Alice Cooper is an American singer, songwriter, and actor whose career spans over 50 years. With a raspy voice and a stage show that features numerous props, including pyrotechnics, guillotines, electric chairs, fake blood, reptiles, baby dolls, and dueling swords, Cooper is considered by music journalists and peers to be "The Godfather of Shock Rock". He has drawn equally from horror films, vaudeville, and garage rock to pioneer a macabre and theatrical brand of rock designed to shock audiences.
Billion Dollar Babies is the sixth studio album by American rock band Alice Cooper, released in 1973. The album became the best selling Alice Cooper record at the time of its release, hit number one on the album charts in both the United States and the United Kingdom, and went on to be certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. The album has been retrospectively praised by such critics as Robert Christgau, Greg Prato of AllMusic, and Jason Thompson of PopMatters, but The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004) gave the album only two and a half stars.
Neal Smith is an American musician, best known as the drummer for the rock group Alice Cooper from 1967 to 1974. He performed on the group's early albums Pretties for You and Easy Action, their breakout album Love It to Death and the subsequent successful albums Killer, School's Out, and Billion Dollar Babies. The last new studio album with the five original Alice Cooper group members participating in new music was Muscle of Love in 1973. The original group's Greatest Hits studio album was released in 1974. In 2018, a live performance album Live From The Astroturf, Alice Cooper recorded in 2015 was released, featuring four of the original group members performing eight of their hit songs, with long-time Alice Cooper solo band guitarist and friend Ryan Roxie interplaying lead guitar parts with original group rhythm guitarist Michael Bruce, on behalf of original group lead guitarist Glen Buxton, who died in 1997 of pneumonia three weeks before his 50th birthday.
The Left Banke was an American baroque pop band, formed in New York City in 1965. They are best remembered for their two U.S. hit singles, "Walk Away Renée" and "Pretty Ballerina". The band often used what the music press referred to as "baroque" string arrangements, which led to their music being variously termed as "Bach-rock" or "baroque rock". The band's vocal harmonies borrowed from contemporaries such as the Beatles, the Zombies and other British Invasion groups.
Michael Owen Bruce is an American rock musician, best known as a member of the rock band Alice Cooper.
Dennis Dunaway is an American musician, best known as the original bass guitarist for the rock band Alice Cooper . He co-wrote some of the band's most notable songs, including "I'm Eighteen" and "School's Out".
Alice Cooper's Greatest Hits is the only greatest hits album by American rock band Alice Cooper, and their last release as a band. Released in 1974, it features hit songs from five of the band's seven studio albums. It does not include any material from their first two albums, Pretties for You and Easy Action.
Zipper Catches Skin is the seventh solo album by Alice Cooper, released in 1982.
Love It to Death is the third studio album by American rock group Alice Cooper, released in March 1971. It was the band's first commercially successful album and the first album that consolidated the band's aggressive hard-rocking sound. The album's best-known track, "I'm Eighteen", was released as a single to test the band's commercial viability before the album was recorded.
Pretties for You is the debut studio album by American rock band Alice Cooper, released on June 25, 1969 by Straight Records. At this time, the name "Alice Cooper" referred to the band and not its lead singer Vincent Furnier. The album has a psychedelic flavor to it; the group had yet to develop the more concise hard rock sound that they would become famous for. Most of the tracks feature unusual time signatures and arrangements, jarring syncopation, expressive dynamics, sound effects, and an eclectic range of music influences. A few songs, such as "Levity Ball", show the influence of Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, with whom the band hung out during the British group's U.S. tour. Alice Cooper guitarist Glen Buxton stated he could listen to Barrett's guitar playing for hours on end.
Easy Action is the second studio album by the American rock band Alice Cooper, released by Straight Records in March 1970. The title comes from a line from one of the band's favorite films, the musical West Side Story. As with Pretties for You, the band's debut from the previous year, Easy Action was neither a commercial nor critical success. Singles include "Shoe Salesman" and "Return of the Spiders".
"The Garden" is a song by the rock band Guns N' Roses released in 1991. It appears on the album Use Your Illusion I and features alternating lead vocals between Axl Rose and Alice Cooper.
Ryan Roxie is an American guitarist, singer/songwriter best known as a solo artist and for his guitar work with Alice Cooper, Casablanca, Gilby Clarke and Slash's Snakepit. Ryan is the primary founder of the System-12 Guitar Method and also hosts the weekly 'In the Trenches with Ryan Roxie' podcast.
"School's Out" is a song first recorded as the title track of Alice Cooper's fifth album. It was released as the album's second single on April 26, 1972. It has been regarded as the band's signature song and reached number 7 on the Billboard Hot 100.
"I'm Eighteen" is a song by rock band Alice Cooper, first released as a single in November 1970 backed with "Is It My Body". It was the band's first top-forty success—peaking at number 21—and convinced Warner Bros. that Alice Cooper had the commercial potential to release an album. The song and its B-side feature on the band's first major-label album Love It to Death (1971).
"Elected" is a single by rock band Alice Cooper, released as the first Hot 100 hit on their sixth studio album Billion Dollar Babies (1972). The single reached #26 during election week on the charts in the United States, #4 on the charts in the United Kingdom and #3 in Austria. It inspired one of the first MTV style story line promo videos ever made for a song.
Orianthi Penny Panagaris is an Australian musician, singer and songwriter who rehearsed in 2009 with Michael Jackson in preparation for his This Is It concert series, and performed with Alice Cooper's touring band. Her 2009 debut single "According to You" peaked at No. 3 in Japan, No. 8 in Australia and No. 17 in the US; her second album, Believe, received a worldwide release in late 2009. The same year, she was named one of the "12 Greatest Female Electric Guitarists" by Elle magazine. She also won the "2010 Breakthrough Guitarist of the Year" award hosted by Guitar International magazine.
"Halo of Flies" is a 1973 single by rock band Alice Cooper taken from their 1971 album Killer. The single was only released in the Netherlands, two years after the song appeared on the album. The song was, according to Cooper's liner notes in the compilation The Definitive Alice Cooper, an attempt by the band to prove that they could perform King Crimson-like progressive rock suites, and was supposedly about a spy organization.
Alice Cooper was an American rock band formed in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1964. The band consisted of lead singer Vince Furnier, Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, Dennis Dunaway, and Neal Smith (drums). Furnier legally changed his name to Alice Cooper and has had a solo career under that name since the band became inactive in 1975. The band was notorious for their elaborate, theatrical shock rock stage shows. In 2011, the original Alice Cooper band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Detroit Stories is the twenty-first solo and twenty-eighth overall studio album by American singer-songwriter Alice Cooper. The album was released on February 26, 2021, by earMUSIC. The studio album crowned Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart debuting at No. 1. It was the first chart-topper for Cooper in the 29-year history of the Top Album Sales chart. The album was produced by Bob Ezrin, who also appears on the album playing the organ. As a solo album, it incorporates a variety of artists contributing on a number of instruments.
