Alice Cooper – The Man Behind The Monster | Devil On My Shoulder, London

“I love playing him because I don’t have to be him”. If one sentence sums up the relationship between Vincent Furnier and Alice Cooper, this is it, the legendary rockstar having spent the past fifty-eight years switching between the two personalities.

Alice Cooper – Devil On My Shoulder Book Tour

The Palladium, London

Words: Paul Monkhouse

Photography: Manuela Langotsch

With his brand new book on the shelves, this was Alice/Vincent at his most confessional and true, the tour to promote the tome reaching the stage of one of the most famous theatres in the capital, Arthur ‘Fire’ Brown hosting the evening in his own unique style that thankfully kept the flaming headpiece away from the red velvet curtains that adorn the place.

Whilst Brown may have been a little hesitant at times, the same cannot be said of Cooper, and the master of the macabre is on fine form, stories coming thick and fast. At his own admission, some of his tales are embroidered and refined so much as to totally remove them from reality, but nonetheless, they are hugely entertaining, and the book purports to be a more honest and factual run-through of his life.

Part of the fact of the previous flights of fancy when regaling adventures of the past comes down to the simple fact of recall, Cooper rightly saying, “Who remembers what they said forty years ago?”

It is a good point, but given the life he has led, there is plenty of fascinating material from which to draw. 

Born out of a love for theatrics, Alice Cooper the band has a fascinating genesis, and the growth of the character himself saw them go from opening act to The Yardbirds, the guitar playing of Jeff Beck jaw-dropping, to headlining arenas all over the globe.

Wielding a sword belonging to Errol Flynn and basing his make-up on Bette Davis in Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?, Cooper was always going to make an impression, and ironically a peace festival was something of a turning point, the singer remarking of the line-up that “there were plenty of Peter Pans but no Captain Hooks.”

Given the incendiary atmosphere and look around the band, the unfortunate death of a chicken during their set at the event, Alice Cooper soon became the notorious bad boys of rock ‘n’ roll, a chance meeting with THE Colonel Saunders a little later causing Cooper to ask, “This guy kills six billion chickens, and I kill one, and I’m the villain?”

The whole show is littered with such wit and incidence, stories of Keith Moon, including a hilariously salacious one where The Who drummer was part of the cast of a Mae West film with Cooper, a telling and heartbreaking story about meeting Elvis Presley “his life was a prison” and his falling in and recovery from the drink and drug pitfalls of ’70s rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle.

As well as the wild tales of excess, there were plenty of deeper and personal details of his life, his relationship with his parents, his strong Christian faith and his determination to make music his career from his very first nascent days, going from being a track star at high school to forming Beatles pastiche The Earwigs and beyond.

Whilst Alice Cooper is a character, the man himself states, “I designed Alice to be my favourite rock star” and “Alice is a separate character and a tool,” the two have become so intertwined for almost six decades that the public perception blurs the lines, whilst Furnier himself gleefully reports that he can happily be organising a golf game with guitarist Tommy Henrickson before and after a show, but the second the lights drop and he walks onstage, he becomes that figure.

Touchingly, at one point he brings both his wife and daughter onstage to share the spotlight, and the separation between legendary rock villain and loving family man becomes crystal clear.

The book is a fascinating read and the show an illuminating one, the man behind the mask revealed in wonderful and vibrant life. When he states, “I never lost the love of rock ‘n’ roll”, you know he means it.

One of the biggest and best characters in music, we can but bow in his presence and, like Wayne and Garth, declare “We are not worthy”.

Brain surgery’s loss is our gain.

Devil On My Shoulder, the definitive autobiography of Alice Cooper, is out now via Ebury Spotlight. For more details, visit lnk.to/AliceCooper.

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