in a trilogy released from 1994-2001 where Cooper explores the fall of mankind into damnation. The bookends of this trilogy (“The Last Temptation” and “Dragontown”) are two of my favourite Alice Cooper albums, but “Brutal Planet” does not hold up nearly as well as its compatriots.

First the good, because there is some. There is a power to this album and it was fun to listen to Alice Cooper embrace the heavy metal stylings of his day. The first two tracks are strong. “Brutal Planet” (the song) is an introduction to the themes of a planet doomed by sin, violence and excess and “Wicked Young Man” personalizes that wickedness in the form of a single person, self-absorbed and full of hate.

The title track is particularly dark with a pounding beat and Alice angrily spitting about excess and sin:

“Here's where we starve the hungry

Here's where we cheat the poor

Here's where we beat the children

Here is where we pay the whores”

Cooper has a real gift in infusing his lyrics with import, but that example above (judgey comment about prostitution notwithstanding) is about as good as it gets. The rest of the record has Alice trying to be as shocking as he can, but instead ends up making awkward and strained rhymes like these from “It’s The Little Things”:

“You can steal my car

And drive it into the lake

You can stick me in the oven

And put it on bake.”

That line belongs in a kid’s poem about Hansel and Gretl, not a metal album.

The other challenge is the evidence of the Loudness Wars on this album’s production, where every dial just seems turned up too far. It is great for chunky riff-driven songs like “Eat Some More” but overall I thought the record would have benefited from being turned down to a respectable level. Like 11.

Alice has been trying to remake his 1975 classic “Only Women Bleed” for years, and the entry on “Brutal Planet” is “Take It Like A Woman.” This song feels like it could be on Heart’s “Bad Animals” with all its organ and empty bombast, but it lacks the subtlety Alice is looking for. It isn’t a terrible song; it just reminds me of a host of Alice Cooper songs that are similar but better.

If you are an Alice Cooper completionist (and I am) you should get this album. Otherwise, I would encourage you to steer toward “Dragontown,” an album with similar themes but better songs, better lyrics and better sound.

Best tracks:  Brutal Planet, Wicked Young Man, Eat Some More

CD Odyssey Disc 710: Alice Cooper

Another long day that started early, but I capped it with a good workout and am feeling rather pleased with myself as a result. Also, I enjoyed my latest album – it is almost like this CD Odyssey I am on is filled with albums right out of my own collection…

Disc 710 is…. The Last Temptation

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 1994

What’s up with the Cover? A nightmarish collage of temptations and troubled figures, gathered around the master of the macabre himself, Alice Cooper. Alice appears to be casting a spell over some sort of mystical Bunsen burner. Or he could just be trying to get warm – he’s so cold he’s gone blue!

How I Came To Know It: Believe it or not there was a period when I stopped buying Alice Cooper albums. After 1991’s “Hey Stoopid” I was starting to feel like he didn’t have another really great record in him so I moved on. Also, I was really heavily into folk music in the early nineties, and my obsession left little room for other styles.

Then ten years later I was given 2001’s “Dragontown” for my birthday and I discovered I’d just missed a relative renaissance of Cooper’s career. I earnestly began to drill backward until I finally got to “The Last Temptation.”

How It Stacks Up:  I have 26 Alice Cooper albums, which I think is all of them. “The Last Temptation” holds up pretty strong – definitely top half, although probably not top ten. I’ll put it 11^th.

Rating: 4 stars.

For five years from 1986 to 1991 a newly sober Alice Cooper decided he was going to be an eighties metal star. When I was a teenager it made me perfectly happy, but these albums have not aged all that well. “The Last Temptation” is Alice shedding notions of what he ‘should’ do to be successful and getting back to doing what he does best: mixing shock rock with broad and ambitious musical concepts.

The album is the first in a loose trilogy of records which continues with “Brutal Planet” (2000) and “Dragontown” (2001) that explain the fall of man into damnation. The theme becomes progressively broader on the later records, but on “The Last Temptation” it is focused on one man’s temptation.

“The Last Temptation” is almost a sequel to 1976’s “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell” except instead of it all happening in a dream sequence, you get the impression that it is happening for real. The circus has come to town, Bradbury style, and the devil’s got an offer you can’t refuse. Cue music.

The first song is “Sideshow” which is a passable track that introduces the titular temptation. Passable except for one thing – it pretty much pulls its melody wholesale out of the Clash’s “Lost in the Supermarket.” I’d like to think it is an homage, given the similar themes of consumer/wish culture, but I can’t deny what I heard and the liner notes don’t have any credits noting the Clash.

With that one sour note out of the way, “The Last Temptation” steps up and delivers an amazing journey through Alice Cooper’s favourite recurring theme – getting dragged to hell. As a recovering alcoholic and born again Christian it isn’t a surprising theme for him, but for all that I don’t know anyone who does it with quite the same panache as he does.

Cooper’s signature take on empty consumer culture is on fine display in “Lost in America” which is one half indictment of the lack of opportunity and one half indictment of the people who use that as an excuse to not move forward. The song opens:

“I can’t get a girl cuz I ain’t got a car

I can’t get a car cuz I ain’t got a job

I can’t get a job cut I ain’t got a car

So I’m looking for a girl with a job and a car.”

It is this kind of logic that’ll get you signing a deal with the devil.

Later the album introduces us to other lost souls in the devil’s playground. My favourite is “Smoky Joe” who appears on the song “Bad Place Alone.” Smoky Joe is described as “thin as a coroner’s needle” shaking like a cold Chihuahua, with a runny nose and a road map on his arm. It is all so delightfully grim.

The album alternates from heavy, crunchy rock to more ballad-like structures and is reminiscent of Cooper’s early records with the Alice Cooper band. The mix shows that Alice has finally synthesized the lessons he learned from eighties metal back into his own style. He’s absorbed it, dissected it and now he can simply add it to his repertoire without letting it rule the entire sound of his record. It is a welcome evolution.

When the songs get stripped down, such as on “Stolen Prayer” and “It’s Me” you can hear Cooper’s vocals, that are still very strong at this stage of his career. He tends to sing a lot of songs in a raspy tone, but on tracks like these you get to see his range, switching from smooth and folksy up into controlled aggression with equal ease.

The album ends with “Cleansed by Fire” a fine - if over-amped - rejection of the devil song. Instead of waking up, as he does at the end of “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell” here Cooper’s character (the ever-present Steven) is awake the whole time and needs simply to apply his wits sufficiently to not sell his soul. Not to worry though, he’s back in 2008 making bad decisions on “Along Came a Spider.”

I don’t typically want to know much about the albums I review, but while looking up some minor detail about “The Last Temptation” I discovered it is also a graphic novel by Neil Gaiman. It shouldn’t influence how I feel about the record, but damn it I love Neil Gaiman, and it makes me enjoy “The Last Temptation” even more.

Best tracks: Lost in America, Stolen Prayer, Unholy War, Lullaby, It’s Me

CD Odyssey Disc 661: Alice Cooper

After a crazy weekend where I behaved like I was twenty years younger, I awoke today hung over and feeling decidedly 44 again. It was a great weekend though, surrounded by friends and revelry so I regret nothing.

Speaking of good friends, discerning readers will note that I seem to have skipped reviewing Disc 660 – that’s because it was an album by a friend of mine. I listened to it and I loved it (and generally love all the music he’s made over the years) but way back at the beginning of the Odyssey (at Disc 56/67, to be precise) I decided I wouldn’t review albums by my friends.

