Page 40 - Classic Rock (February 2020)

Once upon a time, a garage band from Phoenix moved to LA and

became Alice Cooper, with a little help from Frank Zappa, a dark alter
ego and... West Side Story. This is the story of their album Easy Action.

Words: Ian Fortnam

n 1967, a year after graduating from Phoenix, only white guys in the neighbourhood”), before finally
Arizona’s Cortez High School, The Spiders – an settling in the decidedly more sedate Topanga Canyon.
Anglophile garage band based around cross-country Meanwhile in Berkeley, another Phoenix band, the Holy
lettermen Vince Furnier (vocals), Dennis Dunaway Grail, were similarly trying to break into California, but their
I (bass) and Glen Buxton (lead guitar) – grew tired of drummer, Neal Smith, was becoming disillusioned at the
being big fish in a small pool. After they brought in rhythm extent of his bandmates’ drug use. As destiny would have it,
guitarist Michael Bruce, their second single, Don’t Blow Your while Smith was visiting Dunaway in LA, John Speer
Mind, had given them a local hit, reaching the dizzy heights announced that he was leaving. “John quit, Neal was there,”
of No.11 in Tucson. They were on the radio and in demand says Dunaway. “It wasn’t pre-planned, it just happened.”
on the South-West club circuit, but Tinseltown beckoned. With Smith in place, the band – and vocalist Vince –
“It was like Dorothy landing in Oz,” Dennis Dunaway adopted the name Alice Cooper, and acclimatised their
recalls of the band’s arrival into Los Angeles. “We were young, lifestyle to that of the burgeoning Los Angeles freak scene.
had a vision, so just jumped in a van and While San Francisco was the centre
drove there.” of the blissed-out hippie scene, LA’s
With no money for a hotel, the quintet counter-culture was defined by
(initially completed by drummer John “The Byrds were significantly more militant freaks, and the
Speer) slept in Griffith Park. As dawn Coopers recognised kindred spirits. Their
broke they begged stale sustenance from here, The Doors regular Cheetah Club performances soon
a truck-based sandwich vendor as he there... We’re like: found favour with local scenester Vito
binned his previous day’s stock. “We and his ever-present harem of young girls.
pushed Vince to the front, as he was the ‘Okay, we’re gonna Their downstairs neighbours were
skinniest and most pathetic-looking. That have to up the ante Rushton Moreve of Steppenwolf
night we walked down Sunset Boulevard and his aptly named girlfriend
and it was unbelievable; The Byrds were to compete here.’” Animal Huxley (novelist Aldous
here, The Doors there, Love… We’re like: Huxley’s ‘wild’ granddaughter,
‘Okay, we’re gonna have to start all over. Dennis Dunaway who wasn’t averse to smashing
We’re gonna have to up the ante to guitars when roused).
compete here.’” The GTOs (Girls Together Outrageously), an
The band were able to gain a foothold in the city thanks to, all-female band of Frank Zappa associates,
Dunaway recalls, “this guy named Doke, who worked for befriended the Coopers.
[film star] Tony Curtis. He had a little apartment and said we “Everybody says they did our look,” says
could stay. We got some mattresses, covered the floor with Dunaway. “But we used to shop in the
them at night so we could sleep, and the windows during the women’s section of the thrift stores back in
day so we could practise. Doke was too nice to ask us to leave, Phoenix. That was our look. When we got to
but we finally got some gigs and got our own place.” LA we asked the GTOs: ‘Where’s the thrift stores?’ They
The band moved, somewhat incautiously, into the [US soul showed us, but didn’t style us. [GTOs member] Miss Christine
group] Chambers Brothers’ old place in Watts (“[we were] the ratted Alice’s hair and dyed it blond, though. Tiny Tim was

40 CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM