In honor of Alice Cooper's entry into the Rock-N-Roll hall of fame, I'm posting my impressions of the band's run of classic hard-rocking albums recorded between 1971 and 1973.  It's a staggering accomplishment, both in quality and consistency, but maintaining such a high standard proved to be overwhelming.  The band broke up shortly after the release of Muscle of Love.  A final tour was started, then abruptly abandoned; but Alice Cooper left behind a string of 5 killer albums, 12 memorable hit singles, and a live act that inspired, for good or evil, legions of ghoulish followers.  These were the rock records that I grew up listening to, and I'm still listening to them today.  Congratulations Alice Cooper!

LOVE IT TO DEATH (1971)

Most of the elements that made Alice Cooper a unique 70s act are in place here.  Luckily, producer extraordinaire Bob Ezrin caught the band live one night at a half-full Max's Kansas City in New York. They had already released two undistinguished albums that had done little to grow their fan base beyond the local club scene in Detroit.  All that changed when Mr. Ezrin convinced his boss Jack Richardson to let him take Alice Cooper into the studio.  He turned their raw, unfocused sound into something with serious commercial potential without polishing away any of their rough edges.  Garage Rock, Proto Punk and Arena Rock can be heard on “Caught In A Dream”, “I’m Eighteen”, and “Long Way To Go” respectively.  And the band’s trademark weirdness appears in the two Gothic epics, “The Ballad of Dwight Fry” and "Black Juju.”  Alice is in top form vocally, employing a variety of “voices”; Mike Bruce and Glen Buxton layer each song with distinctive guitar work, and the rhythm section of Neal Smith and Dennis Dunaway drives each track into the stratosphere.
A Classic.

KILLER (1971)

This is where the band really solidified their hard rock style while simultaneously perfecting their ability to produce a wide variety of songs that, taken together, provided the Coopers with a lose theme for their macabre live shows.  On Killer, songs like “Dead Babies” and the title track fit in perfectly.  But what keeps the record a compelling listen are the shorter, punchier hits, like “Under My Wheels”, “Desperado”, and “Be My Lover.”  The long and winding “Halo of Flies” with its rhythmic, punchy synthesizer parts, sounds very Who-ish to this fan, but in a good way.  The Coopers were always a little derivative, but at least they had excellent taste.  The songs “You Drive Me Nervous” and “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah” burn with the garage-rock energy of their early club-stomping days.  A Classic.

SCHOOL'S OUT (1972)

Did the band stay up late one night, drop acid, and watch West Side Story.  Except for the fact that they came up with their most original, incendiary single to date, School’s Out sure sounds like it.  No matter, the record still burns with raw energy, and they did get a theme for the accompanying tour out of it, so why not.  This just might be the Cooper’s Art Rock record.  “Looney Tune”, “Gutter Cat vs. the Jets”, “Street Fight”, and “Grand Finale” are all pieces of a grand and grandiose design, and “My Stars” and “Blue Turk” while rocking, trade the garage for the theater with their grand piano adornments and cool jazz arrangements.  “Public Animal # 9”, the meanest song on the record, gives Alice a chance to employ another of his great character voices, and "Alma Mater" is reverent without being overly sentimental.  A Classic. 

BILLION DOLLAR BABIES (1973)

 This is where I first heard Alice Cooper.  My older brother had a copy, which really attests to the crossover popularity of Billion Dollar Babies. The band pretty much peaked with this one, due mainly to the quality and quantity of its hit singles and overall high production values.  “Billion Dollar Babies”, “Elected”, and “No More Mr. Nice Guy” all charted.  And “Hello Hooray” and “Generation Landslide” became FM radio staples.  There are so many good singles here it’s scary!  The theme for the tour was defined by the tracks “Sick Things” and “I Love the Dead”; and for this fan, both seem a little more calculated than compelling.  With hindsight, it’s easy to see why the band became so divided after this recording.  It’s a great record sure, and it brought the band more fans than ever: they went from national attention to worldwide fame.  But they had also strayed well away from their garage rock roots, and the theatrical nature of their recordings had become confining.  I still play this record, and it always satisfies; but its slickness is also its salvation.  A Classic.

MUSCLE OF LOVE (1973)

The great divide: the band wanted Bob Ezrin, big production and grandiose themes gone; the singer wanted to continue in the direction they had so successfully board out.  So what is Muscle of Love? To this fan, it’s simply a great collection of hard rocking songs, pretty ballads, a movie title song (The Man With the Golden Gun) and forward looking experiments that could and should have been explored further.  I love this record!  I would characterize this one as the band’s Deep Purple album.  They pulled back on the futuristic sounding synthesizers and upped the organ ante considerably.  If the songwriting hadn’t been up to the band's usual high standard, things could have gone terribly wrong; but the songs are there.  On a side note: on previous records, Bob Ezrin had begun substituting professional studio musicians for band members when he thought it necessary, and that practice continued on Muscle of Love. The record making process, The Job, had all come a long way from Love It To Death; and maybe the time was right for a split.  But I simply cannot fault this record.  The singles, “Teenage Lament ‘74” and “Muscle of Love” are as good as the band gets.  And both sides of the record have a flow, a groove, that makes them, for this fan, compelling listens.  This is a personal record that sheds new light on the Coopers.  A Classic.