Alice Cooper: Terrorist
Good Morning Gentle Readers,
My kids made parole. As of the end of next week, School's Out! Not exactly for summer, because we're year round. The House Blond starts fifth grade right after Independence Day and Jake starts Junior High on or about his twelfth birthday.
Just like a little kid myself, I been toe tappin' around the Casa, humming no more pen-sills, no more booooks-ah.....
That's from the GOP's token psuedo-drag queen Addams Family makeup queen and bad boy shock rocker Alice Cooper's wildly popular rock standard that's been adopted by succeeding generations of adolescents yearning to be free of the chalkboard yoke.
It occurs to me that by modern standards, this guy is a fargin' terrorist. I mean, look at these lyrics:
School's out for summer
School's out forever
School's been blown to pieces
Emphasis mine. But can we be too careful? What would happen to a seventh grader running through the halls on the last day of school, not singing, but gleefully shouting....
Not sure, but if you are horseplaying on a school bus, tossing around a kitchen timer in a game of hot potato, and somebody jokes that it's a bomb, you will be expelled. Or, if you make a crude drawing of something that looks like a gun, you will be expelled. Or if you accidentally bring a butter knife to school, you will be expelled.
Head implosion? Boy Howdy, you shoulda seen it when the House Blond brought a plastic replica of a rifle to school. Teacher's request. A prop for the kid playing Daniel Boone in the school play about the westward movement of America. Daniel Boone DID carry a rifle, didn't he?
Later, in the office retrieving the offending item: Good grief, Ma'am, it's not like someone just handed you a live grenade with the pin pulled. Handling it gingerly doesn't make it less likely that a toy rifle is going to explode and take the admin office out with it.
Mrs TWC was right about sending the kid to school with a toy gun when she observed that this isn't going to go well.
Alice Cooper was inspired to write his terrorist screed by.....
.....the last three minutes of the last day of school when you're sitting there and it's like a slow fuse burning. If we can catch that three minutes in a song, it's going to be so big.
He was right.
If you can't see the vid, it's here.
Can't salute you, can't find a flag......
As Ever,
TWC
Ohmygod, you SO rock!
You rock for the video...for the pic... for sending your kid to school with a plastic gun... You even rock for just knowing who Alice Cooper is.
You So Rock :)
I have that album still. It was my sister's. I have most of his older albums. Will never let them go. My sister kept the paper panties that came in the album cover, though. She got them autographed.
He's a good golfer too.
I SO love Alice Cooper. Think I'll have to go dig that one out and blast it with the windows open.
Posted by: Lone Chatelaine | May 21, 2008 at 10:55 AM
Alice Cooper was never a favorite of mine, but that song came out just as I graduated from High School and it was my anthem that summer.
Even though I chose to continue with schooling, there was a big difference in that now it would be by choice; My choice, of schools, subject matter, and teachers.
Being able to choose, that is the basis of freedom.
Posted by: NoStar | May 21, 2008 at 01:50 PM
You So Rock :)
Ms C, in the words of Toby Keith, you put a big Texas smile on my face. Today. Thankee much, I appreciate your kind words, which I'll likely keep nearby for a while.
The blog keeps me out of the bars and I'll admit to being narcissistic about it, but it is ever so cool when someone else enjoys the moment and enthusiastically says so.
I was going to throw in the golf thing but I figured I had enough adjectives. Is that what they're called? I'm not good at that kind of stuff. Col Hogan would know. And my friend Chris, of the Grammar Police.
Hmmm, autographed paper panties. Sounds vaguely obscene. :-)
Posted by: TWC | May 21, 2008 at 02:39 PM
NoStar Domus, I think that song is and has been every school kid's anthem for the last 35 some odd years.
Posted by: TWC | May 21, 2008 at 02:41 PM
I love making men smile :)
All blogs are narcissistic for the most part. They're supposed to be. We don't come here to read someone else's thoughts. We come here to read yours.
And please! My blog is the precious princess of narcissism.
Posted by: Lone Chatelaine | May 21, 2008 at 03:44 PM
The drummer in the video is playing a chrome set of drums which looks much like the chrome Slingerlands I played from 1973 until 1988 when I quit to get a real job.
Prettiest drum set ever, but what a hassle to keep polished. Never was able to hire a roadie to polish them for me.
This blog has brought back so many memories.
Thanks TWC.
Posted by: NoStar | May 21, 2008 at 04:48 PM
Of course he is a terrorist! We all know that he loves the dead!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-MM__7Im6k&feature=related
Posted by: Gene Trosper | May 21, 2008 at 07:43 PM
Alice Cooper is one of my faves too--terrorist or not. Besides, blowing the government children's prisons to pieces isn't a bad idea. Just get all the kids out first.
How's the Eddie Eagle program at the kids' school?
Posted by: Col. Hogan | May 21, 2008 at 08:39 PM
I love making men smile :)
The pleasure was entirely TWC's although a cat seems to have gotten his tongue.
Posted by: Jeff | May 21, 2008 at 10:31 PM
Speaking of cats - did you ever get another kitty, TWC?
Posted by: smartass sob | May 22, 2008 at 05:29 AM
Speaking of ants, SASOB, we used your ant cleaning idea to clean up some rattlesnake rattles. Worked like a champ. Just left the rattles sitting on the slump stone wall for a day or so and the ants cleaned them perfectly.
