Full Album Performances - What would Be Least Popular?

[VinceRaven]

On the Chuck Garric thread I mentioned the Sparks tour of 2008 when they played all 21 of their albums in entirety at separate gigs over the course of a month. The quietest of those gigs were for two or three of their least popular albums from the early eighties and (although it's pure fantasy) it got me thinking about what would happen if Alice did the same.

Imagine Alice did a residency over a month or two in which, excluding live albums and compilations, he performed every album in entirety from Love It To Death (starting there due to it being acknowledged as the first 'proper' Alice album) to Welcome 2 My Nightmare. For what album night would there be the least demand? It's actually a very hard call. My guess would be The Eyes of Alice Cooper or Dirty Diamonds. Obviously, Along Came A Spider would be a candidate as well, but I reckon the fact that only two songs off the album have ever been heard live would generate a bit of interest.

[Paul]

Lace and Whiskey
Zipper Catches Skin
Along Came A Spider

would be the 3 I would give a miss to.

[VinceRaven]

I actually think Zipper Catches Skin would be one of the hot tickets due the bizarre nature of it all and the fact that none of the songs has ever got close to being played live.

[pitkin88]

I think a lot of the albums would fall flat on their face. There would need to be some kind of stage show so the ones that had one originally would be the ones that would work best. Apart from Killer, LITD or BDB's, Alice would be too frightened ( as many have claimed here ) of upsetting the casual fan or the promoters. No chance of you hearing Da Da I'm afraid.

[Daggers & Contracts]

Where would he set up this "residency"? Las Vegas? His home base is in Arizona. Are there enough fans in that area to support such an undertaking? Also, (if there are) it would be a kind of Grateful Dead thing where the "true" fans would be at every show. I'd have no problem buying a ticket to one or more shows that fell into MY schedule.

[A_MichaelUK]

> Alice would be too frightened ( as many have claimed here ) of upsetting the casual fan or the promoters.

That perfectly sums up your perspective on a lot of these issues. Nobody said anything about anyone being "frightened" - it's about giving value for money to "the casual fan" you refer to. Trying to ensure the majority of the audience is entertained rather than pandering to one's own needs has nothing to do with fear.

[kevinuk81]

If Alice done this, how many fans do you think would turn up for ZCS or L&W compared to the very popular albums WTMN or B$B?

[wind_up_toy]

If Alice done this, how many fans do you think would turn up for ZCS or L&W compared to the very popular albums WTMN or B$B?

I've made the bold claim before that Alice would sell out a modest sized venue if he did something like this, say in a place like London. The Club 100 concert a few years back was my supporting evidence. This was very much a spare-of-the-moment thing by all counts though (if memory serves me right, they had the void left by a cancelled gig to fill).

Hypothetically speaking, if he decided to do a residency over a month or two then the whole thing would be a massive flop in my opinion, Alice has hardcore fans but most have finite resources (and probably have bills to pay and kids to feed too).

I'm not actually sure the choice of album would have much impact on the size of the crowd, the classic albums you refer to are very old now.

[A_MichaelUK]

>I've made the bold claim before that Alice would sell out a modest sized venue if he did something like this, say in a place like London. The Club 100 concert a few years back was my supporting evidence.

It doesn't sound like there's a lot of money to be made in this scenario.

[dadascot]

I may be wrong, but I took vinceraven's original question to be more of a lighthearted, fun, hypothetical question! Perhaps an admendum might be "and what ones would be successful performed live". Although he's not performed a whole album live some of the concerts I like best were supporting albums I liked least I.e. RYFAY and Dragontown. When DADA came out I envisioned a creepy, haunted house stage set which would be cool! Perhaps the eyes would work least successfully because although I love that album it had no cohesive thread to hang a show on!

[Toronto Bob]

What would be least popular? Man that's tough to say considering I could only imagine WTMN, B$B, FTI and possibly Killer as being the only albums where such an attempt could be made.

I think full performances of DaDa/ZCS/SF/L&W/GTH/BP/HS/Constrictor/RYFAY/TLT/DT/ACAS would be more or less equally unsuccessful

PFY/EA/MOL/LITD/SO would have old timers clapping for joy but not likely to interest many others

and
Trash/DD/TEOAC would seem rather pointless

[wind_up_toy]

>I've made the bold claim before that Alice would sell out a modest sized venue if he did something like this, say in a place like London. The Club 100 concert a few years back was my supporting evidence.

It doesn't sound like there's a lot of money to be made in this scenario.

Almost none I'd say, but life is littered with the odd exception to the status quo.

[ThePainAddict]

Obviously jsut a thread for fun, but not sure it is very legitimate to exclude PFY & EA. Plenty of the Alice hallmarks on both lps. I would rank EA over quite a few solo lps and enjoy PFY over a couple.

[mestreech]

Constrictor
Along came a spider
Lace and whiskey

[I'm Pain]

I think DADA would work (artisticly), if it were done acoustic in small venues. Something like that would be interesting to see, though I doubt many enough are familiar with that album..