In addition to excess, it was a weekend full of music, starting on Friday night where Sheila and I and some friends went to see Canadian punk legend Art Bergmann at the Upstairs Lounge. Bergmann was great, and so was the opening act RADco. In fact although I loved Bergmann, it was RADco that inspired me to buy one of their downloads – they are a cool band with a great energy. They reminded me of L7 crossed with very early No Doubt. I’m looking forward to downloading their music, once I get enough courage (I always buy my music in hard format, so this is new territory).

With all these good musical experiences, this next review is a sharp turn into disappointment.

Disc 661 is…. Science Fiction

Artist: Alice Cooper (mostly)

Year of Release: recorded in 1969, although not released until 1987.

What’s up with the Cover?  A young Alice Cooper, sans eye makeup, looks thoughtful and – dare I say it – reasonably sober. Behind him, his alter ego lurks, haunting and haunted at the same time.

Also note in the upper right hand corner the logo for “music options.” Not all options are good, my friends.

How I Came To Know It:  I was browsing through the Alice Cooper rack at a local music store looking for rarities and found this – a rarity! Made in Holland, no less so you know it’s…er…European. I’d never heard of any of the songs, which was even better.

How It Stacks Up:  I have all twenty-six of Alice Cooper’s studio albums (I’m kind of a fan). “Science Fiction” is a live album, so doesn’t really stack up against the studio collection.

Rating: 1 star. I never thought it would come to this, Alice.

Alice Cooper is one of my all-time favourite musicians, and he’s given me a lot of joy over the years, which is why it pains me to have to say this, but “Science Fiction” is a wretchedly awful album.

The record was originally a live illegal bootleg, which I guess somewhere along the way became legitimate when some Soulless Record Exec (or Alice himself) figured they could make a buck off of it.

This is very early in Alice Cooper’s career, and while I liked the relative obscurity of the songs initially, it didn’t take long to realize why they have remained obscure. They just aren’t that good. Most are little more than two to three minute snippets of musical ideas. They are performed like the band is wading through knee-deep industrial sludge; slow and plodding.

Not in that good, crunchy kind of way either. The songs lurch around and fail to create any energy. It is like Pink Floyd tried to write Cream songs and then performed them in the shower drunk.

I realize this is a live bootleg, but even so the sound quality is awful. Whoever recorded this should have reviewed what they had and kept it private. In fact, it is an early cautionary tale for all those folks that record concerts on their phones and then post them to Youtube. Mostly, those clips suck. Digging through them trying to find something worth listening to is not unlike digging through “Science Fiction” looking for a song I liked. The main difference being at least some of those Youtube clips are OK.

In fact, the best sounding songs on the album are “Goin’ to the River” and “Ain’t That Just Like a Woman” and those songs are (inexplicably) performed by Ronnie Hawkins, not Alice Cooper at all. What the hell?

For no apparent reason the other songs all have the wrong titles (it’s no wonder I didn’t recognize any of them). This isn’t just a weird CD upload thing either; the album prints them with the wrong titles, and always has. The title track is actually called “Fields of Regret” a song off of their first album “Pretties For You.”  Well, it is half of “Fields of Regret” anyway – at the 2:40 mark it just abruptly stops. I guess I should be thankful for small miracles.

“Fields of Regret” would certainly be a better name for this album, since I deeply regret ever buying it. I’m going to get rid of it so that I can get back to my usual thoughts about Alice Cooper – that he is a great talent and a living legend of rock and roll that consistently gives me joy. I hope I roll one of his many awesome albums soon to wash the echo of “Science Fiction” out of my ears.

Best tracks:  um…no.

CD Odyssey Disc 604: Alice Cooper

It’s been over 16 months and 150 albums since I last reviewed an Alice Cooper album, but he’s finally back on the rotation, and as welcome as ever.

Disc 604 is….Love It To Death

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 1971

What’s up with the Cover? There is no mess more glorious than a rock band on the verge of stardom. Here they are, hanging it all out there in their gold pants and fringe, their long hair and their women’s blouses. Alice isn’t even painting his eyes yet but he’s still as creepy as ever.

