Today we celebrate the birthday of Vincent Furnier who was born February 4, 1948. Better known as Alice Cooper, the black-clad rocker made a name for himself when he pushed the outrageousness of his proto-glam theatricality toward the macabre, becoming the primary architect of shock rock. Here’s Furnier in a Rolling Stone interview from last year, discussing his alter-ego…
I didn’t really figure it out until later. The Alice character was originally a victim. He represented all the disenfranchised kids that didn’t fit in, the kids that didn’t even listen to mainstream FM. These were the kids that were going to get bullied. These were the artistic kids. These were the kids not looking for something straight up. And there were lots of them.
When I got sober in 1982, I went, “I’m not that anymore. The character’s not that, so who’s he going to be? I want him to be this arrogant villain. I want him to be this condescending, ‘I’m in charge’ villain.” So I changed him, totally. Now when he stood up, he stood with his chin up, didn’t say “thank you” to the audience. And the audience liked that; they liked the idea that this guy was totally in charge. But there was a little bit of [Inspector] Clouseau element – that he could blow it. He might slit your throat, or he might slip on a banana peel. [Laughs] So I liked the humor involved in that. I still play Alice like that, because I can’t play him as a victim. He just isn’t that anymore. He isn’t the whipping boy; he is the dominatrix.
Happy Birthday, Alice! Here’s the man himself live in Paris in this documentary from 1972…
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