Detroit News

More new interviews promoting ‘Detroit Stories’

Things are definitely gearing up for ‘Detroit Stories’ now with several new interviews appearing including The Independent, Noise11 (video), Metal Hammer (In the new issue), Pasadena Weekly, Kerrang!, and Kansas City Pitch. Alice was also on Australia’s ‘Studio 10’ yesterday for a short interview which you can see here or embedded below.

There’s a new two minute promo video for the album which features a short clip of ‘Shut Up And Rock’ along with Alice chatting about the album. In fact there are 30 second preview clips of the whole album up now at MediaMarkt in the Netherlands if you just can’t wait another week.
UPDATE: Just after posting this an official preview of the album appeared here which I’ve also added below.

According to TalkShopLive it appears Alice will be launching the new album online with a livestream interview on February 25th (2AM on the 26th UK time). It appears to be free so don’t miss it!

The news of Alice and Sheryl getting vaccinated has been covered pretty widely. AZ Big Media has a different photo and a couple of AC quotes.

Chuck Garric was interviewed by Czech site Frontman.cz which Google translates here. It’s not the greatest translation (Alice seems to change sex in the course of a sentence) but you get the gist.

One I missed earlier is a short interview from Phoenix restaurant ‘Los Sombreros’ on Alice’s birthday from AZTV7 with updates on the new Teen Centre in Mesa, AZ.

Alice Cooper Court

Detroit to have “Alice Cooper Court”

With just two weeks to go until ‘Detroit Stories’ things are starting to move. During an interview with Detroit station WCSX it was announced that Alice will be getting his own road somewhere in the city called "Alice Cooper Court’. Host Jim O’Brien announced the news as a special birthday present to Coop. The exact location is yet to be decided and they are running a competition to choose the right spot.

There’s a new Alice interview in Spin magazine, and AZCentral has a video of Alice confirming that he and Sheryl have now been vaccinated against the Covid virus, having contracted it themselves late last year. German magazine ‘Rocks‘ (which looks very much like a version of the UK’s ‘Classic Rock’) is another European mag to have Alice on their cover this month.

Variety has a short article about being sober in the music business and it has a few quotes from Alice.

Dennis Dunaway is the star of a new advert for RotoSound strings which should be appearing in musicians magazines any time now. You can see the advert below. DD is also interviewed by Max1on1 which is available via Facebook.

Dennis and Blue Coupe will also feature during the Valentine’s Day virtual tribute show to New York Dolls guitarist Sylvain Sylvain who died last month age 69. Tickets for the livestream are on sale now here.

Ryan Roxie’s latest ‘In The Trenches’ guest was ex-Alice keyboardist Teddy Zig-Zag, and you can watch what happened here.

Nita Strauss is featured on the January cover of ‘Recovery Today‘ magazine, a "Addiction, Sobriety and Recovery" magazine.

Glen Sobel is interviewed by North Wales Drum Productions which you can watch on Facebook.

Lastly there is a new movie due out on digital platforms in a couple of days called "School’s Out Forever". It’s a comedy horror film which looks amusing, and while the trailer doesn’t feature the song there can be little doubt where they got the title from, so surely it will play at some point?

Social Debris

Alice Cooper posts new track ‘Social Debris’

This morning Alice marked his birthday with the third “single” from ‘Detroit Stories’ which appeared on the official Alice Cooper YouTube account. Written by Alice, Bob Ezrin and Neal Smith, and with an obvious tip of the hat to ‘Elected’, it features original Cooper band members Neal, Dennis Dunaway and Michael Bruce on drums, bass and guitar respectively. ‘Detroit Stories’ is due February 26th, although I’ve heard reports that Amazon in the USA is notifying people who pre-ordered that the special edition box set has been delayed by a week.
UPDATE: You can officially download the song for free here.

In a new interview this week with EW it’s revealed both Alice and Sheryl Cooper were diagnosed with COVID-19 in late 2020 but that both made a full recovery: “We had it at the same time, which was great, because we could commiserate.”

