SOCIAL MEDIA

Alice Cooper review 

Alice Cooper Live in Canberra at AIS Arena on 23/10/17

On Monday the 23rd of October, Alice Cooper played his 3rd last show of the Australian leg of the ‘Paranormal’ tour. Unlike the show in Sydney this venue was entirely seated but the crowd were still on their feet!

After the voice over finished and the curtain came down, Alice stepped onto the stage in a shower of sparks and an impressive show of lights and broke into ‘Brutal Planet’. The crowd were immediately captivated by the godfather of shock rock and his amazing band consisting of Glen Sobel on drums, Chuck Gerrick on bass, Nita Strauss and Tommy Hendrickson on rhythm guitar, and Ryan Roxie on lead guitar.

Alice has a stage presence that is unmatched by any other musician. His use of unique props such as the medieval surgeons table in ‘Feed my Frankenstein’ or the guillotine and the straight jacket in ‘The Ballad of Dwight Fry’ provide the shock element to his music that we have come to know and love.

During the Canberra show, the audience got the be witness to Alice playing his classics such as ‘Billion Dollar Babies’, ‘Poison’, ‘No More Mr. Nice Guy’, and ‘Department of Youth’ as well as songs off the new album such as ‘Halo of Flies’ and of course ‘Paranoiac Personality’.

But as always, after the final song ended and the lights went out, the crowd grew restless and then the familiar ring of a school bell to signal the encore was heard throughout the arena and the band came back on stage to play the classic hit ‘Schools Out’. In this song we finally get to hear Alice speak when he introduces the band and himself with the classic line “and playing the part of Alice Cooper tonight!............ ME!”. Along with this song one fan was lucky enough to be brought on stage to throw giant balloons into the audience which would then make their way back to Alice who would then pop them with his sword and an assortment of knives to result in an explosion of confetti and the crowd losing their minds.

To surmise, Alice Cooper puts on an incredible show and it was an honour to see him play live!