SickthingsUK

Excellent album. The title track is probably my least favourite.

I think it works as a great companies to TEOAC.

I also agree that the performance on the Montreux dvd is superb. Let down somewhat by the erratic camera work and lacklustre audience.

From darkmenace:
> The album (more or less) has a 60s psychedelic vibe to it,

I completely don't get that impression. If that was the case, I don't know how you would explain tracks like "Dirty Diamonds", "Sunset Babies (All Got Rabies)", "Zombie Dance", "The Saga Of Jesse Jane", "six Hours", "Steal That Car" and "Run Down The Devil" - in fact, the majority of the songs!

>but I like the way it starts off that way with the songs that follow.

That doesn't make any sense. Tbe first song is "Woman Of Mass Destraction" which you just said don't like.

This album has some good stuff on it, but it was big a step down from "The Eyes of Alice Cooper".

From RemarkablyInsincere:
" This album has some good stuff on it, but it was big a step down from "The Eyes of Alice Cooper".2

I agree.

RemarkablyInsincere wrote:

pitkin88 wrote:Perfect name checking J Lo makes me want to hurl.

I'm not a big fan of Alice putting current pop culture references in his songs because it tends to date them.

I agree, especially the Xbox reference in What Do You Want From Me on TEoAC.

wind_up_toy wrote:

RemarkablyInsincere wrote:

pitkin88 wrote:Perfect name checking J Lo makes me want to hurl.

I'm not a big fan of Alice putting current pop culture references in his songs because it tends to date them.

I agree, especially the Xbox reference in What Do You Want From Me on TEoAC.

Yes that is another good example. Decent tune that suffers from poor writing.

A_MichaelUK wrote:
I completely don't get that impression.

If there's a musical theme the closest would be 60s and early 70s music, some songs in the psychedelic category. I'm thinking of songs like Perfect, You Make Me Wanna, Pretty Ballerina, and Sunset Babies. Your Own Worst Enemy sounds early 70s.

I believe at the time Alice said he was going for unpolished 60s garage rock sound, hence the title Dirty Diamonds. I also believe, and am open to be corrected, that he was interested in producing some psychedelic rock for this album. An unused version of the album cover has been posted and it had more of a psychedelic feel that the final version.

A_MichaelUK wrote:That doesn't make any sense. Tbe first song is "Woman Of Mass Destraction" which you just said don't like.

A reasonable person would have understood that I meant the songs that followed that one.

From: RemarkablyInsincere:
"I'm not a big fan of Alice putting current pop culture references in his songs because it tends to date them."

He tends not to write songs about events in the news for exactly that reason (with songs like "Pick Up The Bones" and "Somewhere In The Jungle" being exceptions) although that should be the least of his worries when writing a song. However, given that his songs can be quite satirical, it's hard to be satirical without referring to something specific.

These two DD and TEOAC should have been just one album. You could take about 6 songs off each and make one pretty good album. Neither to me were particularly Alice Cooper-ish though.

I like the album a lot, but it is interesting. I remember when The Eyes of Alice Cooper came out, I didn't care for it at all. I really liked the heavier direction, Alice went to with Brutal Planet and Dragontown. I still listen to Brutal Planet on a consistent basis to this day. I was hoping he would stay in that direction for a little while longer.

It took several listens and several months for me to start liking TEOAC, so when Dirty Diamonds came along, I was a little more accepting and actually liked the album a lot. I thought the songs were good and it was an enjoyable album, but it didn't quite have the full feel of an Alice album to me but I liked it better than The Eyes. Three or four years ago, I went back to both TEOAC and Dirty Diamonds and now I enjoy both almost equally, but I now slightly prefer the Eyes. There is a little more energy on that one. I think the three or four best songs on the Eyes top anything on Dirty Diamonds, but Diamonds may be the more consistent of the two.

A_MichaelUK wrote:From RemarkablyInsincere:
" This album has some good stuff on it, but it was big a step down from "The Eyes of Alice Cooper".2

I agree.

I agree as well