Alice turned up on a new ‘advert’ for Uber Eats, the food delivery. Alice appears twice in the two and a half hour(!) video which features Mike Myers and Dana Carvey, as Wayne and Garth from ‘Waynes World’, watching a list of all the Uber Eats restaurants scroll past on screen, and occasionally doing something amusing. You kinda need to see it to understand, which you can do on Youtube here. This link should take you to Alice’s first appearance, with him turning up again around the 2.20 mark near the end.

Other new interviews have been appearing in the European music press. Alice features on the front covers of ‘Hard Rock’ in both Italy and France (presumably translations of the same article) and ‘Rock and Folk‘ in France. There’s also an article in the new issue of ‘Uncut‘ in the UK.

‘Talkulture interviews drummer Glen Sobel for an hour or so which you can see on YouTube.

Dash Cooper and CO-OP have a new single out. It’s called ‘Lie To Me’ and can be found here, and apparently features a guest appearance from Tommy Henriksen.

Catching Up

New Interviews

Another very quiet couple of weeks in Cooper-world. There’s not been much happening but here’s a few things to check out.

Alice has obviously been doing interviews to lead up to ‘Detroit Stories’ next month and a few have started to appear. AZCentral have a new interview revealing that Neal Smith, Dennis Dunaway and Michael Bruce appear twice on the album, on ‘Social Debris’ (co-written by Neal) and ‘I Hate You’ (co-written by Dennis). There’s an article in the March issue of ‘Uncut‘ in the UK and Alice appears on the front cover of the new issue ‘Rock and Folk‘. There also a substantial article in the new issue of ‘Sweden Rock‘, The last two in their local languages of course.

Rolling Stone have published a great article about the legendary 1971 press party at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles that was used to launch Alice Cooper on the unsuspecting public.

Neal Smith is interviewed by ‘ChurchOfRock’ on YouTube, while Dennis Dunaway was chatting to ‘IndiePower’ which is also up on YouTube. And to complete the original band make sure you didn’t miss Michael Bruce chatting to Ryan Roxie for ‘In The Trenches‘. In related (pun intended) news Calico Cooper has been talking to ‘Metal From The Inside’ which you can find here.

Weekly Catchup

Detroit Stories Splatter Vinyl

It’s been very quiet this past week with only a few small things to cover to stay up to date.

Good Records in Texas, the guys behind the ‘Live From The Astroturf’ reunion album, will be releasing a exclusive ""Spider Eyes Splatter vinyl" version of ‘Detroit Stories’ in February and it’s available to pre-order now. This version comes with an 12" x 12" silkscreened art print of the band at Pontiac Farm in 1971 (from the Dunaway’s archive) and Alice Cooper trading card.

The official Alice Cooper social media pages have also posted a photograph showing the contents of the ‘Detroit Stories’ box set which you can see below.

SkyArts in the UK (now also on Freeview) will be showing Alice’s appearance in ‘Jesus Christ Superstar‘ on Wednesday evening (23rd) at 9pm. As far as I know this will be the first time it has aired in the UK.

Ryan Roxie is now offering gift certificates for his ‘System-12 Guitar Method’, the perfect gift for your budding guitarist relation. All the info is here.

Dennis Dunaway’s ‘Cold Cold Coffin‘ has won yet another award. This time it’s won the ‘Best Music Video’ at the Shockfest Film Festival in Hollywood.