How I Came To Know It: I don’t remember. I’ve loved Alice Cooper for so long and this album has been part of my life since before I could talk. I’ve had it on CD for about twenty years and I’ve got it on vinyl as well, although that more recently.

How It Stacks Up:  I have all 26 of Alice Cooper’s studio albums (I’m kind of a fan). “Love It To Death” is one of his finest. Really, it is tied for first place, but since I’ve got to make only one album hold top spot, I’ll leave that for “Billion Dollar Babies.” “Love It To Death” is a very close second.

Rating:  5 stars

Two albums into their career, Alice Cooper had plenty of talent and ambition, but their music lacked the direction and focus needed to bring it all together. Enter producer Bob Ezrin to kick start the career of one of rock and roll’s defining artists.

Gone were the wayward attempts on earlier records to sound like the Beatles or early Pink Floyd. Instead, Ezrin (and co-producer Jack Richardson) allow the melodic influences of these earlier bands to survive but help the band find their own unique sound. It is so successful most people think “Love It To Death” is the band’s debut.

Everything that makes Alice Cooper great comes together here. Michael Bruce’s guitar is loose and nasty; founded in sixties acid rock acts like Cream, and yet it is equally the harbinger of harder rock riffs that would become synonymous with the decade this album helped usher in.

The rhythm section is as good as they ever were, and never more so than on the iconic nine minute horror track, “Black Juju.” The song develops slowly. The tribal drumming of Neal Smith creates is paired with a gothic inspired bass-line from Dennis Dunaway that leaves you feeling entirely uneasy. The song is about the living dead – African style – and as ill-luck would have it, early work shifts found me walking through the silent streets of my city in the dead of night while listening to it. It was easy to imagine the zombie apocalypse waited just around the corner and, you know, kinda fun. Cooper’s vocals are amazing as well, but “Black Juju” is more about the suspense and rising terror of a horror movie than any specific lyrics.

Cooper is better vocally when he gets introspective, such as on the equally epic “Ballad of Dwight Fry,” the story of a disturbed man who kills in a fugue and awakes to find blood on his hands, and a vague understanding that he is responsible. There are a lot of artists that lay their inner demons bare for the sake of great vocals (Johnny Cash and Ozzie Osbourne also come to mind) and Alice Cooper is every bit their equal.

The album wavers between the terrifying Poe-like tales of “Black Juju” and “Ballad of Dwight Fry” and songs about the alienation and confusion of youth. The generation that first heard this record were emerging bleary-eyed from the Summer of Love to find a mad and uncertainty of foreign wars and domestic breakdown – it was the perfect greeting card for the new world.

“Love It To Death” rarely gets political (the closest they come being the dystopian “Long Way To Go”). Instead paradoxically it finds its strength by embracing self-doubt. As Cooper sings on the album’s iconic hit, “Eighteen”:

“I’ve got a baby’s brain and an old man’s heart

Took eighteen years to get this far

Don’t always know what I’m talking about

Feels like I’m living in the middle of doubt.

Because I’m eighteen I get confused every day.”

My favourite song on the record is “Is It My Body,” a song that captures this same uncertainty while managing to be sexy as hell. “Is It My Body” is stripped down, featuring dirty guitar solos combined with Cooper sounding sexy, creepy and confused all delivered in a mere 2:39. The song could have been a hot mess, but it has been stripped down to its essential parts, allowing the innovative melody to carry all its disparate themes with equal ease. It has Bob Ezrin’s fingerprints all over it.

All the record’s themes are brought together with “Second Coming,” which is equal parts demonic horror, troubled psychiatric confessional and youthful angst:

“I couldn’t tell if the bells were getting louder

The songs they ring I finally recognized

I only know hell is getting hotter

The devil’s getting smarter all the time.”

