Covers

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jacknifejohnny
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Covers

Post by jacknifejohnny » Thu Aug 20, 2020 1:36 pm

Whilst not a big fan of the live cover section Alice done for a while, they’re are a couple of good covers he has recorded, “Hello Hurray” being my top pick by a mile. I always wish the originals had recorded The Stones “Paint It Black” , perfect for his voice and their image. “Smoking In The Boys Room” , by I think it was Brownsville Park Station (correct me if I’m wrong) was another one I could see the originals doing and getting it bang on....and later on “Night Train” by Guns & Roses woulda been a great choice for a solo album with Slash on guitar. Anyone out there have any tracks they feel would’ve been a perfect fit to cover

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Re: Covers

Post by VinceRaven » Thu Aug 20, 2020 3:20 pm

As far as the original group goes, I don't think any of the albums that didn't have them would have benefited from the addition of covers, with the possible exception of Muscle of Love. Maybe including some song they all loved, perhaps even beating Aerosmith to the punch with Train Kept A-Rollin', would have helped develop the group/gang mentality for the record. Probably not though.

In the live context, Helter Skelter could have been a pretty intense addition to the Billion Dollar babies set. But they already had so many good songs in there that they didn't need it.

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Re: Covers

Post by jacknifejohnny » Thu Aug 20, 2020 6:46 pm

You’re right mate, couldn’t really better the original albums, maybe a Bowie type “Pin Ups” album woulda given them some artistic breathing space to write another 7 masterpiece’s afterwards....wishful thinking , i know 😉

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Re: Covers

Post by jettrainfan » Thu Aug 27, 2020 10:55 pm

I'm surprised Alice didn't cover "Cracked Actor" by David Bowie. He could've gave it a more sinister sound and everything.

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Re: Covers

Post by jacknifejohnny » Sun Aug 30, 2020 4:09 pm

Think I woulda gone with “Panic In Detroit” over that one jettrainfan. Although “Cracked Actor” was a great tune

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Re: Covers

Post by Daggers & Contracts » Sun Aug 30, 2020 6:25 pm

Well, AC did cover "Suffragette City" for his "Raise The Dead" segment & The Vampires have
"Heroes" with JD singing... "Panic In Detroit" could be an obvious choice. :HEART:
"Cracked Actor" is from the same LP.
However, they are much more obscure Bowie songs.
An average AC fan may/or may not recognize them because neither (got nor gets) much, if any airplay.
At least in the U.S. :smack:
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Re: Covers

Post by pitkin88 » Thu Sep 10, 2020 4:03 am

Prefer no covers from Alice for quite some time. The last cover I Really liked was Pretty Ballerina as he really used his voice in a different way. He sounds almost out of body. The music is great too. Prefer it to the original which is the highest compliment I could give it.

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Re: Covers

Post by Mr. Misdemeanor » Tue Jan 03, 2023 6:15 pm

jacknifejohnny wrote:
Thu Aug 20, 2020 1:36 pm
“Smoking In The Boys Room” , by I think it was Brownsville Park Station (correct me if I’m wrong) was another one I could see the originals doing and getting it bang on.
That is a great choice. I can't think of one for the original band that would be any better. Brownsville Station had a couple of other songs that were decent. They did a mash-up of "Whole Lotta Love" and Link Wray's "Rumble" that I kinda liked. Their version of "Sweet Jane" was o.k. too.

Four cover songs that I think the ACG would have nailed live:

"White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane.
"The Green Manalishi with the Two Pronged Crown" by Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac.
"I Put a Spell On You" by Screamin' Jay Hawkins & CCR
"Midnight Rambler" by the Rolling Stones.


Cooper is great at doing covers. He can do stuff in almost any genre and has a knack for imitating other singers voices. Which makes it really hard to choose tracks he should cover because, well, he can do almost anything. So I'm only going to choose songs that I think would sound good live with his current band.

