ALICE COOPER: TRASH BY PETER GERMANY

I don’t know how it came about but my brother and I were watching Wayne’s World. I’m pretty sure it was something my brother had come across. We gleefully noticed Meat Loaf as a club doorman- we’d known of him since getting our Dad a Meat Loaf greatest hits CD for Father’s Day a few years before. We had no idea who Alice Cooper was though. I can’t speak for my brother, but when Cooper burst through that skeleton and started working his way through Feed My Frankenstein, I was blown away! Not only had I never seen someone who looked like Cooper, but I’d not seen someone with the attitude he had, nor had I heard music like Feed My Frankenstein. Being older than me, my brother got hold of an Alice Cooper album before I did. I believe it was The Last Temptation as Lost In America is almost ingrained into my eardrums.

The first Alice Cooper album I brought was Trash. It was a few years after seeing Wayne’s World when I was in HMV. The cover of Cooper, head hanging, a leather studded jacket on with a t-shirt that had an image of Alice Cooper on with half of his flesh removed from his face, immediately grabbed me and I remember sticking the disc straight in my Hi-Fi when I got home.

The first few seconds of "Poison" crawled from my speakers and straight into my head. Compared to the poppy stuff I tended to listen to this felt real, dirty, like an exposed nerve which is felt throughout the album. The conflict of passion for someone who could be so poisonous to you wasn’t something I would experience until years later, with Poison smashing to the forefront of my mind when it did.

After Poison we get "Spark In The Dark". Not as memorable as some of the other tracks on the album but one of my favourites. It has that grimy element to it, and strikes home how passionate that early part of a relationship can be.

With "House of Fire" we get a track that is pure optimism and one of the catchiest tracks on the album. Its simple lyrics and energy have stuck in my mind from when I first heard it. I really do love the positivity of the song. There’s a sense of that during passion the right person can bring, but it’s also a song that pumps me up. It makes me feel like I can do anything I want, if I put my mind to it. It’s also a great track to have blaring in the car on a hot summer’s day.

"Why Trust You" is a track that I often forget when thinking about this album, but when I listen to it it’s got the same energy as much of the album and Cooper sounds like he’s having a lot of fun with the vocals. This song also strikes home how false people can be, how someone can promise you the world but can’t follow through. There’s also some great lyrics in it that I find very memorable and it’s a good addition to Trash.

"Only My Heart Talkin’" is one song on the album that doesn’t grab me. I like my music a little faster than this track and it hasn’t got the sort of intensity that resonates with me either. Listening to the lyrics always makes me feel like that old cliché where men aren’t supposed to vocalise how they’re feeling because it just wasn’t done, and how hard it is to not say those things. It isn’t a bad song, and slows down the album halfway through which serves as a breather before picking up the pace with "Bed Of Nails."

"Bed Of Nails" is one of the best songs on the album for me. I love the energy and pace it has. It feels a little like a cross between "Poison" and "Spark In The Dark", but quicker and much more in your face. Its that fiery type of relationship where it balances between pure rage and passion. This is a song that I easily see as one you’d put in a high tempo playlist. I’ve got it in a motivational one myself. Definitely a song I always sing along to.

"This Maniac’s In Love With You" has a different energy to the rest of the album. It has a sense of resignation to it that comes with blind love. What really sits with me about this song is how it’s paced. It builds up slowly to the chorus and then drops down and begins again. The intensity of the song and how it builds up works really well together. I don’t think it’s one of the iconic tracks on the album but I find it one that’s very memorable and like "Only My Heart Talkin’" slows the pace of the album down before we hit the title track.

"Trash." I always love when an album has a title track. I don’t know why, it’s kind of like when you’re watching a movie and the title is mentioned in dialogue. "Trash" has that dirty, no holds barred feel to it. The lyrics are on point and are saying that it doesn’t matter what you wrap yourself in, you’ll always be the same person at the core. This song isn’t a ballad, it’s not one you’ll blurt out the lyrics to like "Bed Of Nails" but it’s damn good though. Although it sits very snugly with the rest of the album it feels a lot more like its own entity then the rest of the tracks here.

The pace of the album drops again with "Hell Is Living Without You." Where this differs with "Only My Heart Talkin'" is its intensity. This song feels like someone is lying on their bedroom floor with their heart torn out by the person they love the most, but it’s more. They’ve been tossed aside like a piece of garbage. It’s heartbreak in that moment of realisation before you’ve pulled yourself out of the pit it’s put you in. There’s no redemption in the song, it’s just that pain of the moment.

Then we get fired up by "I’m Your Gun." This is an adrenaline-filled, vulgar ballad. You cannot help but sing along to it. Like the rest of the album it feels dirty but it’s different in its energy. It’s another song you pop into motivational playlists as it gets the blood pumping. "I’m Your Gun" ends the album with a bang.

Trash had a lot of hands in it that need mentioning. It was produced by Desmond Child, who also co-wrote a number of the songs on the album. Steve Tyler, Jon Bon Jovi, Joan Jett, Richie Sambora played a part in writing various songs. Bon Jovi and Tyler both added vocals as well. Joe Perry and Richie Sambora added guitar on tracks as well. I’m sure there are other recognisable names in the mix as well, but I’m not well versed in music and the names I’ve mentioned are ones that I recognised.

I’ve only listened to a handful of Cooper’s albums but this feels like the most mainstream of them. It’s the one I’d recommend to someone who was curious about Cooper and wanted to know where to start.

It’s not my favourite Alice Cooper album, that will always be The Last Temptation, but Trash is where it all started for me. It grabbed me and took me into a world of music that wasn’t the cheesy pop I’d see each week on Top Of The Pops. It was real, it was raw, but it was only a taster to what Alice Cooper really is. You can call it watered down and commercial but it’s still Alice Cooper. He didn’t bring people in and leave them to it, he played a part in writing each song.

Trash is the gateway drug for the world of Alice Cooper. 

BIO:
Peter Germany is a writer of Science Fiction and Horror from Gravesend in Kent who intends to finish a novel, one day. He is influenced by writers like Dan Abnett, Scott Sigler, CL Raven and Joe Haldeman.When not pretending to be normal at a day job, he is writing or dealing with a supreme being (a cat), an energetic puppy, and trying to wrangle a small flock of chickens. He also spends an unhealthy amount of time watching good and bad TV and movies.He has had stories published the anthologies Sparks:An Electric Anthology and 12 Days of Christmas 2017
You can find him at his blog: petergermany.com

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