The record is only 36 minutes long, but it is 36 of the most challenging and amazing minutes in rock. It all culminates with the final track, a cover of Rolf Harris’ 1961 song, “Sun Arise” (sadly minus didgeridoo).  After such a dark journey through the psyche and all the phantoms it can create, “Sun Arise” is like a bowl of lime sorbet after a raw steak dinner. It is the perfect final song for what is, for me, a perfect album.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 449: Alice Cooper

This is a random system I use for picking albums, but sometimes the coincidences can get a little weird.  This is my 5^th Alice Cooper review in the last twenty albums and my 3^rd in the last ten.  Given I have around 1,000 albums, that is a very unlikely situation.

Nevertheless, here we are.  And after a wild and crazy Halloween party last night, this next record shows up at a perfect time.

Disc 449 is… Welcome to My Nightmare

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 1975

What’s up with the Cover?  Alice Cooper’s first solo album has him formally introducing himself to us on the cover.  How do you do, Mr. Cooper – I wear a top hat myself from time to time.

How I Came To Know It:  I’ve known this album almost from when it first came out and definitely well into my childhood.  When CDs first came out it was one of my first purchases, and I quickly replaced it with the re-mastered version when that became available.  I also own it on vinyl.

How It Stacks Up:  I have all twenty-six of Alice Cooper’s studio albums, and this is one of his best.  I’m going to put it 4^th, narrowly beating out "Killer".

Rating:  5 stars.

Many people say that Alice Cooper never matched his excellence once he struck out on his solo career.  While it is true that on balance, the early ‘with the band’ work is more consistently strong, albums like “Welcome to My Nightmare” are a nice reminder that he did some fine work on his own as well.

This album is his first solo album, but the influences of the Alice Cooper band are still very strong.  The guitar has the same grotesque sound that Michael Bruce played on earlier records, and the production is still driven by master producer Bob Ezrin.  This means the songs are rife with horn sections, classical piano and various other weird and odd sounds mixed into a sub-humanary stew.

On “Devil’s Food” there is even a lengthy speech by Vincent Price playing the role of local bug expert with great enthusiasm, slowly transitioning from bookish entomologist into fiendish spider worshipper as he ends with the triumphant declaration:  “I feel that man has ruled this world as a stumbling demented child-king long enough!”

Of course this is only after Cooper introduces the album’s theme with the opening title track; a slow-builder that starts out sounding strung out and detached and grows into a full-fledged anthem.  It warns us that we are about to be treated to an Alice Cooper journey into the subconscious, and that it isn’t going to be all roses and wet dreams (although with Alice, both of those are likely to be in the mix).

Once again, Cooper’s incredible range is on display, with musical numbers like “Some Folks” that peel back the darker layers about how some people get their kicks, bringing it close to home with the refrain of ‘some folks’ that implies we’re unknowingly brushing shoulders with them every day.

For all its delightfully sick revelry the album’s centre piece is the anthem (and minor hit in its day) “Only Women Bleed.” This song would be either silly or insulting in the hands of anyone other than Cooper, who instead delivers a touching anthem about spousal abuse, both physical and emotional, in a way that is earnest and heartfelt, and a perfect interlude amidst all the more fantastical horrors featured in the songs that surround it.

The album flashes moments of humour in “Department of Youth.”  As the song fades out Alice yells out “Who’s got the power?” and a chorus of children respond “We do!” but if you listen carefully right before the fade ends, he asks “Who gave it to you?” and the children gleefully reply “Donny Osmond!” Cooper is never above sending himself up if it means entertainment for the audience.

“Cold Ethyl” doubles as a song about necrophilia as well as drinking hard liquor (the ethyl in this case, possibly referencing ethyl alcohol).  Cooper had his serious problems with alcohol, and yet once again he demonstrates a full appreciation of his condition, even at this early stage of collapse.

