ALICE COOPER
LENNON

October 13, 2001
The Tabernacle
Atlanta, GA

LENNON:

  

(To comprehend this review properly, from this point forward hear it in your head as spoken by cheesy B-movie heavy Vincent Price.)

When the wind starts to blow cold and leaves start to fall, the nights tend to become a little creepier. For the last couple of years, a part of Atlanta’s tradition has been to celebrate the turning of the leaves with metallic Vaudeville ghoul Alice Cooper. As if that wasn’t potentially skin crawling enough, this time he brought along death obsessed femme fatale Lennon to share the bone scattered stage with him. The dark young lady brooded over leaden dirges and skull crushing mayhem. Having grown more accustomed to her role as spokeswoman for the damned since her last materialization in Atlanta, she howled and whined like a bitter storm for the make-up metal minions at her command. Then again, what dark soul wouldn’t be warmed by “Couldn’t Breathe” and “Property Of Goatfucker”? A human skull dangled precariously on the end of her keyboard. She was ever so precious in her pale fisted glory as she writhed and groaned in infernal ecstasy.

For another Lennon live review, click here.

ALICE COOPER:

It wasn’t until the ringmaster himself took the stage that the true evil fury of the blood-lusting crowd was made manifest. Wielding first a sword, then a whip, the black-eyed demon lashed out at his followers with a messianic furor. New anthems like “Sex Death And Money” and “Sanctuary” gave way to “Welcome To My Nightmare” and “Go To Hell.” When a scantily clad nurse arrived pushing a baby carriage during “Nurse Rozetta,” Alice took it upon himself to strangle her with her own stethoscope before stuffing her into the trunk of a car. All of this was to the grand delight of the throngs that witnessed this beautiful cruelty. He then took the hideously deformed baby and impaled it on his sword as he sang “Dead Babies.” Soon after, the nurse reappeared to the astonishment of everyone, bruised and disheveled, but clearly not dead. She brought her own henchmen with her. They grabbed Alice and proceeded to chop his head off with a massive guillotine that they wheeled into sight. As if this wasn’t horrid enough, the executioner then took the dripping head to the edge of the stage where he actually kissed the detached cranium’s bluing lips before spitting the fresh blood all over the front rows of the now headless singer’s fans. Following a nearly heart-stopping musical interlude from the band which featured former KISS drummer Eric Singer, the nurse reappeared and placed the head atop a Frankenstein monster that was assembled from pieces of bodies found within the carnage of the stage. After flicking the switch, smoke belched from the contraption and before you know it, a top-hatted restored Alice Cooper crashed out of the machine to reclaim his evil lordship. He then freely admitted that he WAS under our beds when we were children. He actually did wait for us in our closets. His band members, it turns out, were even responsible for our missing candy on the days after all of those mysterious Halloweens. This lesson ended with a double sucker punch of “Under My Wheels” and “School’s Out.” After the final bell rang, the demented fools demanded more and soon they had more than they could’ve hoped for. “Elected” found American flags waving and “Department Of Youth” even found Britney Spears showing up on the stage for the sordid celebration. You know, it’s really too bad she had to go and lose her head that way. There’s no pun intended, because you see she actually did lose her head and we weren’t about to recreate her in the Frankenstein machine, now were we? Alice Cooper is becoming Halloween’s answer to Santa Claus. Okay, maybe he’s not…but he should be. I should know. I must go now. I smell “the funk of forty thousand years” coming on and I feel a sudden desire to break dance.

Vincent Price (as channeled by Chris McKay)

ALICE COOPER SET LIST (10-13-01)

1. Sex Death And Money

2. Brutal Planet

3. Sanctuary

4. Eighteen

5. Welcome To My Nightmare

6. Go To Hell

7. Billion Dollar Babies

8. Teenage Frankenstein

9. Triggerman

10. Nurse Rozetta

11. Dead Babies

12. Ballad Of Dwight Frye

13. Medley:  I Love The Dead/Devil's Food/Black Widow/Drum Solo

14. No More Mr. Nice Guy

15. Is It My Body?

16. Fantasy Man

17. Be My Lover

18. Lost In America

19. Every Woman Has A Name

20. Only Women Bleed

21. Poison

22. Under My Wheels

---encore---

23. School's Out

24. Elected/God Bless America

25. Fire

26. Department Of Youth

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