Alice Cooper: "People Hated Us"

John Soeder of cleveland.com recently conducted an interview with Alice Cooper. Read excerpts below.

Alice Cooper, which was the name of the band as well as the stage name of frontman Vincent Furnier, stormed the charts in the 1970s with sneering anthems such as “Eighteen” and “School’s Out.”

The group became a top draw on tour with its darkly theatrical brand of rock ’n’ roll, complete with mock executions onstage via guillotine and electric chair. Cooper was fond of sporting a boa constrictor around his neck, too.

The band will be ushered into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame during the 26th annual induction ceremony Monday night at New York City’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

Set to be enshrined alongside Cooper himself are drummer Neal Smith, bass player Dennis Dunaway, keyboardist Michael Bruce and the late Buxton, who died of complications from pneumonia in October 1997, a few weeks shy of his 50th birthday.

“The original band did all the groundbreaking work,” Cooper, 63, said by phone recently from his Phoenix home.

“We were the ones who started in a garage, brought theater to rock ’n’ roll and paid the price for it. I mean, people hated us. Not just the press. Other rock ’n’ roll fans hated us. They didn’t like the idea of where we were taking the future of rock.”