Three of the last four songs, “Year’s Ago,” “Steven,” and “The Awakening” form a trilogy that brings the album’s nightmarish theme back.  Audiences are introduced to a recurring character, “Steven” an emotionally stunted man who dreams he is still a child.  When the character awakens, it is only to find blood on his hands, and the proof that while he was in some fugue state he has committed terrible crimes.

With its haunting piano intro (later lifted wholesale by John Carpenter for the “Halloween” theme) “Steven” is a troubling horror tale made so much more troubling with Ezrin’s amazing production decisions.  As Cooper’s Steven character sings “I must be dreaming/please stop screaming” and then as the guitar riff swells in he hears someone shouting “Steven” like they’re speaking down a tunnel, or up through water. Later we can surmise these were the cries of his victims desperately trying to wake him up.  Whatever it is, the way Cooper’s voice matches the swells of the song from confused child to triumphant rock vocal and back again just makes it that much creepier.

The final song, “Escape” seems like a bit of an add-on musically, and sounds more like a single (although never released as such).  With its placement on the album, it could be a song featuring Cooper as a mental patient (I imagine after being arrested for his crimes).  However, the lyrics to me speak to a deeper experience we’ve all had; how we put on our masks to play the roles expected of us, and that corresponding emotional desire to escape that responsibility:

“Paint on my cruel or happy face

Hide me behind it.

It takes me inside another place

Where no one can find it.

Escape – I get out when I can

I escape – anytime I can

Let’s all escape – I’m cryin’ in my beer

Escape – just get me out of here.

Of course, as the song’s bridge reminds us:

“But where am I runnin’ to, there’s no place to go

Just put on my make up and get me to the show.”

Alice’s escape is to flee back to where he is most comfortable – the stage, and in a way we all flee back to our own version of the stage.  Returning to the roles we know best when the nightmares of the unknown become too much for us to bear.  It is why I love Halloween so much; it is our chance to put on a mask and safely be a little bit more ourselves than we might otherwise dare.  For Alice Cooper, every day is Halloween, and great albums like “Welcome to My Nightmare” are the fortunate byproduct of his experience.

Best tracks:  All tracks, although the bonus tracks on the remastered CD are not worth your time.  I tend to skip those when I’m not doing a CD Odyssey and only pay them last minute lip service when I am.

CD Odyssey Disc 447: Alice Cooper

I’ve had a nice productive day of getting chores done as well as fulfilling my creative needs.  I’ve just finished a good two hour session writing my new book, and now I’m going to come down off of that literary high in the halfway house of the mind that is a blog entry.

This time it is a continuation of the Alice Cooper Reign of Terror.  I've randomly rolled 4 Alice Cooper albums in the last eighteen reviews, three of those in the last eight.  Weird.

Disc 447 is… Alice Cooper Goes to Hell

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 1976

What’s up with the Cover?  A relatively boring head and shoulders shot of Alice.  With that tint to his skin he looks less like he’s gone to hell and more like he’s gone to sea and found it disagreed with him.

How I Came To Know It:  I’ve known Alice Cooper all my life, and this particular album since about my late teens.  I bought this originally on tape, partly because I knew I always liked Alice, and partly because I’d never heard of any of the songs on it, and this intrigued me even more.

How It Stacks Up:  I have twenty-six Alice Cooper albums, which I think is all of them.  “Goes to Hell” is one of my all-time favourites, but competition at the top is fierce, and it only manages to work its way up to seventh.

Rating:  4 stars.

I’ve never been a fan of musicals, but if more musicals were like “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell” I’d have to rethink my position.

Make no mistake; this record deserves to be made into a musical.  It already has all the component pieces.  “Goes to Hell” is a concept album that tells the story of a man who is condemned to hell, where he meets the Devil, pleads for his life and then ultimately admits his guilt, only to find it was all a dream – or was it?

Yeah this is a pretty tired plotline, but “Goes to Hell” covers it well and is a hell of a lot more enjoyable than “The Wizard of Oz” and look how famous that was.  Unlike “Wizard of Oz” Cooper covers pretty much every style of popular music along the way, from hard rock to disco to Broadway and even a remake of “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows” which was sung by Judy Garland in 1941.  And so we come full circle and return to our story.

