APPENDICE #3: Self Indulgence - The Final Lap
Top 50 Alice Cooper Songs
Over the years, Alice has recorded over 270 songs. Some of these have become classics, while others have been forgotten as soon as they were put on vinyl. Here is a list of my favourite 50, but as anyone who has ever posted in the Top Ten Tuesday thread knows, five minutes after I have pressed 'enter', I will have changed my mind!
They are listed in chronological order, and I have highlighted the 10 that I consider to be the best of the best. (I have cheated on Chop, Chop, Chop/Gail/Roses On White Lace and included all three as one of the best):
- Levity Ball
- Reflected
- Mr. & Misdemeanor
- Caught In a dream #6
- Long way to go
- Is it my body
- be my lover #2
- halo of flies #8
- desperado
- dead babies
- killer
- guttercats vs the jets/street fight #10
- elected
- billion dollar babies
- no more mr. nice guy
- generation landslide
- working up a sweat
- man with the golden gun
- Welcome To My Nightmare #3
- Department Of Youth
- Cold Ethyl
- Escape
- Go To Hell
- Guilty #7
- From The Inside #4
- Wish I Was Born In Beverley Hills
- Nurse Rozetta #9
- Millie And Billie
- Serious #1
- For Veronica's Sake
- Pain
- Who Do You Think We Are
- For Britain Only
- Prettiest Cop On The Block
- I Love America
- Teenage Frankenstein
- The World Needs Guts
- Freedom
- Chop Chop Chop/Gail/Roses On White Lace #5
- Brutal Planet
- Wicked Young Man
- Blow Me A Kiss
- Disgraceland
- Dirty Diamonds
- Vengeance Is Mine
- Caffeine
- I'll Bite Your Face Off
- The Underture
You have probably noticed that there are 4 major omissions from my list - I'm 18, The Ballad Of Dwight Frye, Schools Out and Poison. These are essentials songs, and should be on the list, but familiarity breeds contempt! I have heard them so many times, I am bored with them!! They are always played live and it seems that two on them are on every rock compilation I own, and crop up in every teen comedy film I have ever seen
Closing
So, here I am, sitting on a sofa in the dark, listening to the rain hammering down outside. Somehow that seems appropriate. I started this overview on April 1st, 2015 and 19 months later I have reached the end. To quote The Grateful Dead, 'it's been a long, strange trip'. I have chronicled a band moving through many different musical genres - psychedelic head-trip, glam, storytellers, heavy metal, industrial, pop metal. I have highlighted the ups and downs of a man who has been both a musical innovator and a musical imitator. I have shown how fast the music industry moves and how Alice influenced an entire musical movement, but after taking a couple of years off, returned to discover he had been left behind. I have shown how a man who constantly sings about the darker side of life, breaking many subject taboos, has become one of the most respected and respectable people in an industry that is more known for turning on people. Lastly, I hope I that I have introduced some people on the forum onto songs that they had never heard before
Alice Cooper - I salute you Sir. Long may you continue to rebel, defy authority, get killed on stage and give fun to millions!
