Alice Cooper - Love It To Death

The first Alice Cooper album released on a major label was Love It To Death in 1971. This album featured the classic line up of Alice Cooper (Vincent Furnier), Dennis Dunaway, Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, and Neal Smith, as well as being produced by Bob Ezrin.

This nothing album, recorded by a bunch of weirdos that relocated from California to Detroit, was produced by a nobody that thought this band was going somewhere. Bob Ezrin was very right, and on his way to becoming a major name himself.

Let me start with the only reason Alice Cooper (which was actually the band's name at the time, not the vocalist) was famous. "The Chicken Inccident" was when a chicken somehow found itself on stage with Alice, during a point when they use to shower the audience in feathers from pillows. The vocalist picked up the flightless bird, and being some type of moron, threw it back into the crowd thinking it would fly. The audience instead tore the animal apart.

Now, if you have ever owned a copy of Pink Floyd's The Wall, Kiss' Destroyer and Revenge, and Lou Reed's Berlin to name just a few, you'll know hat Bob Ezrin produced some of the best albums Rock ever released. However, this was the album that started it all.

What you might not know is that Bob Ezrin and Alice Cooper (band and artist) released not only Love It to Death (1971) together, but also Killer (1971), School's Out (1972), Billion Dollar Babies (1973), Welcome to My Nightmare (1975), Alice Cooper Goes to Hell (1976), Lace and Whiskey (1977), The Alice Cooper Show (1977), DaDa (1983), and Welcome 2 My Nightmare (2011). Bob also was the executive producer for Brutal Planet (2000) and Dragontown (2001). But, I digress.

This is the album that made Alice Cooper famous, and it's all thanks to a song that Bob originally thought was called I'm Edgy, or something to that effect. It was actually I'm Eighteen, which I'm sure if you are reading this you know exactly what song I'm talking about. This song was made famous by CKWW in Windsor, Ontario. Long before it became a completely crap talk station. Why would a song like I'm Eighteen get so much airplay in 1971? Because the words were clear and they could easily appeal to the masses. "I got a / Baby´s brain and an old man´s heart / Took eighteen years to get this far / Don´t always know what I´m talkin´ about / Feels like I´m livin´ in the middle of doubt / Cause I´m eighteen / I get confused every day / Eighteen / I just don´t know what to say / Eighteen / I gotta get away." This song is so good that for the longest time it was a go to song when I would perform live.

Now that I've covered one of the weakest songs on the album, I'm going to go back to the beginning of the album. It opens up with Caught In A Dream, this is a great garage rock song about dreams and ambitions. Simple teenage day dreaming. "Well I'm runnin' through the world with a gun in my back tryin' to catch a ride in a cadillac / Thought that I was livin' but you can't really tell been tryin' to get away from that success smell / You know I need a houseboat and I need a plane I need a butler and a trip to Spain / I need everything the world owes me I tell that to myself and I agree / I'm caught in a dream so what you don't know what I'm goin' through / I'm right in between so I'll I'll just play along with you". In fact the song is so awesomely simple that the lyrics pretty much just repeat themselves in various ways, with Glen Buxton throws out some kicking lead lines.

From there we move on to the already discussed classic that everyone should know. After that we move on to Long Way To Go. This song pretty much picks up where Caught In A Dream left off. One way that you could actually take it is the first three songs on the album are supposed to go together to create a story teenage angst struggling to become famous.

The longest song on the album is Black Juju, which at 9:09 is a bit longish. This is Alice Cooper's version of The Door's The End. Not to say that Alice was ripping off Morrison and crew, but this song was clearly inspired by them. Which is also understandable since they were all friends back in California. This is a good way to finish off side one on the original vinyl as well. I personally tend to skip this song myself, it's one of the only songs on this album I like less than I'm Eighteen. The other is Sun Arise, which I will get to.

The second side of the original vinyl opens with Is It My Body. This is one of the best slow sexy groove rock and roll songs of all time. Dennis Dunnaway's bass playing is what drives this song, the guitars just add that little bit of dirty charm. What's even better is listening to a guy sing "What have I got / That makes you want to love me / Now is it my body / Someone I might be / Somethin' inside me / You better tell me / Tell me / It's really up to you / Have you got the time to find out / Who I really am". This was just the start of Alice's now famous gender bending. As a side note. I love Is It My Body even more when my significant other/sexier half/writing editor sings the song. It get's me uber hot. Thank-you Alice!!!

Hallowed Be My Name is sort of like Alice taking a pot shot at the church, or Alice reflecting his religious upbringing by pointing the finger at the sinners. It could be taken either way. Either way it makes this song a bit dark and music makes it a bit creepy, which makes the oddly weak song seem so much more than it is.

The next song is my second favourite song on the album. Second Coming, unknown to almost anyone, is my absolute favourite Alice Cooper song to sing. "I couldn't tell / If the bells were getting louder / The songs they ring I finally recognize / I only know / Hell is getting hotter / The Devil's getting smarter all the time / And it would be nice / To walk upon the water / To talk again to angels / On my side / Time is getting closer / I read it on a poster / Fanatical exposers / On corners prophesized / It would be nice / To walk upon the water / To talk again to angels / At my side / I just come back to show you / All my words are golden / So have no gods before me / I'm the light". Yeah, that's right. My Favourite Alice Cooper song to sing is a simple ditty about the second coming of Jesus. This was also in 1971, long before everyone got offended by Alice being a born again. Dumb asses!

Second Coming flows right into my favourite Alice Cooper song, if I have to absolutely pick one. Ballad Of Dwight Fry was the first insane song. It was the first time Alice Cooper introduced the world to the madman hiding inside. "I was gone for fourteen days, I could've been gone fore more, / Held up in a intensive care ward, I was lying on the floor. / I was gone for all those days, but I was not all alone. / I made friends with a lot of people, in the danger zone. / See my lonely life unfold I see it every day, see my lonely mind explode, when I'm gone away / I think I lost some weight there, I'm sure I need some rest! / Sleeping don't come very easy, in a straight white vest. / Sure like to see them little children, only four years old. / I'd given them back all their play things, even the ones is stole. / See my lonely life unfold, I see it everyday.. / See my lovely mind explode when I've gone insane!" There are only three other Alice Cooper song's I have ever performed live more than this one, I'm Eighteen, Sick Things and Dead Babies. I still perform bass renditions of the last two by myself. If I could give this one the same treatment I would. Ballad Of Dwigth Fry is the song!!!

Sun Arise finishes off the album. Originally it was the fourth single released by the Australian singer-songwriter Rolf Harris (1962). I have no use for this song and normally stop the album after Ballad. This song is a nice happy ending to the album which is fine, but really it just sounds like a bunch of hippy filler.

This is not the best Alice Cooper record. The production was a bit shakey and thin, a problem with anything recorded prior to 32 channel mixerboards being part of the norm. Also normal for a guy working on his first album.

However, this is a very, and I do mean very, powerful album. I bought this album originally just for Ballad Of Dwigth Fry, and that alone made it worth every cent. When you add in everything except for the last song on both sides of the vinyl, I could have lived without those, this is a great album.

9/10 - content

7/10 - production

8/10 - personal bias