Alice Cooper — Alice Cooper Goes To Hell

intothewellsabyss
Jun 25, 2023
3 min read

𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐘𝐏𝐓𝐒 - 𝐂𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐁𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐏𝐀𝐒𝐓 𝐀𝐋𝐁𝐔𝐌 𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐀𝐒𝐄𝐒 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘 𝐨𝐟 𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐃 𝐑𝐎𝐂𝐊 & 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐕𝐘 𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐋…

47 years ago today, Alice Cooper “Goes To Hell”!

On June 25, 1976, Alice Cooper released his second full-length solo studio album, “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell” via Warner Bros. Records.

A continuation of “Welcome to My Nightmare” as it continues the story of Steven, the concept album was written by Cooper with guitar player Dick Wagner and producer Bob Ezrin.

Background:

With the success of "Only Women Bleed" from his first solo effort, Alice continued with the rock ballads on this album.

“I Never Cry” was written about his drinking problem, which would in one year send the performer into rehab and affect all his subsequent music up to and including 1983’s “DaDa”. Cooper called the song "an alcoholic confession".

The "Alice Cooper Goes to Hell" tour of 1976 was completely cancelled prior to commencement due to Cooper suffering from anemia at the time.

However, a number of songs from the album ended up in Cooper's live show. "Go to Hell" proved the last song until the 1989 hit song "Poison" to become a consistent part of Cooper's live setlists, being performed on most tours to the present.

"I Never Cry" was also regularly performed in the late 1970s and during the 2000s, while "Guilty" was performed regularly on the “Flush the Fashion” and “Special Forces” tours and occasionally during the 2000s, and "Wish You Were Here" was frequently played on the tours for the following two albums.

Critical Reception:

Rolling Stone wrote that "the soppy old standard, 'I’m Always Chasing Rainbows', probably expresses (Cooper's) musical sympathies much better than this record’s dynamic, if derivative, Rock & Roll."

Greg Prato at AllMusic wrote;

“Following the success of his first solo album, “Welcome to My Nightmare”, Alice Cooper followed it up with another concept album, “Goes to Hell”, similar in style to its predecessor. Again, longtime Alice producer Bob Ezrin was on board, and while there are a few highlights, “Goes to Hell” signaled an Alice era where he pretty much forsook the raw Garage Rock of his early days (Killer, School's Out) in favor of polished studio glitz. That said, the title track is worthy of any headbanger's time (and remains one of Cooper's most overlooked rock tunes), while "I Never Cry" was another Alice ballad that found a place near the top of the charts. Other highlights include such tracks as the disco-rock-boogie of "You Gotta Dance" and the laid-back yet sinister funk groove of "I'm the Coolest." Elsewhere, the musical experiments aren't as successful -- the old-time sounds of "Give the Kid a Break," "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows," and the album-closing "Going Home" are about as far removed from the expected hard-rocking AC direction as you can get. And while the rocker "Wish You Were Here" would become a late-'70s concert standard for the Coop, the original studio version lacks the firepower the song achieved on the stage. Alice was supposed to follow up the album's release with another highly theatrical stage show (following the cue of his first solo tour in 1975), but an illness squashed the tour altogether. Despite its missteps, the gold-certified “Goes to Hell” would prove to be Alice's most commercially successful solo album for quite some time.”

Legacy:

“Go to Hell” was covered by Dee Snider, Zakk Wylde, Bob Kulick, Rudy Sarzo, Frankie Banali and Paul Taylor on the 1999 tribute album “Humanary Stew: A Tribute to Alice Cooper”. Also, was included on the 2009 videogame Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned on the fictitious station Liberty Rock Radio.

Links to Artists, Albums, and Music Videos:

Click this link to listen to “Goes To Hell” via Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/album/alice-cooper-goes-to-hell/79574454

Click this link to watch the official music video for “I Never Cry”: https://youtu.be/mvXO1WPJOjI

Click this link to follow Alice Cooper on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AliceCooper

Note: The reviews shared here are for historical reference. The views and opinions expressed within are not always supported (in full or in part) by Into the Wells. — E.N. Wells

Alice Cooper — Alice Cooper Goes To Hell

Background:

Critical Reception:

Legacy:

Links to Artists, Albums, and Music Videos:

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