After experiencing a combination of substance abuse and
\nsquabbling over the future musical and artistic direction of the
\nband, the Alice Cooper group parted ways in 1974, ending an
\nextremely prolific period during which they recorded no less than
\nseven studio albums in four years, with practically non-stop
\ntouring in between. You don’t see that sort of insane dedication
\ntoo often, and it’s no wonder that they suddenly burnt out. While
\nAlice Cooper himself would go on to have a highly sucessful solo
\ncareer which continues to this day, the other supremely talented
\nmembers of the band unfortunately went into total obscurity.<\/p>\n
In light of this event, Warner Brothers records felt the time
\nwas right to unleash this greatest hits compilation in 1974,
\nbecoming yet another multi platinum success for this pioneering
\ngroup, and what a sweet compilation it is!<\/p>\n
Twelve tracks of sheer early 70’s hard rock brilliance: “I’m
\nEighteen”, “Is It My Body”, “Desperado”, “Under My Wheels”, “Be My
\nLover”, “School’s Out”, “Hello Hooray”, “Elected”, “No More Mr.
\nNice Guy”, “Billion Dollar Babies”, “Teenage Lament ’74”, and
\n“Muscle Of Love”.<\/p>\n
Each song included here is an undisputed masterpiece, and it’s
\nall the more astonishing when you realize that all of the material
\nfilling out this entire hits compilation was created over only two
\nyears…what were these guys on?? Not a single one of these songs
\ndoes not deserve to be included here, and while this is an amazing,
\nif brief, overview of what many many believe to be the absolute
\npeak period of Alice Cooper’s career, there are a few minor
\ncriticisms that I have.<\/p>\n
Firstly, the band’s first two albums,
\nPretties For You<\/i> and
\nEasy Action<\/i>, are not represented here at all. They both had
\nsome tracks that were worth salvaging, but unfortunately the vinyl
\nformat of the day only allowed for about 45 minutes of music per
\nrecord, and I don’t think it would have been right to leave off any
\nof the tracks on the compilation to make room for tracks from the
\nfirst two albums. As well, those first two records were not
\ntechnically Warner releases, so there was no reason for Warner to
\ninclude any tracks from them. It would also have been unecessary
\noverkill to have a two-record set of greatest hits for such a young
\nband, so I guess I can’t really complain…can’t have
\neverything!<\/p>\n
Secondly, the emphasis here is very much on the raw, hard
\nrocking side of Alice Cooper, while the other essential aspects of
\nwhat made the band so special are for the most part ignored. The
\nmore adventurous and highly theatrical leanings of the band are
\nnowhere to be found here, and neither is any of the sinister creepy
\nstuff, which played a large part in the appeal of the band in the
\nfirst place. “I Love The Dead”? “Unfinished Sweet”? “Halo Of
\nFlies”? “Man With The Golden Gun”? All are glaring omissions, but
\nthe two songs that I think should have been a must for this album
\nin place of two of the others are “The Ballad Of Dwight Frye” and
\n“Dead Babies”…their absence was a huge mistake, and I would have
\nincluded those instead of “Be My Lover” and “Teenage Lament
\n’74”.<\/p>\n
And what about the excellent yet shamefully ignored smoky jazz
\nhonky tonk blues song “Crazy Little Child”, from 1973’s
\nMuscle Of Love<\/i>?? The song would have perfectly captured the
\nessence of the excellent cover artwork, showing the band members in
\nblack and white, leaning against a vintage 1920’s automobile in
\npin-striped suits and the like, looking very much like hoods in
\nprohibition era urban America, about to carry out a “hit” (get
\nit?)!<\/p>\n
These are very small criticisms, and admittedly, considering the
\nwealth of brilliant material over the five albums represented, I
\nwould have a hard time coming up with 45 minutes worth of tracks
\nthat I was totally happy with as a die-hard Alice fan, but I think
\nfor the most part they did a decent job. Despite the inaccurate
\nportrayal of the band’s output, this is still a superb way for the
\ncasual Cooper listener to get a taste of the power of a band during
\narguably its creative and commercial peak.<\/p>\n
But that’s just it; it should serve only as the appetizer to a
\nmain course. For a truly wonderful journey into some of the most
\noriginal rock music of the 70’s you’re much better off getting the
\nindividual studio albums…if you love the songs on
\nGreatest Hits<\/i>, you’re bound to be blown away by the
\ndiversity of the group that is not shown here.<\/p>\n
But, if you insist on buying a greatest hits compilation of
\nAlice Cooper, it should be noted this this collection is out of
\ndate. In 2001 Rhino records (a subsidiary of Warner) released an
\nexpanded version of this album, called
\nMascara & Monsters: The Best Of Alice Cooper<\/i>. That CD
\ncontains all of the songs included here, as well as one extra song
\nfrom the early era and nine tracks from Alice Cooper’s equally
\namazing solo career since 1975, making it a much more complete
\ncollection on one disc.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":25995,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5676],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-37203","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-alice-cooper","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37203\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37203"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37203"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}