"Elvis Died for You" by Zodiac Mindwarp & The Love Reaction. Alice's cover of their "Feed My Frankenstein" is a classic, and I'm sure they would knock this one out of the park.

"Fight for Your Right" by the Beastie Boys. An oddball choice, I know, but his band plays a great version of it when they are playing without Alice. I really like the idea of seeing Calico in nurse regalia singing this one on stage.

"Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo Heartbreaker" by the Rolling Stones. Not my favorite Stones song, but I think Alice and the band would really be able to do a dynamite version of it.

"Eve of Destruction" by Barry McGuire. A Brutal Planet style reinterpretation.

"Detroit Rock City" by Kiss. Hey, it's a rock song about Detroit so it's a natural fit, right? I love the Thin Lizzy style dual guitar part of this song and since the band has 3 guitarists I think a live rendition would sound great.

"Cold Sweat" by Thin Lizzy. A monster riff. For a while Cooper's band was playing a drum solo in the middle of Dirty Diamonds. Instead of coming back from the solo with the second half of DD, it would be cool to segue into "Cold Sweat." Both songs are good rockers and they share the "illicit deal gone bad" theme.

"The Seeker" by the Who. A good song with a crummy guitar solo. I would love to hear the band do a live reinterpretation of it.

"Gimme Three Steps" by Lynyrd Skynyrd. It's a fun "story" song with plenty of opportunities for Alice to pantomime. This would kill on any setlist of a show in the South.

"The Watcher" by Motorhead. The version from their "On Parole" album. This a early track from the band and isn't as heavy as their later stuff. It's a good track and the theme of madness and paranoia fits in with a lot of Alice's material.

"I Don't Want to Grow Up" by Tom Waits and the Ramones. All Ramones songs sound good live. It's science. Tom Waits' lyrics seem to fit Alice too.





Three songs that would probably have worked best in earlier eras of Alice's career:


"Good Girls Don't" by the Knack. This would have been a fun cover to do during the Zipper Catches Skin era. A fun song with slightly risqué lyrics and an opportunity for Alice to play the harmonica.

"Once Bitten, Twice Shy" by Ian Hunter & Whitesnake. Alice would have sounded great doing this one during the Trash/Hey Stoopid era.

"Teen Angst" by Cracker. This would have been a fun song to do during the Dirty Diamonds era.



Two ballads:

"Ride On" by AC/DC. I think the band would do a great job with almost any Bon era song. "Problem Child" or "Sin City" would be great I'm sure. But I'd be interested in hearing Alice sing this one. It will always be Bon's song, but I think Alice's voice really fits it. On the other hand a cover of "Have a Drink On Me" would be the perfect opportunity to bring the old dancing liquor bottles out of storage.

"Life by the Drop" by Stevie Ray Vaughan. Alice can play guitar a little, right? This is a pretty simple song to play and I think Alice doing this song solo would be great. Even if someone else had to play the guitar while he sang it would still be powerful.



p.s. If Alice ever did a live album of Beatles tunes I'd buy it. He obviously loves the band and does a great job of covering their stuff. I don't think I'd care for a slick studio album, but a live album would be great.

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Re: Covers

Post by Si » Fri Jan 06, 2023 9:58 am

Mr. Misdemeanor wrote:
Tue Jan 03, 2023 6:15 pm

"Fight for Your Right" by the Beastie Boys. An oddball choice, I know, but his band plays a great version of it when they are playing without Alice. I really like the idea of seeing Calico in nurse regalia singing this one on stage.

"Detroit Rock City" by Kiss. Hey, it's a rock song about Detroit so it's a natural fit, right? I love the Thin Lizzy style dual guitar part of this song and since the band has 3 guitarists I think a live rendition would sound great.
Alice has actually sung both these in the past.

'Fight For Your Right' in May 2001 at the opening of the Denver Cooperstown (the band have played it at their "solo" shows as well)

'Detroit Rock City' at Cooptock in April 2021 as the charity show also featured Tommy Thayler of Kiss.

