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If Alice Cooper's Act Shocks Anyone, He's Happy

Alice Cooper made the youth scene in Louisville last night, the theatricality of his rock and roll music and stage presence matching the mood and mode of an audience that displayed the commonality in clothes and talk and understanding that is the basis of the youth culture.

Alice is a 23-year-old man who is leader of a five-man rock group also called Alice Cooper. They played to two capacity audiences last night at the Brown Theater downtown.

"Their parents hate us," Alice said while sipping Budweiser to relax in a cramped dressing room before the first show. "Their parents hate us so the kids love us, and that's cool."

The singer is happy not to oblige anyone older than 30 and pleased to offend anyone at all.

Outrage is his stock in trade, he acknowledged, and the vampirish hair, and quarter inch-long fingernails and the feminine speech and movements he affects are part of that act.

A gullible press has given Alice Cooper a reputation of sucking the blood from live chickens on stage. But the truth of the Alice Cooper psycho-sexual performance is sufficient without creating fantasies.

At the Brown Theater he appeared in a black bodysuit with provocative holes running up the thigh and a zipper that found itself several inches below his navel during the course of the show.

Alice offered a sneering, teasing face to the audience, his body writhing, and the music growing in intensity along with the chemistry of the crowd.

There was much effeminate prancing on stage and teasing of hair.

A slaying was pantomimed, and all the time the music rose to a crescendo that was a conscious imitation of a sexual frenzy.

Stage props that he touched were fought over by the audience.

The thin young man in long stringy hair and sallow complexion talked about his lifestyle and music in an interview yesterday at Stouffer's Inn.

If anything he does shocks someone, Alice couldn't be happier. He said the act is creating his popularity and may even have something to do with the fact he is No. 20 on the Playboy popularity poll for male singers. The group is No. 17 among instrumental groups in the poll.

"Basically," he explained, "we do a psycho drama that has no conclusion. It's black humor that makes fun of things that are usually not made fun of. And people don't know what to make of it."

The uninitiated think Alice Cooper is some "blonde folk singer," Alice said. And as the crowd left the theater last night, some in the well-pressed flower shirts and Granny gowns that mark the weekend hip did wag their heads in disbelief. Those in the dirty dungarees and workmen's shirts seemed unfazed by the show.

"I love gimmicks," Alice said, explaining his act touches as many senses as possible.

"Music alone gets boring after a while," he said.

"Anything you can think of to do on stage can be entertainment. And if you're having fun, and the audience is having fun then you don't have to explain anything to anyone."

Alice Cooper the group lives in a party atmosphere. Hangers-on backstage at the Brown sipped wine from bottles kept cool in a bucket and beer iced down in a waste bucket.

The man Alice Cooper kept a tall can of Bud in one hand most of the time. Drinking beer is the only preparation for a performance he makes, Alice said.

There is much banality between the five men who are collectively Alice Cooper. They are old friends who went to college together in Tucson until they dropped into rock music seven years ago.

They're television nuts, and they swap TV trivia questions with anyone who will play the game.

Life and music for Alice Cooper are bizarre and fun.

"We want to inject a little life," he said, bangles tinkling on his right wrist.

"You don't go to a rock concert like you go to school. It's like going to a party — you want to have fun."