1/11/2010 Alice Cooper's Night Of Fear @ The Roundhouse

Subject	Alice Cooper's Night Of Fear @ The Roundhouse
PostedDate	11/1/2010
	This always looked like being one of the gigs of the year - and it was!  Amazingly, this was my first visit to Camden's famous Roundhouse. It's certainly a unique venue, and the Victorian architecture of this huge former steam locomotive shed give an appropriate Gothic feel to this Halloween themed event.  Although this is a venue that holds thousands of people, it's unusual in not being a 'Corporate' venue - meaning the drinks at the bar are cheaper than the 'Academy' venues for example - and we aren't forced to drink Carling or restricted to the usual choice of just pints of overpriced lager or cider. No real ales of course, but they do have Old Speckled Hen on tap - at last, a venue with more of a clue what rock fans actually want to drink!  The two 'Night Of Fear' dates sold out virtually straight away and I was lucky to be able to get a ticket at all - although all the touts outside seemed to have plenty as usual.  As well as the two bands, there were various other Halloween themed acts - after all, this was billed as 'Alice Cooper's Night Of Fear'.  The Jim Rose Circus provided gory thrills and there was a fancy dress competition judged by Alice himself. However, all this just provided handy toilet/bar breaks as far as I was concerned. One thing that impressed me was that although this was a sold out show, I had no trouble getting served at the bar at any point of the evening - why can't other venues be like this?  And of course the fact that they also served a beer I actually like made me want to patronise the bar more than usual.  There were a few characters shuffling about in the crowd - limping and looking like they had been in a fight. They I realised, they were 'Zombies' and must have been plants to enhance the atmosphere - some thought had obviously gone into this show.  The sound wasn't too great for Zodiac Mindwarp & The Love Reaction but they did their best in the circumstances and trotted out the hits. They are pretty good musicians, but seem more at home in smaller pub and club venues than places like this. Cobalt Stargazer has lost some weight since I last saw the band, but was without his famous 'Sleazegrinder' guitar on this occasion. He still made the effort to get into the crowd during the band's last song - a cover of Thin Lizzy's 'The Rocker'. I was pleased to find a copy of the infamous book 'Fucked By Rock' on their merch stand afterwards - I've been wanting to read that for years!  So, onto the main event. Alice Cooper's live shows are legendary - and for good reason! At only £34 a ticket. the show is amazing value for money - it's obviously not cheap to put on with all the stage props, cast of characters, costumes, etc. This just goes to show how band bands like Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, etc are ripping people off - especially as Kiss can put on the most spectacular show for a very reasonable ticket price. Of course, you know some of the things that are going to happen - especially if you've seen Alice Cooper before. It gets a bit Panto like at times, but that's half the fun! You really can't fail to be entertained by all this and I love every minute! There is no doubt that Alice is the absolute master rock showman - a natural entertainer! Obviously, all the hits get played as well as some more recent stuff - and set pieces with the guillotine, hanging, etc and the 'Billion Dollar Babies' bit. There is also a new giant green monster that I didn't see at last year's show - unfortunately I can't show you because the only picture I got was so badly out of focus.  The amount of energy that this man has at 60+ is incredible - he acts like a man half his age. Another thing which really impresses is that you can tell he still absolutely loves what he does. He certainly doesn't need the money, doesn't need to tour, and could rip people off and charge a lot more for the tickets if he wanted - he could easily just stay at home playing golf every day if he wanted while the royalties from the hits still roll in. All that said though, at £25 the T-shirts on the merch stand are the most expensive I've seen - I buy one outside for £5 instead.  Alice Cooper also has a great band! They have to carry the show at times while Alice is changing costumes or stage props are being moved, but they do a terrific job in their own right. This is easily the best SHOW I've seen since Kiss earlier this year, and like that show I also walk out of this one on a high thinking I'll definitely be buying another ticket next time round.

PS: Halloween itself may have been a bit of an anti-climax in the end, but this show the following night certainly made up for it!