The album begins with “Go To Hell” a song that lays down a funky bass line only to slather a thick coat of rock and roll all over it.  It is vintage shock-rock Alice Cooper, as he decries his alter ego’s many crimes, starting with the real ones:

“For criminal acts and violence on the stage

For being a brat refusing to act your age

For all of the decent citizens you’ve enraged

You can go to Hell”

And moving on to ridiculously malicious sins such as “making your Grandma sick”, “poisoning a blind man’s dog”, and my favourite, gift wrapping a leper and mailing him to your Aunt Jane.  Yet for all its silliness, this is one monster rock song that gets the album off with a bang.

Following up on this song, our unrepentant anti-hero decides to go dancing, in this case to a disco song called “You Gotta Dance” which gets your hips moving, your body swaying and even features the finest of seventies rock instruments; the cowbell, which is played with Will Ferrell-like abandon.

After a brief laid back-funk track introduces Satan (“I’m the Coolest”) the album picks up again beautifully as our narrator tries to figure out where he’s seen the devil before.  This song is Cooper showing his range from the hesitant piano that opens the song with Cooper’s querulous “Pardon me/But you see/I’ve seen that face before” and then launches into yet more rock guitar greatness, mixed with a healthy dose of showmanship.  Cooper is an actor and entertainer at heart, and he plays all the characters in the song to great effect.

For all its silly fun, “Goes to Hell” still manages to deliver some moments of pop music magic that stand perfectly strong on their own outside the album’s concept.  “I Never Cry” is a five star ballad that I can’t go two days without finding myself humming in the shower, even when I haven’t played it in months (which is rare).

“I Never Cry” is a harbinger of Cooper’s full descent into alcohol abuse, and it is written with the painful clarity of someone who sees all his bad habits without filter or misunderstanding, but pursues them anyway.  Cooper describes how it is to be so famous that you can get away with all manner of crimes to yourself, and people will just watch you go down:

“Sometimes I drink more than I need

Until the TV’s dead and gone

I may be lonely

But I’m never alone

And the night may pass me by

But I’ll never cry.”

“I Never Cry” is also one of Cooper’s finest vocal performances.  I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating; he’s an underrated singer, likely because his stage shows have always overshadowed his talent.  “I Never Cry” would work regardless on the strength of its got great song construction and production decisions, but the magic happens because Cooper is willing to completely put himself out there, both vocally and lyrically.  Take my advice and YouTube it!

After this song, the album returns to its showtune/musical quality as our hero pleads for freedom (“Give the Kid a Break” and then accepts his fate “Guilty” before eventually waking up with “Going Home.”

“Going Home” has some very schmaltzy lyrics, and out of context it comes off a bit saccharine but the song itself has a strong melody that caries it off, and within the context of the full album, it is exactly what is needed to finish the record off.

“Goes to Hell” is one of those albums that is sadly unappreciated, maybe because it came out so soon after the splashy “Welcome to My Nightmare.” Also, if you only like the hard rock side of Alice Cooper some of these songs are going to be jarring for you, as he experiments with the other sounds of 1976 like disco and soul.  However it is this experimentation that keeps the record so fresh for me many years later.  It would be a mistake to overlook this album simply because you don’t recognize any of the songs.  You may not know them but trust me, you want to.

Best tracks:  Go To Hell, Didn’t We Meet, I Never Cry, Guilty, Wake Me Gently, Wish You Were Here 

CD Odyssey Disc 444: Alice Cooper

Since the beginning, the dice gods have seemed to enjoy choosing Alice Cooper records for me to review.  This next review is my 18^th Alice Cooper record and the third in the last fifteen.  Weird.

