It was 52 years ago today when School’s Out by Alice Cooper was released. 52 years, yet to me it feels like, well, 52 years ago. The ear-shattering opening guitar riff, followed by Alice’s roaring vocal; this I knew was special. Alice should have been an elderly grandmother, with big flowery spectacles and permed silver hair, but not this one. She wasn’t even a she. He was Vincent Furnier.
School actually wasn’t out for me in the summer of ’72. I still had two more years to waste in the classrooms of Briz (Brislington) School in Bristol, two more years to not learn very much at all and so set me off on the road to nowhere. Come on inside.
They don’t make music like that anymore, do they? Alice certainly doesn’t, his last decent record, in my humble opinion, being 1987’s Poison but frankly, who cares? With his body of work he can, and deserves, to trade on those memories.
I saw him in Bristol in 2011, touring his No More Mr Nice Guy show and he was brilliant. Sure, it’s a nostalgia fest and who doesn’t like the odd nostalgia fest from time to time, but few do it better than Alice. He sang and postured around stage like the young Alice Cooper did back in 1972, keeping School’s Out for the final song of his set and Elected for the encore. That meant, of course, we were kept waiting for his classics right to the end and we did have to suffer a few fillers before we got there.
The only disappointment for me was that Alice didn’t play Hello Hooray, a personal favourite which I didn’t know was a song composed by Rolf Kempf and first featured on Judy Collins’ 1968 album Who Knows Where The Time Goes? Alice’s boisterous version appears on 1973’s Billion Dollar Babies. I listened to Ms Collins’ version and it’s a different song.
Alice still tours the world with his show and good luck to the old boy. Until recently, he presented a radio show in Detroit, called Nights With Alice Cooper, which was syndicated to heritage and oldie rock stations all over the world with huge success. Sadly, that show was discontinued late in 2023, although Alice says he still hopes to carry on presenting at some stage in the future.
I’m just happy with Alice Cooper is still with us, the old shock and roller, in his 77th year. To see him live was a bucket list item and he didn’t disappoint. But 52 years since School’s Out. Even I was very young then. Which is probably the scariest thing of all, far more scary than his live show.