Detroit Single Tomorrow

Since posting yesterday the official announcement of ‘Detroit Stories’ has appeared. Here’s what it says:

Named for the city that launched the original Alice Cooper group on the road to success, “Detroit Stories” follows last year’s “Breadcrumbs” EP as a modern-day homage to the toughest and craziest Rock n Roll scene there ever was.
In 1970, fledgling producer Bob Ezrin walked into a farmhouse on the outskirts of Detroit to work with the Alice Cooper band. Abandoning flower power Los Angeles, because they were the opposite of the hippie peace and love ideal, Alice had brought his decidedly darker gang back to his birthplace to the legendary rock scene that gave birth to hard rock, garage rock, soul, funk, punk…and more.
“Detroit Stories” will be available on CD, CD+DVD Digipak, CD Box Set (including CD, Blu-ray, T-shirt, face mask, torch light and 3 stickers), and 2LP Gatefold on earMUSIC.
The DVD and Blu-ray will show the incredible live performance “A Paranormal Evening At The Olympia Paris” for the first time on video.
"Detroit was Heavy Rock central then,” explains Alice, “You’d play the Eastown and it would be Alice Cooper, Ted Nugent, the Stooges and the Who, for $4! The next weekend at the Grande it was MC5, Brownsville Station and Fleetwood Mac, or Savoy Brown or the Small Faces. You couldn’t be a soft-rock band or you’d get your ass kicked."
“Los Angeles had its sound with The Doors, Love and Buffalo Springfield,” he says, “San Francisco had the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. New York had The Rascals and The Velvet Underground. But Detroit was the birthplace of angry hard rock. After not fitting in anywhere in the US (musically or image wise) Detroit was the only place that recognized the Alice Cooper guitar driven, hard rock sound and our crazy stage show. Detroit was a haven for the outcasts. And when they found out I was born in East Detroit… we were home.”

Tomorrow (Friday) will see the release of the first single from the album. Called ‘Rock’n’Roll’ it’s a cover of an old Velvet Underground song that Lou Reed supposedly wrote in Detroit.

Needless to say the news of a new album has been covered by all the major outlets, all unavoidably repeating the same information. You can check out the following for the occasional unique quote. NME, Ultimate Classic Rock, Consequence of Sound, and Rolling Stone.

Alice is among the names announced for Joe Walsh’s virtual ‘VetsAid’ show on December 12th. The online event is the fourth ‘VetsAid’ but obviously the pandemic has prevented a proper live show. The bill includes a diverse list of artists and tickets to watch the stream are available now from vetsaid.org.

Rolling Stone have posted a long interview with guitar legend Steve Hunter which hits on all the major working relationships Steve’s had over the years including Alice Cooper and Lou Reed.

Beginning on November 29th Ryan Roxie officially launches his ‘System-12’ twelve week guitar challenge. ‘System-12’ is Roxie’s guitar tuition course which aims to get even novices playing real songs in a matter of days and includes videos, transcripts and live lessons from Ryan and his team. Get all the information of how to join here.

Ultimate Classic Rock speak to Calico Cooper about life on the road with her dad.

Nita Strauss has partnered with D’Addario strings to release the ‘Nita Strauss Guitar Maintenance Kit’ which includes the same products Nita uses to keep her guitars show ready. Included in the kit are a "string height gauge, flashlight, 9V battery, multi-tool, Eclipse tuner, hydrate fingerboard conditioner, XLR8 string cleaner and lubricant, fret polishing system, micro-fiber polishing cloth, pro-winder, travel case and instructional manual."

Legendary Cooper photographer Bob Gruen has a new book out called ‘Right Place, Right Time: The Life Of A Rock & Roll photographer" which is sure to contain some Cooper related anecdotes. It’s out now via Abrams Press.

Detroit News

Lots more ‘Detroit Stories’ info has been surfacing over the last 24 hours or so. AmazonUK and AmazonUS have now added pages for various editions of the new album to be released on February 26th. The first single will be ‘Rock’n’Roll’, a Velvet Underground cover, which will be released on Friday. There seem to be the following editions (so far and subject to change):

  • A double album on red vinyl
  • A double album on black vinyl
  • A double album on purple vinyl (Townsend exclusive)
  • A double album on blue vinyl (JPC exclusive)
  • A double album on clear vinyl (500 copies)
  • 1xCD edition
  • 1xCD+1xDVD edition which adds the previously unreleased film from ‘A Paranormal Night At The Olympia, Paris’
  • 1xCD+1xBlu-ray box set including t-shirt, face mask, torch light and 2 stickers. Blu-Ray is the previously unreleased film from ‘A Paranormal Night At The Olympia, Paris’