Cats? Good timing, the kids brought home a couple of new cats from Grandmas last Friday. Pix later. Thanks for asking. BTW, the Black cat is still around and making the most of his genetic predisposition to be very hard for large predators to see.
Posted by: TWC | May 22, 2008 at 07:45 AM
This blog has brought back so many memories.
NoStar, that's very cool. Thanks your own self, for dropping by now and again, but glad to be of service. All us cows do our best for Jerseymaid Milk.
Posted by: TWC | May 22, 2008 at 07:54 AM
Eddie Eagle? Ha, Col, have you forgotten that we live in Californicate?
Gene, forgot about that tune. Thanks for the link to Loves the Dead.
Posted by: TWC | May 22, 2008 at 03:31 PM
No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher's dirty looks. I can remember chanting that over and over again, laughing with my girlfriends every day of the last week of school. Turning that into a song really was genious. Alice Cooper was subversive!
Posted by: Anonymous Blond | May 23, 2008 at 08:54 AM
I love making men smile :)
Well, it's working. :-)
Posted by: TWC | May 23, 2008 at 09:47 AM
Ok wow...this is yet another example of people thinking too hard and over interpreting things. Alice was just trying to write a song that will hit home with the teenagers of the day...and it did...and did he blow up any schools? No...in fact he is currently building a CHRISTAIN youth center...please do some research before you blame...ok?
Posted by: ALICE COOPER FANATIC | May 27, 2008 at 04:15 PM
please do some research before you blame...ok?
It is apparent from your comment that you did not read or at least did not understand the post you are commenting on, which was not about Alice Cooper actually being a terrorist. It was a commentary on zero tolerance public school policy.
Posted by: TWC | May 27, 2008 at 05:39 PM
Omg, lmao at the "Alice Cooper Fanatic". Preaching to the choir, buddyboy.
Posted by: Lone Chatelaine | June 03, 2008 at 05:58 PM
I own every single Alice Cooper album. I like his newer stuff too. The Last Tempation, Brutal Planet, and Dirty Diamonds were great albums. He is a legend. He has a new album coming out, let me post the details because this sounds like vintage Alice like his early stuff since there are some other fans here.
"There are only a handful of rock artists that have proven to be as enduring and influential as Alice Cooper has over the years. Name just about any hard rock artist, and they've probably borrowed a thing or two from Alice. And on his latest studio recording, "Along Came A Spider" (issued via SPV Records on July 29), Alice has returned with a concept album with a sinister streak.
"A dark and menacing album for dark and menacing times" is perhaps the most fitting description for Alice's 25th studio album overall, as a chilling conceptual thread runs through the songs, which are told through the voice of a serial killer named Spider — one that Alice describes as "an arachnophobic psychopath" (in the song "Catch Me If You Can"). Alice, the master storyteller, weaves a web of danger, intrigue and death that rivals his best work.
Co-produced by Danny Saber, Greg Hampton and Alice himself, "Along Came A Spider" manages to marry both vintage and modern-day Alice. As theatrical as ever, the album is a sonic combination of familiar Alice musical elements from albums as diverse as "Billion Dollar Babies" and "Brutal Planet", with the storytelling of "Welcome To My Nightmare", capturing the historic dark side of Alice in peak form, an instantly recognizable presence that will be welcomed by his fans. Joining Alice on the album are members of his touring band — longtime Alice drummer Eric Singer, bassist Chuck Garric, and guitarists Keri Kelli and Jason Hook, with additional contributions from others, including Saber, Hampton, and renowned backing vocalist Bernard Fowler. Slash also lends some guitar style to "Vengeance Is Mine".
Saber and Hampton co-wrote several of the album's songs with Alice, while others were collaborations with Alice's band members. Danny Saber, best known for his role as member and producer of BLACK GRAPE, has also worked with many other artists, including THE ROLLING STONES, OZZY OSBOURNE, and DAVID BOWIE, while Greg Hampton's been working on a new album project teaming up Buckethead and Bootsy Collins.
Who else but Alice Cooper, with "Along Came A Spider", would create a "love story" about a serial killer named Spider? His trademark is wrapping his victims in silk, and his victims are specifically chosen to feed his hunger to kill. But, upon meeting his (possibly) last victim, he falls in love with her and cannot kill to complete his plan. That could be his demise.
Though it is often said about artists with as rich a history as Alice that their newest albums capture the essence of their greatest work, it may honestly be proposed that "Along Came A Spider" does exactly that. It's got hard rock with hooks, an Alice trademark ("Vengeance is Mine", "I Know Where You Live"), classic balladry, another Alice trademark ("Killed by Love", "Salvation"), and always with an overtone of evil, yet another Alice tradmark. Throughout the album, Alice BECOMES Spider, telling the story of a cold-blooded killer to life vocally, as if this were the soundtrack to an as-yet unmade horror film.
"Along Came A Spider" track listing:
01. Prologue/I Know Where You Live
02. Vengeance Is Mine
03. Wake The Dead
04. Catch Me If You Can
05. (In Touch With) Your Feminine Side
06. Wrapped In Silk
07. Killed By Love
08. I'm Hungry
09. The One That Got Away
10. Salvation
11. I Am The Spider/Epilogue"
Posted by: Katina Lee | June 10, 2008 at 06:56 PM
Thanks for the review, Katina Lee.
:-)
Posted by: TWC | June 10, 2008 at 08:34 PM