ALICE COOPER: 'We Will Take On Any Band Of 20-Year-Olds And Blow Them Off The Stage'

October 10, 2008

Johnson Cummins of the Montreal Mirror recently conducted an interview with legendary rocker Alice Cooper. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Montreal Mirror: What were those early days in Detroit in the late '60s like, playing with the MC5, STOOGES, MITCH RYDER and so on?

Alice: Detroit at that time was by far the healthiest music scene going. When we first went to Detroit, we had never heard of the MC5 or the STOOGES. We went on after the STOOGES at this festival and when I saw Iggy, I just realized that I had found some competition. Detroit audiences would only respond to bands that had attitude, offered no excuses and played it loud. Every week, we would play bills like STOOGES, MC5, ALICE COOPER and THE WHO at the Grande, and even at that time we realized that these were some of the greatest rock 'n' roll shows that would ever happen. Everybody was really competitive too. If Keith Moon had 31 drums, Neal [Smith, ex-drummer] would make sure he had 32.

Montreal Mirror: It does seem rare that the STOOGES and your current show can still deliver after 40 years.

Alice: When people call me and Iggy dinosaurs, I just tell them we're carnivores because we will take on any band full of 20-year-olds right now and blow them off the stage. I'm not even basing that on content or showmanship, but just on energy alone.

Montreal Mirror: Do you ever get pissed that so many people have ripped off your image and theatrics, and continue to do so?

Alice: When Marilyn [Manson] came along, I thought, if he was playing hard rock, it was way too close, but he didn't really. I mean, I respect what he does, but I still think it's a little funny — gee, a guy with a girl's name wearing make-up, I wish I would've thought of that. When I first met him, it was like Bela Lugosi meeting Boris Karloff.

Read the entire interview from Montreal Mirror.

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