If you are a fan of Alice Cooper, than I’m guessing that’s why you are reading this, and if you know Cooper you know he has a lot of albums, many of which are different styles and concepts. After listening to his new album, “Welcome 2 My Nightmare” which is more or less a sequel to his landmark 1975 album “Welcome to My Nightmare,” I have to admit I was quite pleased.
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Alice Cooper | 
"Welcome 2 My Nightmare"
(Bigger Picture)
Released September 13, 2011
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The songs are interesting and fun, the production is great by legendary producer and long time collaborator Bob Ezrin, who has produced legendary albums such as Cooper’s “Love It To Death”, “Killer”, “School’s Out” and “Billion Dollar Babies” as well as Kiss’s “Destroyer” and Pink Floyd’s “The Wall.” It is an excellent album and one of my new favorites.
Cooper is a legendary performer and is well known for his shocking tactics and great shows, this year he finally made it into the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame, which took long enough. This record features many different styles ranging from the sound of early albums like “Love it to Death” and the original “Welcome To My Nightmare,” to tracks like “Trash” and “Hey Stoopid” as well. This record is a journey through various nightmares similar to the first record.
The album features the original band members on the tracks “A Runaway Train”, “I’ll Bite Your Face Off” and “When Hell Comes Home,” giving the songs an older 60s or 70s sort of sound -which is pretty awesome. A variety of other artists join Cooper on the album with faces both new and old. This cast of characters includes current guitarist Tommy Henriksen, legendary long time collaborator and guitarist Steve Hunter who played on many early Alice records, Keith Nelson of Buckcherry, legendary songwriter and producer Desmond Child, Dick Wagner (another long time collaborator), the awesome Vince Gill, pop star Ke$ha, shock rock master Rob Zombie and his guitarist John , to name a few.
Many of the songs are quite comedic and funny like “Caffeine,” “Disco Bloodbath Boogie Fever.” While others take on a more mature tone and are quite serious like the haunting “When Hell Comes Home” and the nice ballad “Something to Remember Me By.” Most of the songs are solid, but some are not really needed. Cooper sounds as good as ever on the record, which is nice to hear at age 63. One weird addition is his strange choice of collaboration partners. On the track “What Baby Wants” with Ke$ha, it’s not quite clear what motivated Cooper to take on such an eclectic duet but you have to give the man props for finding new ways of surprising his fans. I can only wonder how that came to be.
My personal favorites are the opener “I Am Made Of You”, “A Runaway Train“ (which has a sick guitar solo courtesy of Vince Gill), “Last Man On Earth”, “I’ll Bite Your Face Off”, “Disco Bloodbath Boogie Fever“ (with John 5 playing some mean guitar), “Something To Remember Me By”, “When Hell Comes Home” and the last song -“The Underture” which features various pieces of music from the original and current album.
The bonus version and deluxe editions include additional new tracks “Under the Bed”, live versions of “Poison”, “No More Mr. Nice Guy” and “The Black Widow”, as well as a cover of The Animal’s “We Gotta Get Out of This Place.” This nightmare has a lot more humor and is far less serious than the first nightmare. The original told the story about fictional character Steven who is likely the main character on this album as well. If you listen well on the song, “When Hell Comes Home,” you can hear his abusive father calling his name during the solo. Make sure to check out Cooper live on his “No More Mr. Nice Guy” tour which began on March 10th of next year.
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