Being one of the biggest fans of Alice Cooper I was thrilled when Sound Waves ask me to do this interview. With his new CD, “Dragontown,” just released and his tour coming to Foxwoods on October 30th, I had a ton of questions for the “king of shock rock”. This phone interview took place on the afternoon of Tuesday September 18th, 2001.
PH – Alice, tell me about the your new CD “Dragontown.”
AC – “Yeah, Brutal Planet part two. You know it was sort of like when I got Brutal Planet done I realized that it wasn’t done. It needed a part two and I’ve never done a sequel to an album. I just didn’t think the story was finished yet. And so I wanted to continue with the idea that Brutal Planet was this place where you didn’t want to go. And now, we’re going to the worst part of Brutal Planet – Dragontown! It’s one of those perfect kind of theatre pieces for Alice.”
PH – Wow that’s great because Brutal Planet was fabulous.
AC – “Thank you very much.”
PH – And you’re working with Bob Marlette again?
AC – “Yeah, he’s a character. You know I always work well with really good guitar players.”
PH – Right, it’s almost like you and Michael Bruce again.
AC – “I always found that if I can sit down and work with piano players, Bob Ezrin was a piano player, we would sit and write those songs together. Like Welcome to my Nightmare and other really creepy things on piano, or the really pretty ballads. But when it came to writing really, really creeepy big rock and roll anthems and stuff, you need a guitar player. And the thing that was very distinctive about these two albums, Brutal Planet and Dragontown, was if I look back at all the albums I can usually say well, I’d say maybe five or six songs are stage songs. A lot of songs on the other albums well, they were good songs, they just weren’t stage songs. Everything on Brutal Planet and Dragontown are stage songs.”
PH – They are!
AC – “Every single one of them could be a stage song. So obviously it’s a high energy album.”
PH – Last year I saw you third row center up here in Wallingford. Now you’re coming to the Fox Theatre. What can we look forward to on the new tour?
AC – “It’s going to be part two if you saw the first one. We’re going to take it, and it’s going to look very similar, except for the fact that now you’re going to feel like you are in a different place. And there’s going to be a lot of new songs. There’s going to be a lot of different characters and we’re just going to take it and twist it into a different thing now.”
PH – I love it!
AC – “And I think people will like it because we’re going to be doing all the hits. Like we did in the first one only we’re going to be adding a few different ones and taking a few out. We’ll do maybe five or six songs from Dragontown and it’s going to look different too. We’re staging it all different. Even though your still down there, you can tell your still in this horrible place.”
PH – Now what about the band. Is it the same lineup?
AC – “Yeah, I got all the same guys back, and sometimes that’s hard to do only because of the fact that people float around a lot. So I managed to get everyone back and they’re already in rehearsal right now. I start about three days before the tour starts. I’ll go in and sort of like get everything sparkling.”
PH – That’s a tight band. When I saw them I was just floored.
AC – “Oh they’re a good group. You know I’ve got Eric Singer on drums, Ryan Roxie and Eric Dover on guitar, and Craig Smith too. They’re all experienced guys, they’ve all been in other bands. When they come together in my band, they all get very theatrical and after every show we play poker on the bus. During poker games we talk about ways to improve the show, doing different things. If someone comes up with an idea, we’ll try it. I like the show to be flexible, not set in stone. We want to be able to move around and breathe a bit, change here and change there, add this and take away that. It makes it a living thing then.”
PH – Which makes you wonderful!
AC – “And it makes it fun for me! I’ve been offered Broadway parts before and I thought, do I really want to do two years of the same material over and over every night, exactly the same way? Because I’m so used to having the luxury of moving my show around a little bit. Pulling this song out, putting this one in, trying this one, trying that. When you have all the say in the show it’s great! When you’re in a show of someone else’s, you have to do the their way.”
PH – Now speaking of theatre, I heard you were making a movie?
AC – “Yeah, I’ve been in about 13 movies, I’ve been able to play characters other than Alice, which is nice. The new movie is called the Addict Expedition. I play this character that’s a mental patient. And he’s an escape artist, and he keeps thinking he’s getting smaller. He’s convinced in his mind that he’s getting smaller every day, until he’s finally going to disappear. It’s just a bit part thing. It was fun.”
PH – So you’ve got a lot going on. I saw too where you just opened up another Cooperstown restaurant in Denver.
AC – “Yes Denver. Cooperstown is a rock and roll sports restaurant. The one in Phoenix is right next door to the American West Arena, where the Suns and Coyotes play. And we’re located next to where the Diamondbacks play too. So, the one in Denver is right next to Coors Field. We’re trying to find cities that are rock and roll and sports cities. It’s fun to do.”
PH – I can imagine.
AC – “I mean my partners are so eclectic. I’ve got Dave Mustane from Megadeath. Randy Johnson, the big unit, from the Diamondbacks. And Ryne Sandburg from the Cubs, people like that.”
PH – Wow, you’re surrounded.
AC – “Yeah, I’ve always been a big sports nut. So I like the fact of connecting rock and roll with sports, they’re very similar.”
PH – I remember you were on the track team in high school, do you still jog?
AC – “I run everyday.”
PH – Do you really?
