Middle-aged rocker Alice Cooper of "School's Out" and "No More Mr. Niceguy" fame (just check the Dazed and Confused soundtrack), recently gave his two cents on New York indie rockers Vampire Weekend. Making the connection to his days wearing guy-liner and thriving off of Halloweenish stage-setups, Cooper commented "I heard the title Vampire Weekend and I thought, 'Oh, man, that's gonna be great. I gotta see it.'" Unfortunately, after further inspection, Cooper was not satisfied. "There are these guys with little Gap T-shirts on and I'm going, 'What happened to the balls in rock 'n' roll? Why are American bands so wimpy?'" Seems the good old days have come and gone Alice. While hits like "A-Punk" and "Oxford Comma" certainly were catchy, I can't disagree with Cooper's disgruntled outlook on some of indie rock's big names. It seems as though many of the indie bands of the current decade are allotted one good album, but can't seem to follow it (bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Peter Bjorn and John, and even the Arctic Monkeys come to mind). Also, from a man who saw most success from his outrageous live shows, we'll see what becomes of bands like Vampire Weekend, MGMT, and the Ting Tings who may find difficulty adding creativity that is not found on a studio album into their live performances. This may be the first and last time we hear Alice Cooper's name in a while, so I'll take this post to add a video of Alice on the Muppet Show in 1987. Enjoy.
No comments:
Post a Comment