The main album track list is as follows:

  1. Rock’n’Roll
  2. Go Man Go (album version)
  3. Our Love Will Change The World
  4. Social Debris – A Neal Smith Song
  5. $1000 High Heel Shoes
  6. Hail Mary
  7. Detroit City 2021 (Album Version)
  8. Drunk And In Love
  9. Independence Dave
  10. I Hate You
  11. Wonderful World
  12. Sister Anne (Album Version) – MC5 song
  13. Hanging On By A Thread (Don’t Give Up)
  14. Shut Up An Rock
  15. East Side Story (Album Version) – Bob Seger song

Detroit Stories

Detroit Rumours

Strange things have been happening this week, and I’m not talking about the election. On November 1st Amazon.com posted a page for the forthcoming ‘Detroit Stories’ album (vinyl and CD) which included an album cover illustration. It also appeared to confirm they are aiming for a February release date, as mentioned by Alice in the recent AirB&B Halloween webcast. February 26th to be precise, although of course this could still change. The cover image featured the album title and the Alice splatter logo over a industrial scene, clouds filling the top half of the cover outlining the spider eye make up.
The following day the page was gone.
And in the last hour or so the official Alice facebook page has posted a short 15 second, silent video of clouds or smoke. Could this the start of the ‘Detroit Stories’ promotional campaign? Don’t forget the cool cryptic videos earMusic posted before ‘Paranormal’ was released. Could they be planning something similar for the new album?
Update: Today (sunday) they’ve just posted another cryptic silent clip, this time with the buildings in front of the clouds.

Dennis Dunaway is featured on ‘American Blues Scene‘ promoting last weeks ‘Love Potion #9’ single and his appearance tomorrow evening in a webcast talking about his career and book. More details about the webcast can be found here.

Alice has turned up on a new single by ‘Splash n’ Boots’, a childrens record by Canadians Nick Adams and Taes Leavitt. You can here the song ‘Heart Parade’ now on Spotify.

Alice has released a short "fact video" on ‘Elected’ which you can check out here.

NME have announced that Alice will take part in a forthcoming ‘Reunion’ video with the cast of ‘Waynes World’. No date is set for the event but previous reunions for the casts of ‘Ghostbusters’ and ‘lord of the Rings’ have been popular. ‘Nights With Alice Cooper’ posted that Alice would be there.

Wacken World Wide

Alice Cooper and Band to appear on Wacken World Wide Virtual Concert

This years Wacken Open Air Festival in Germany has obviously been cancelled, however they are mounting an online version with interviews and performances by many of the festival regulars and this includes Alice and the band. On Thursday there will be an interview with Alice, followed a little later by a special performance by the full band and some archive footage of previous Wacken shows. You can see the daily schedules at ‘Wacken-world-wide.com‘ where you will also be able to tune in. Ryan Roxie and Glen Sobel confirmed their participation during the latest ‘In The Trenches‘ podcast this evening saying they would be playing "a few songs" for the event.

Sheryl Cooper has just announced the arrival of their first granddaughter, named Desiree Diaz! Congratulations to Sonora Cooper and her husband Diego Diaz!

And speaking of ‘In The Trenches‘ Ryan also announced that his next guest will be Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick! This will air next Tuesday at 5PM UK time. Make sure you catch up with Roxie’s recent podcasts including chats with Glen Sobel and a return of Kane Roberts, both well worth watching.

In a tour update it seems as expected every show this year is now cancelled, with the exception of the Seattle show with is listed as ‘Postponed’ but expect that to go as well. I wouldn’t expect any new show announcements until things have calmed down significantly and it’s safe for them to go ahead without more cancellations.

Cleveland.com have a new interview with Alice talking as usual about the lockdown and the new album, ‘Detroit Stories’ which is now apparently 99% done.