AC – “I run EVERY day! Yes, in fact when I get done with these interviews, Ive got a three mile indoor run coming up. That way I get ready for the tour. Once I’m on the tour, an hour and forty-five minute show, that keeps you in shape.”
PH – I’m sure you’re getting some golf in there too.
AC – “Oh yeah, golf is great. Golf to me is just a great waste of three and a half hours. There is a period of time during the year, around January and February where I get very serious about it. Because that’s the time of all the big tournaments. And that’s when I start really playing.”
PH – Yeah, you’re pretty good, I saw you play once on VH-1.
AC – “I’m about a four handicap. I play a lot.”
PH – If given a choice to win a Grammy for album of the year for Dragontown or to win a PGA tournament, what would you take?
AC – “Oh man! It would be easier to get a Grammy than a PGA win because you’d have to beat Tiger Woods. But you know I’ve been in the business for so long, it would be better for me to have the Grammy.”
PH – You deserve it.
AC – “After 26 albums it would be nice to win a Grammy. I’ve been nominated before, but I’ve never won.”
PH – Your turn will come soon.
AC – “Yeah, I’m the Susan Lucci of rock.”
PH – Hey she finally won! Alice, changing the subject, I’ve always wanted to ask you what rock performers shock you?
AC – “Shock me?”
PH – Yeah, anyone ever shock you throughout your career?
AC – “I wonder sometimes if I’m shocked, or if sometimes I’m just taken aback. I’m always amazed by how big mediocre acts can get. I’m always amazed that acts that are more clever or acts that are technically better, don’t do better. When I look at the top songs I go geez, it’s about as mediocre as you can get. Then I start thinking that people want mediocrity. People basically want average songs, they don’t want ultra clever songs. Obviously or there would be a lot of acts doing a lot better.”
PH – Do you think the music business has changed in that regard?
AC – “I think there’s sort of a safety net of certain acts. I’ve heard of people that go into record stores and say ‘I’ve got fifteen dollars, what’s number one.’ They’re not going to the record store to buy something they like, they just want to make sure they buy what is number one. You just go, come on, what’s wrong with you, don’t you have a mind of your own? I’ve never understood that. But as far as shocking me, I’ve seen bands push the envelope. Marilyn’s videos are really good, I mean, they’re really disturbing. I don’t know if they shock me as much as they’re disturbing. Which I kind of like, I enjoy that. To be different is OK. I don’t agree with a lot of the things that Marilyn says, especially on the theological level. He does a very interesting show.”
PH – Yeah but he’s robbed a lot from you.
AC – “Well I think a lot of people have borrowed from Alice. I mean totally, from a lot of areas. If someone was going to say to me what did you bring to rock and roll, I would say we made it possible to be visual. At one time if you did anything theatrical it was to hide the fact that you couldn’t play. Well, we had to break that mold. We had to get out of that. For a long time the press would say that Alice Cooper is fun to watch but couldn’t play. Then after about five or six hit records and a couple of number ones, well that speaks pretty loud. All of the sudden they were going well, you know, maybe you can do theatrics and be a good musician. Then all of the sudden you started seeing more and more bands getting theatrical. Like Elton John got more theatrical. David Bowie got theatrical and Kiss and everybody, and then it was accepted. But for a long time we kind of suffered under that sort of blanket. If you were a theatrical band, you were not a very good musical band. We lived through that.”
PH – Alice I know you gotta get going soon but I wanted to ask you if you had a favorite golf course here in Connecticut?
AC – “You know I used to live in Greenwich but I didn’t play golf then. I didn’t start playing until we moved out to California. When we lived in Greenwich we lived in a big estate right next door to Bette Davis. It was a huge, great big mansion that ended up burning down. But I never played golf in Greenwich or anywhere in Connecticut.”
PH – Who got you into the sport anyway?
AC – “It was one of those things where, I just got so tired of sitting around the hotel room. One of the guys said ‘I’m going to go out and hit some balls.’ And I said ‘I’ll go with you.’ We went out and hit some balls and I had a natural talent for it. I picked up the club and hit it right down the middle and I was addicted. It’s a worse addition than drugs, I’ll tell you that. You should see some of the guys out playing golf now. Guys like Lou Reed, Iggy, Dylan, Neil Young are out there playing. Then you see Pantera, Megadeath, Metallica, and all these bands out playing golf. Everybody plays.”
PH – So as far as rock and roll goes, who’s the best golfer out there?
AC – “The best right now? I haven’t met anyone in the rock and roll business that can beat me. Maybe Dweezil Zappa. Dweezil can play.”
PH – Who’s the worst?
AC – “The worst? Eddie Van Halen. I don’t even have to think about that. Eddie is just the worst. But he’s a great guy and I think he’s a great guitar player.”
PH – Alice thanks so much for your time.
AC – “Thank you Paul and I hope to see you at Foxwoods.”
PH – I’ll be there.
Halloween may be on the 31st of October, but in some quarters the night before Halloween is traditionally called “mischief night.” How appropriate it will be to spent such an evening with Alice Cooper, especially at a venue as cool as the Fox Theatre. I first saw Alice in concert at the New Haven arena back in 1971. I even have tapes of the show. Here it is thirty years later and I still get excited about seeing him.