Biography of Alice Cooper

Originally, there was a band called Alice Cooper led by a singer named Vincent Damon Furnier. Under his direction, Alice Cooper pioneered a grandly theatrical and violent brand of heavy metal that was designed to shock. Drawing equally from horror movies, vaudeville, and Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and the Stooges, the group created a stage show that featured electric chairs, guillotines, fake blood, and huge boa constrictors, all coordinated by the heavily made-up Furnier. By that time, Furnier had adopted the name for his adrogynous onstage personality. While the visuals were extremely important to the group's impact, the band's music was nearly as distinctive. Driven by raw, simple riffs and melodies that derived from '60s guitar-pop as well as showtunes, it was rock & roll at its most basic and catchy, even when the band ventured into psychedelia and art-rock. After the original group broke up and Furnier began a solo career as Alice Cooper, his actual music lost most of its theatrical flourishes, becoming straightforward heavy metal, yet his stage show retained all of the trademark props that made him the king of shock rock.Furnier formed his first group, The Earwigs, as an Arizona teenager in the early '60s. Changing the band's name to The Spiders in 1965, the group was eventually called The Nazz (not to be confused with Todd Rundgren's band of the same name). The Spiders and The Nazz both released local singles that were moderately popular. After discovering there was another band called The Nazz in 1968, the group changed its name to Alice Cooper. According to band legend, the name came to Furnier during a ouija board session, where he was told he was the reincarnation of a 17th-century witch of the same name.Comprised of vocalist Furnier -- who would soon begin calling himself Alice Cooper -- guitarist Mike Bruce, guitarist Glen Buxton, bassist Dennis Dunaway, and drummer Neal Smith, the group moved to California in 1968. In California, the group met Frank Zappa and his manager Shep Gordon, who signed Alice Cooper to their new label Straight Records. Alice Cooper released their first album, Pretties for You, in 1969. Pretties for You captured the band in their formative stages, where they sounded more like a garage rock group than a heavy metal outfit, yet it was a small hit, peaking at number 193 on the U.S. charts. Easy Action followed early in 1970, yet it failed to chart. The group's reputation in Los Angeles was slowly shrinking, so the band moved to Detroit, the city where Vincent Furnier was born. For the next year, the group refined their bizarre stage show. Late in 1970, the group signed with Warner Brothers and began recording their third album with producer Bob Ezrin.With Ezrin's assistance, Alice Cooper developed their classic heavy metal crunch on 1971's Love It to Death, which featured the number 21 hit single "Eighteen"; the album peaked at number 35 and went gold. The success enabled the group to develop a more impressive, elaborate live show, which made them highly popular concert attractions across the U.S. and eventually the U.K. Killer, released late in 1971, was another gold album, featuring the minor hit single "Under My Wheels."Released in the summer of 1972, School's Out was Alice Cooper's commercial breakthrough, reaching number two in the charts and selling over a million copies. The title song became a hit single, cracking the Top Ten in the U.S. and hitting number one in the U.K. Billion Dollar Babies, released the following year, was the group's biggest hit, reaching number one in both America and Britain; the album's first single, "No More Mr. Nice Guy," became a Top Ten hit in Britain, peaking at number 25 in the U.S. Muscle of Love appeared late in 1973, yet it failed to capitalize on the success of Billion Dollar Babies. The album failed to go platinum and it peaked at number ten in America and a disappointing number 34 in Britain. After Muscle of Love Furnier fired the rest of Alice Cooper, taking the name as his own official name; the rest of the band released one unsuccessful album under the name Billion Dollar Babies. Cooper hired guitarists Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter, bassist Prakash John, keyboardist Joseph Chrowski, and drummer Penti Glan as a backing band; all of the musicians had previously supported Lou Reed and both Wagner and Hunter made uncredited contributions to several Alice Cooper albums. In the fall of 1974, a compilation of Alice Cooper's five Warner albums, entitled Alice Cooper's Greatest Hits, became a Top Ten hit. Alice Cooper followed it with his first solo album, Welcome to My Nightmare, in the spring of 1975. Welcome to My Nightmare wasn't a great departure from his previous group and it became Top Ten hit in America, launching the hit acoustic ballad "Only Women Bleed." Released in 1976, Alice Cooper Goes to Hell was another hit, going gold in the U.S.After Alice Cooper Goes to Hell, Cooper's career began to slip, partially due to changing trends and partially due to his alcoholism. Cooper entered rehabilitation in 1978, writing an album called From the Inside (1978) about his treatment with Bernie Taupin, Elton John's lyricist. During the early '80s, Cooper continued to release albums and tour, yet he was no longer as popular as he was during his early-'70s heyday.Cooper made a successful comeback in the late '80s, sparked by his appearances in horror films and a series of pop-metal bands that paid musical homage to his classic early records. Constrictor, released in 1986, began his comeback but it was 1989's Trash that returned Cooper to the spotlight. Produced by the proven hitmaker Desmond Child, Trash featured guest appearances by Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, Kip Winger, and most of Aerosmith; the record became a Top Ten hit in Britain and peaked at number 20 in the U.S., going platinum. "Poison," a ballad featured on the album, became Cooper's first Top Ten since 1977. Since the release of Trash, he has continued to star in the occasional film, tour, and record. His latest album, The Last Temptation of Alice Cooper, featured contributions from members of Soundgarden. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine