Alice Cooper’s Message of Hope: ‘We’ll Get Through This Together’

Alice Cooper was making his way across Germany last week, headlining a tour that also featured Cheap Trick, when he learned that the country was prohibiting gatherings of more than 1,000 people due to coronavirus worries. The tour was canceled, and he and his crew immediately had to navigate their way back home, after the U.S. cut off travel to and from Europe. Everyone eventually flew to the States. Cooper postponed his upcoming North American dates, and now he’s shifting his attention to the things he can do at home.

“While our management is working to reschedule the postponed shows, I’m going to finish work on my next album, which is nearly done,” he tells Rolling Stone via email. “At least now I won’t be squeezing in vocal recording sessions on days off, between shows. I don’t like a lot of time off, as anyone who sees my schedule already knows, but a little extra time at home can be re-energizing.”

Cooper says he hasn’t really turned so much to other people’s music to help him recharge — “I rarely listen to music at home,” he says — but he does enjoy listening to Little Steven’s Underground Garage on SiriusXM when he’s driving, and it’s the kind of soundtrack that makes him happy. “They play a great mix of young retro bands — the Strypes, Bayonets, etc. — and deep cuts from classic bands I play on my radio show, Nights With Alice Cooper, like the Yardbirds, Love, Paul Butterfield, Procol Harum, etc.”

Although he’s best known for doom and gloom onstage (he still travels with a guillotine and dons a straightjacket during his shows), Cooper says hope is keeping him going. Since everyone around the world is going through the same thing right now, he says we’ll be stronger because of it. “We’re all in this together,” he says. “Whether you’re entertainer or fan, rich or poor, male or female, old or young. And we’ll get through this together. And when we do, we’ll be back on the road, doing what we love to do.”

He also hopes people are able to support artists who are less fortunate than him. “My band has been around a long time and are lucky enough to have the resources to survive through this,” he says, “but maybe fans should buy some merch or music from younger newer bands that can’t tour right now and don’t have the reserves that we have.”