Disc 444 is… Easy Action

Artist: Alice Cooper

Year of Release: 1970

What’s up with the Cover?  Modern Alice Cooper album covers usually have a lot going on, and – love them or hate them – high production values.  This one is from before the band made it big so it is pretty basic.  It looks like the guys couldn’t even afford shirts for the photo shoot.  How sad. 

How I Came To Know It:  I thought I had every Alice Cooper studio album, but then a few years ago they re-released a couple of his very early records on CD, “Pretties for You” and this one.  I snatched it up the moment it hit the shelves.

How It Stacks Up:  I have twenty-six studio albums by Alice Cooper.  This one ranks fairly low, likely around 21^st just above “Pretties for You” and just below “Constrictor.”  Yeah, I know I already assigned 21^st to “Constrictor” but I’ll move it up one to fit in this new situation.  When I’m finished all the Alice albums I’ll be doing a full ranking of them anyway, so I’ll sort it out then.  For now, you get the idea.

Rating:  2 stars.

You can have all the right ingredients, but without a good recipe the meal still won’t turn out right.  That’s what “Easy Action” represents in the Alice Cooper discography.

The record has everything that would make “Love it to Death” a classic rock album a year later, including provocatively weird guitar and bass work from Glen Buxton and Dennis Dunaway respectively, the ‘all-in’ delivery of Alice’s lead vocals and a willingness to experiment with traditional rock sounds and explore the edges of the genre.

The album opens with “Mr. & Misdemeanor” which has that show-tune quality which Alice Cooper has expanded even further in his solo career.  In fact, similar to “School’sOut”, “Westside Story” figures throughout the record in direct lyrical and musical references.  The piano borders on cheesy and juxtaposes passingly well with the prog guitar and Alice’s Lovecraftian shrieks of fevered excitement.

“Shoe Salesman” is a pure pop ditty that could just as easily be found on a Beatles record of around the same time.  It has that same light and airy melody of a Beatles song, and the same Beatles habit of overdoing the production wherever possible.  A number of the songs on the record show the band had grown up listening to the Fab Four and were incorporating what they heard (imperfectly) into their own still-evolving sound.

Most of the tracks are short, three minute songs crammed overfull with ideas, but there are a couple of longer pure-prog tracks that had me thinking of early Pink Floyd.  “Below Your Means” and “Lay Down and Die, Goodbye” both ‘explore the space’ to borrow from the Saturday Night Live skit.  Both songs show promise, but at around seven minutes each, they also suffer from attention deficit disorder, unable to spend enough time developing one musical thought before arbitrarily moving on to another one.  “Lay Down…” is a particularly unfocused song, jumping from idea to idea with the discipline of a hummingbird.

As a devoted Alice Cooper fan the imperfections of the album are enjoyable from a historical perspective.  It helps demonstrate some of their early ideas in a very raw and unrefined way that then assists in understanding the band’s future progression.  I enjoyed the journey overall, but it was maddening hearing snippets of greatness mixed together in an energy-laden, but undirected stew.

This is because for all of its promise, “Easy Action” is half-cooked on the production side.  It is almost there at every turn, but desperately needs a good editor to cut back the excess and then further develop the core of the work.  What the record needs is Bob Ezrin’s production.  Listening to it made me deeply appreciate what he did for the band.  Ezrin must have heard the same promise in these songs, and he had the ability and vision to draw greatness out of them when he worked with them a year later.

Taken on its own, though, the unfocused nature of “Easy Action” makes it an average album at best.  If you are a music historian, you’ll enjoy its role in both the psychedelic music of the time, and the specific development of the Alice Cooper band.  However, if you want to hear similar ideas better expressed, go a year into the future and buy the 1971 classic “Love it to Death.”  Once you’ve grokked that album in its fullness, you’ll be in a better position to go back and appreciate just how close “Easy Action” comes to greatness.

Best tracks:  Mr. & Misdemeanor, Shoe Salesman, Return of the Spiders