Tag: No More Mr. Nice Guy

You Picked It! – Alice Cooper – ‘Billion Dollar Babies’ (1973) – Album Review

Published on by 2loud2oldmusic44 Comments

Alright…You Picked It! This one started out close, but one ended up blowing away the rest. Another one had a late batch of votes, but wasn’t enough to get close to the winner. The winner for this month’s picks ended up being Alice Cooper’s ‘Billion Dollar Babies’ and I am real excited about this one. Here are the results.

  1. Alice Cooper – ‘Billion Dollar Babies’ – 10 votes
  2. Rolling Stones – ‘Sticky Fingers – 6 votes
  3. Elton John – ‘Captain Fantastic’ – 2 votes
  4. David Bowie – ‘Diamond Dogs’ – 2 votes
  5. Led Zeppelin – ‘II’ – 2 Votes

Thanks to all for participating. The January choices will be up on Saturday! And the choices are all now from my collection and the next one will be some of the biggest albums of the 80’s. Hopefully you can help me decide which one I should review.

ALICE COOPER – ‘BILLION DOLLAR BABIES’ (1973):

I’ve been wanting to tackle an Alice Cooper album so I am glad this one won the vote. It is Alice’s 6th studio album and Bob Ezrin was still at the helm. Being a Kiss fan, having Bob as producer is a pretty big deal and I could hear a lot of Bob’s influence in the music as there is a lot on here that Kiss tried with Destroyer such as orchestration, sound effects and other magical Bob Ezrin inputs. I’m not Bob is the reason this album is so good, but it did go to #1 in both the UK and the US and sold over 1,000,000 copies giving it platinum status. Who am I kidding, it isn’t Bob that made this album #1 it is strictly Alice Cooper and this amazing band which includes Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, Dennis Dunaway and Neal Smith.

The album was recorded in both Connecticut and in London. Band member, Glen Buxton, was sick throughout the sessions as he was suffering from pancreatitis brought on by abusive alcohol consumption. Guitarists Mick Mashbir, Dick Wagner (Kiss ghost guitarist) and the great Steve “the Deacon” Hunter who handled the guitar solos on 5 songs and pedal steel guitar on the opening track. The album was finished and released on February 25, 1973 and helped take Alice Cooper to a whole different level of success. The song is so good, that 4 of the songs are still played regularly in his live sets even today.

Continue reading “You Picked It! – Alice Cooper – ‘Billion Dollar Babies’ (1973) – Album Review” →

Alice Cooper – 2021 Fall Tour (Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheater, October 7, 2021) – Concert Review

Published on by 2loud2oldmusic35 Comments

Welcome to Alice Cooper’s Nightmare Castle!! That is how the show opened and what a nightmare it was, but in a good way. This was my second time seeing Alice as I saw him 3 years earlier, almost to the day and I am glad to be back to be terrified, freaked out and entertained by the legend himself. This time around, my daughter joined me as she figured if her mom liked the last show, maybe she will and I think she did, but more on that later.

As we were standing in line to get through the vaccine check (negative covid test check) and the metal detector, we noticed people wearing Nita Strauss T-Shirts. It was cool seeing people that were coming to the show to see her. If you don’t know her, she is “Hurricane” Nita Strauss and she is Alice Cooper’s lead guitar player (one of three), but she is the featured one that gets all the press because she is pretty freaking awesome!!

After watching Ace Frehley Open the show, the crowd was pumped and ready. We only had to wait just under 30 minutes to get the stage transferred over and turned in to this giant 2-Story castle and full of horrifying things. But what wasn’t horrifying, but electrifying was the setlist…take a look at what he has to offer this time around…

Continue reading “Alice Cooper – 2021 Fall Tour (Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheater, October 7, 2021) – Concert Review” →

Alice Cooper – Concert Review (Charlotte, NC 10-9-2018)

Published on by 2loud2oldmusic12 Comments

Ok, I am in no means an Alice Cooper aficionado, I am a casual fan at best.  However, I have always wanted to see Alice live, but never actually went.  Well, as I am getting older and so is Alice, I realized that we won’t be around much longer and I better go see him while I am still around and so is he.  So after my pal Deke went and wrote about it at Thunder Bay Arena Rock, he convinced me to finally do it.  And let me tell you, I am so glad I did.

Now, if you want better pictures go to Deke’s blog as he had front row I believe.  I wasn’t so lucky and I am too cheap!  But I did get pictures and they suck because my phone sucks.  So I apologize up front for that.

IMG_1266

My wife decided to join me on this concert experience and I am glad she did as it made the night that much more special that she was with me.  Plus, it is nice any time we get a date night.  No kids!!!

Now my wife is a little height challenged so she had trouble seeing. Me, I am 6’2″ so I had only minor issues as the guy in front of me was a little taller than me.  But that is okay, I got to see most everything.  Okay enough about that, let’s get to the show.

The show opened with Alice’s voice welcomes you to the nightmare and the band comes exploding out with “Brutal Planet” which was such a great opening song and there was no holding back.  Alice comes strolling out with this coat and cane and never has a 70 year old man looked so cool!!  He owns the stage and has such presence that you are completely drawn to him.  And the way he swings that cane around, those band members better not be standing close or they will get knocked on their ass.  Hell, Alice swung the cane so hard against a speaker that the damn cane broke.

Continue reading “Alice Cooper – Concert Review (Charlotte, NC 10-9-2018)” →