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Re: Covers

Post by Mr. Misdemeanor » Fri Jan 06, 2023 7:32 pm

Neat. Have you heard either of those? If so, how did they sound?

I've never heard of Coopstock, but after googling it, it looks like the setlist for that show had some other interesting numbers including a cover of Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth."

p.s. I had no idea who "CO‐OP" was but setlist.fm mentioned them so I googled them. No idea Alice had a son in a band. Their album is pretty good, imo. They sound like a lot of stuff I hear on modern rock radio so I'm kind of surprised that they haven't gotten some play on my local station. "Never Whisper the Truth" is probably my favorite track.

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Re: Covers

Post by Saint&Sinner » Sat Jan 07, 2023 12:11 am

I am so sick of alice's cover songs.
The song i always thought for 20+ years that alice would absolutely smash was "gotta get out of this place" by the animals. i thought it was made for his voice and sound....
Then i heard it on one of the billion different versions of W2MN and well......it's rubbish! instead of doing an Alice version of it , they just do a pretty straight cover which just doesnt have the life or kick to it i wanted.
"Cold Sweat" by Thin Lizzy. A monster riff. For a while Cooper's band was playing a drum solo in the middle of Dirty Diamonds. Instead of coming back from the solo with the second half of DD, it would be cool to segue into "Cold Sweat." Both songs are good rockers and they share the "illicit deal gone bad" theme.


A great song from an underrated album and alice could do a good version of it. But lets just leave the covers in the past for now can we?

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Re: Covers

Post by Mr. Misdemeanor » Sat Jan 07, 2023 3:58 pm

I like Alice's cover of We Gotta Get Out of This Place. What changes did you hope he would make? The thing about songs like this is that their are iconic parts of them that you can't really change. I'll give you an example. I was listening to Co-Op on youtube and they do a cover of "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield. It's ok, but the classic drum beat - which makes the song great - is muted in this new version. You just can't do that. The bass line in "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" is something else that you just can't touch, imo. It's like covering "Spirit in the Sky" without the monster fuzzy guitar riff. I'm sure their are some exceptions, but you get my point.

One thing Alice could have done is do the song as a duet. Eric Burden and Katrina and the Waves did it that way and it works fairly well, imo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9VqHbN ... nel=dimsel

To clarify - I like the duet, but not the 80s pop sound.

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Re: Covers

Post by Saint&Sinner » Sat Jan 07, 2023 7:54 pm

What changes did you hope he would make?
I don't know, its not something thats easy to put into words. I felt his version was too chirpy.....not enough sneer maybe a touch too fast.
hahahaha its hard to describe. i dont hate it, its not unlistenable but just not the right vibe.
Another classic song i love but thought alice could do a great version of is wishing well (by free) but nowadays i don't know! (i like the cover savatage does of wishing well which isnt vastly different just more "metal")

I think the best covers do something different:
Marilyn Manson - sweet dreams (betters the original in my opinion)
Poison - Your mamma dont dance (again betters the original by a wide margin!)
Sonata Arctica - Hell is living without you (Alice Cooper) & Still Loving you (scorpions)
Type O Negative - Cinnamon Girl
Paradise Lost - Small Town Boy
Nine Inch Nails - Hurt

an exception to the rule i think is W.A.S.P. the real me, which is largely the same as the Who's original but heavy as balls hahaha

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Re: Covers

Post by Mr. Misdemeanor » Sat Jan 07, 2023 9:11 pm

I like that W.A.S.P. cover too. I like their cover of Elvis' "Promised Land" as well. When you say "Hurt" I'm assuming you're talking about Johnny Cash's cover, right? Cash did a lot of brilliant covers, particularly when he started working with Rick Rubin. His cover of U2's "One" and Sting's "I Hung My Head" are also standouts.

