Neal & Glen & Dennis & Mike: Supergroup on Ice

Neal & Glen & Dennis & Mike: Supergroup on Ice

If you had been in one of the world’s most successful rock bands, how would you like to be left in the dust of vinyl history? The former members of the original Alice Cooper band aren t content to sit on their dwindling assets either. Originally, after the Billion Dollar Babies tour, the group, instead of calling, it a day, decided to call it a year — taking a much needed vacation from rock and roll and each other after spending ten years of starving and starring together. After that hiatus, they planned on regrouping and picking up where they left off. Now there seems to be some doubt in rock circles, since the success of Alice’s solo project Welcome To My Nightmare. The smart money seems to be saying that Cooper will continue with his backup band of performing pros up another step on the stairway to success, leaving the old band stranded at the landing.

According to Alice’s manager, Shep Gordon, those rumors are totally incorrect. “It is definite that the original band will reform to record together andpossibly tour, although they are presently under no contract.” Shep also wanted to make it clear that there “never has been any bad feelings between any of the guys.” Informing us that they had all flown in to Detroit to1 see Alice’s act, and spent the entire day together, he added adamantly that “They’re the best of friends.”

Still I wanted a recap on the rest of the Cooper stable, so in aseries of interviews, I asked the remaining four how they had spent their summer vacations and if they believed that the original band Would be back in business. Drummer Neal Smith found himself a little stir crazy. “I wasn’t really crazy about taking a year off. Sure I like to rest, but I get bored after a couple of weeks in Hawaii.” So to relieve the boredom he built himself a studio and made himself a solo album. “I love to work and I’ve always wanted tp have total control of what I’m doing, and that’s what this solo trip is.” The lanky percussionist also immodestly informed me that he is very confident on stage and that “Nobody else in the whole world could do what 1 do in Alice Cooper . . .’’So why didn’t /^lice ask hirrt on his current tour? “If he had, I wouldn’t have done it. How could I? Steve (Hunter) and Dick (Wagner) are good guys and everything, but they’re studio musicians. In Ihe old band there was electricity. Dennis is crazy, and I can relate to him and Mike really well. Its not just me dfumming.J have to relate. In Alice Cooper there’s love, there’s hate, there’s fear; all building on stage. In this new band, Well ...”

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' Well, that must mean that Mr. Smith had expectations of a rock and roll remarriage, right? “It depends on how far everybody gets into what they do solo wise and how successful that becofhes.”

Dfennis and Cindy (The Dancing Tooth) Dunaway felt the pinch of not raking in the high rolling loot of a rock band, so they moved to a smaller place in Greenwich, Conn., where Cindy set up a boutique called La Grenouille while Dennis started painting, and, in off hours, playing bass in Neal’s band. The Dunaways are content in their well-ordered life, but Dennis dbesn’t disregard the possibility of returning to his old job as the bass player in the Alice Cooper Band. “You know, I never considered that the group ever broke up. This is just like a solo period, like a vacation. We were working for ten years, being on the road most of that time, and it really gets to you. It got to the point where everybody needed a release. What it resulted in was everybody got a change of pace and is learning a lot more by being alone. As a matter of fact , I think the next album will be the best one we ever did, because we will all have recuperated. Hey, that’s what we should call it: ReCooperated.”

Glen was the most world weary rnember of the group during the last tour; in fact, most of the burden of his guitaf playing was taken over by Mike Bruce, Steve Hunter and Dick Wagner on record, but he considers this year’s vacation “the best thing that could have ■ happened to me. ” So how has he spent it? “A lot of sleeping, and getting my health back. I’ve built a studio, and I’ve been writing songs and taping them with my woman, Susie Aaron.” So you’re getting ready for the old band getting together?

“What???” he asked incredulously.

“Shep informed us that the old band was definitely reforming,” I explained.

“Oh, well, yeah, I guess I’ll be in it. I haven’t heard anything about that. Just rumors. Hey, by the way, when did Shep tell you that?” he asked.

Mike Bruce was always one of the strongest influences in the Alice Cooper band , writing much of the material, and providing excellent guitar work. Even before the onset of the Billion Dollar Babies tour,* he had expressed a desire to make a solo album, so he hasn’t idled away the past year. “What the yedr off meant to me was everybody had a chance to go out on their own and realize how popular the band had been; then coming back and seeing that Alice is the front man and is very popular, but this is what I like to do, and that doesn’t matter. I get off going on* stage playing with hundreds of thousands of people whether it’s with Alice, Eric Clapton, or whoever.” So can we also take this as Bruce’s bid for regrouping?

There was never a formal announcement that the band had broken up. Because Alice has the name and is using it, that’s what everyone assumes happened, but what did happen was the pressures of the Billion Dollar Babies tour and people wanting to do solo projects for their own recognition. Sure, if the group did an album, it’d be a financial shot in the arm for all involved — for me, since my solo project isn’t off the ground financially [As Rock Rolls On produced by Gene Cornish and Dino Danelli of the Rascals). We had a meeting in Detroit and Alice said he’d have to rest after this tour but if Dennis, Neal and I started writing music, then he could sit down and write lyrics. Then we would do an album, but he couldn’t make a committment on when he’d be able to tour depending on what he’s doing. Also if Neal’s thing and my thing really takes off that may be true in our case.”

Jaan Uhelszki