Alice Cooper
Muscle Of Love

THE REVIEW

With "Muscle Of Love," the era of the so-called Alice Cooper band, which had accompanied the king of horror rock since the beginnings of "Pretties For You," came to a close in 1973. In 1974, a Greatest Hits album was released to celebrate the work done up to that point by Alice Cooper and his associates, who were cheerfully dismissed by the singer as he began his dazzling solo career with "Welcome to My Nightmare." In reality, this great distinction won’t be very noticeable, not least because the albums, both before and after, are still credited solely to Alice Cooper and the changes in sound won't be that substantial, except for the absence of the keyboards played by the guitarist Michael Bruce, who played both instruments.

But before all of this happened, "Muscle Of Love" came to life in the studio between one tour and another: it is a concept album focused on the themes of youthful discomfort, sexuality, and prostitution, set in New York, as evidenced by the excellent Big Apple Dreamin’, complete with a violin. The album consists of a handful of good tracks, mostly very classic rock by Alice Cooper’s standards (Never Been Sold Before, Working Up A Sweat, Woman Machine and Muscle Of Love). As always, the best thing is that Cooper is not afraid to experiment: this is demonstrated by the ballad Hard Hearted Alice, the swing of Crazy Little Child, and the duet with Liza Minnelli in Teenage Lament ’74. A special mention goes to Man With The Golden Gun, a rather versatile song due to its rhythm changes and the use of brass instruments, which was initially intended as the soundtrack for the namesake film from the James Bond saga, The Man With The Golden Gun, featuring Roger Moore. Alice Cooper and his crew hoped for an (unexpected) popularity of the song so that the film's producers would consider adopting it as the soundtrack for the new chapter in the saga. Obviously, this didn’t happen, and it remains just a good track on this album.

I have personally always found the cover very ugly, as it sacrifices aesthetic for originality. The LP package consisted of this yellow-striped cardboard with a very industrial flavor, presenting the album as nothing more than a mere musical product and not as an artistic work, confirmed by the "fragile" warning at the bottom right, with a small internal insert that picks up on the pleasant nautical theme of the alternative cover, far better than the original.

Sure, compared to the illustrious "Billion Dollar Babies" and "Welcome To My Nightmare" between which it was released, "Muscle Of Love" somewhat struggles to hold up. But, as already mentioned, the ideas within this album are more than original and represent a fitting farewell from Alice Cooper to Dennis Dunaway, Glen Buxton, Neal Smith, and Michael Bruce, who from here on will each go their own way.