To keep things on topic, I'll mention an odd one that I would like to hear Alice cover: the old Willie Dixon penned tune "I Just Want Just to Make Love to You." Totally out of left field I know and the only reason I thought of it is was because his cover of "Born This Way." At the end of the song, just before Orianthi takes center stage for the last time, Chuck's bass combined with the guitar sounds a bit like the intro to Foghat's version of IJWtMLtY. Just for a split second, but it popped into my head that they were about to launch into it. Crazy, but they had just finished playing a Gaga tune so anything was possible at that moment.

p.s. An unusual (funky) cover that I've always liked is Wilson Pickett and Duane Allman covering Jimi Hendrix's "Hey Joe." Which was itself a cover.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lU_YD8z ... kett-Topic

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Re: Covers

Post by Dannorama » Mon Jan 09, 2023 1:58 pm

I knew there was one I was forgetting about. Fortunately, Ryan put this song up on one of his recent Monsters of Rock episodes. Thanks for the front page link! I learned about it from you, Si. I found his show on the streaming platform that begins with an "S," and it's a great listen. (If this sounds like an ad, please kill it!)

If you can't see the link above, look for: Celebration Suite: Start Me Up-A Hard Day's Night-5:15-See Me, Feel Me, etc... - Alice and the British Rock Symphony.
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Re: Covers

Post by Daggers & Contracts » Tue Jan 10, 2023 12:19 am

Saint&Sinner wrote:
Sat Jan 07, 2023 7:54 pm
What changes did you hope he would make?
I think the best covers do something different:
Marilyn Manson - sweet dreams (betters the original in my opinion)
Poison - Your mamma dont dance (again betters the original by a wide margin!)
Sonata Arctica - Hell is living without you (Alice Cooper) & Still Loving you (scorpions)
Type O Negative - Cinnamon Girl
Paradise Lost - Small Town Boy
Nine Inch Nails - Hurt
"Hurt" happens to be a NIN tune written by Trent & later "Covered" very well by Johnny Cash.
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Re: Covers

Post by Agrophile in Texas » Sat Jul 22, 2023 2:21 pm

My Five Favorite Cooper Covers
1. Pretty Ballerina
2. Hello Hooray
3. Seven and Seven Is
4. Talk Talk
5. Our Love Will Change the World

As for other bands I like, Devo did some amazing covers - put their own mutated spin to them... "Satisfaction" was the biggie, but they also did a bang-up job on "A Worried Man", "Secret Agent Man" (even better live) and Hendrix's "Are You Experienced" to name a few.

Nazareth (another of my 70s favorites) was known for their killer covers. "Love Hurts" was superb, sure, but one I liked equally as well, was their 9-minute, rather nightmarish version of Dylan's "The Ballad of Hollis Brown". Has Alice ever covered Bob? As Nazareth and Hendrix showed, you can do your own thing with them and really make 'em cook.

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Re: Covers

Post by Mr. Misdemeanor » Mon Aug 21, 2023 6:36 pm

There's one cover on the new album, but if there were more, what would be some "Road" themed songs you would like to hear? I think Alice would do a great job with AC/DC's "Ride On" but to me that will always be Bon's song. "Rock 'n Roll Singer" off the Live Wire album would probably sound great. "It's a Long Way to the Top" is (along with Segar's Turn the Page) the best "life on the road" rock song but I'm not sure how an Alice cover would sound.

Chuck would probably do a great version of Motorhead's "We Are the Road Crew."

What are your picks?

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Re: Covers

Post by ianmac » Tue Aug 22, 2023 7:51 am

Mr. Misdemeanor wrote:
Mon Aug 21, 2023 6:36 pm
Chuck would probably do a great version of Motorhead's "We Are the Road Crew."
We Are The Road Crew would be a great choice, maybe better than Road Rats ?
And if Alice and Co want to stick with a Doors cover, how about Roadhouse Blues.

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Re: Covers

Post by bigbradwolf » Tue Aug 22, 2023 10:13 am

I prefer Alice's covers to be discreet numbers. We've had an overload of them in recent years.

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