All Back to Vinyl- Alice Cooper
Hollywood Vampires Live review
Alice Cooper’s classic albums Killer (1971) and School’s Out (1972) have both recently been remastered with extended vinyl editions.
When you think about the live acts who have visited Scotland recently, Cooper’s influence is far and wide on the likes of Guns N’ Roses and Motley Crue, other visitors including his contemporaries such as The Who and Rod Stewart are also still going strong. Killer laid something of a blueprint for shock-rock and punk, tracks such as I’m Eighteen sound as relevant and fresh as they did over 50 years ago.
Cooper arrived in Glasgow to play the track as part of the Hollywood Vampires flanked by Johnny Depp and Aerosmith’s Joe Perry. I’m Eighteen was the song Johnny Rotten sang when he auctioned for the Sex Pistols, Alice Cooper tapping his cain alongside aa brooding Johnny Depp leaning over a Les Paul and Joe Perry snarling his top lip while playing a BC Rich helped deliver a set highlight at the Hydro.
This was followed by a nod to another contemporary of Cooper; Jim Morrison of The Doors, the Vampires ripped through a stunning medley of Five To One and Break On Through. The Doors tracks are a good fit for Cooper, to return to Killer, the likes of Desperado, Be My Lover and Is It My Body could have all been sung by Morrison and the new vinyl remaster gives life to these definitive Cooper cuts. My Dead Drunk friends is a nod to the likes of Keith Moon, friends and contemporaries of Alice who didn’t make it out of the 1970s.
Johnny Depp steps forward to pay tribute to David Bowie on a cover of ‘Heroes’, he does a fine job full of pathos and energy. There’s also a tribute to the late Jeff Beck, Depp introduces his best friend “a white Strat” leaving Joe Perry, one of the few who could, pay a remarkable tribute. The set closes with what else but School’s Out, the stand out track from Coppers 1972 album that he famously performed on Top of the Pops. Schools Out is fine collection but it’s Killer that remains one of the most important rock long-players of all time.
As various institutions fall and various figures from politics and public life fall short, Alice Cooper has become one of the most reliable entertainers of our times.
Just a few months after Cooper’s appearance on Top of the Pops the Home Secretary Mr Leo Abse asked for Cooper to be banned from Britain. Recently, I watched my son finish Primary School, the headteacher’s choice of song for the big exit…Alice Cooper’s School’s Out.
