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45 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Coopers returns with vengence!!!, 8 Jul 2008
After two garage albums it seemed inevitable that Alice would have another crack at the concept album.The problem for Cooper is that his output has been so vastly varied over his career that one persons poison is another's delight.
A serial killer named Spider is the focus of the album and seems to be sung in a first person perspective.
Musically the album dips into Alice's past.
1. Prologue/I Know Where You Live: Great guitar riff and seventies style lead.I believe there is even some tambourine in there!!!
2. Vengeance Is Mine: This could belong on Dragontown, great melody
3. Wake The Dead: Sixties psychedelic feel with vocals that match, good guitar riff and nice bass work.
4. Catch Me If You Can:Pretty straight rock song, good chorus with intelligent guitar breaks.
5. (In Touch With) Your Feminine Side:Good chorus and another seventies groove!
6. Wrapped In Silk:Excellent bass work and great guitar interplay.
7. Killed By Love:The ballad!!! Actually works well and is helped by nice backing vocals and a great Alice vocal.
8.I am Hungry:To my ears, a definite nod to the original ACG,nice Bruce type riff. A good measured lead solo.
9. The One That Got Away:Good melodies and a fine arrangement, a seventies feel again!
10. Salvation: This sounds as though it could of sat quite happily on the Go to Hell album, nice drum work, mixed with inventive bass playing and a big chorus!
11. I Am The Spider/Epilogue:A zombie feel and a deliberate plodding and down beat(what do you expect, its about a serial killer),with another great guitar riff!
This album demands many listen to fully appreciate all its wonders, to me this is the most satisfying Alice album in years, and like any truly great album it makes you work to fully explore its brilliance.
There is a real retro feel that is offset by clean and modern production.If you listen through head phones it brings another dimension to the sound!
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
...back to the 70's as Alice returns with a killer concept..., 17 Jul 2008
Well, it looks like the garage rock years are over, as Alice returns to his old stomping ground - the concept album! This time it tells the charming tale of a serial killer named Spider, whose trademark is wrapping his victims in silk. Hurrah! But don't worry, this is cuddly 21st century Alice, so he gets his comeuppance when he goes all girly and falls in love with one of his victims. Boo!
He's stuck to his road band for this trip to the studio, so Kiss drummer Eric Singer, bassist Chuck Garric and guitarists Keri Kelli and Jason Hook handle the majority of the work on the album. And all that time spent touring has paid off. They sound like a proper band, not just a bunch of session guys who've popped in to pay the bills. There is room for some guests, though, and Guns n' Roses / Velvet Revolver fella Slash lays down an excellent solo on "Vengeance Is Mine", one of the highlights on the album. In a novel twist Ozzy Osborne whips out his mouth organ for some, well, pedestrian harmonica work on "Wake The Dead", where he also gets a co-writing credit.
It's a surprisingly heavy album, especially considering that for studio album number 25, Alice has brought in a new production team in the shape of Danny Saber, formerly of Black Grape, and Greg Hampton who's been working on an album project teaming up ex Guns n' Roses guitarist Buckethead and Bootsy Collins. But any fears that this would end up a dance crossover are firmly dashed, despite some heavy synth work on "Catch Me If You Can", which I'm sure will get pushed as a single.
Despite the return to the concept album, the sound is more similar to his Brutal Planet and Dragontown albums than it is to the seventies sounds of Welcome To My Nightmare or From The Inside, especially the large amounts of riffing laid down by Keri Kelli and Jason Hook. The one track that totally fails is the big ballad, "Salvation", which just pales besides older material like "How You Gonna See Me Now". Luckily, there is an array of material that rocks out and will, doubtless, slot happily into his never-ending tour. "Wrapped In Silk" and "I'm Hungry", for example, are custom built for audience sing-a-longs. Finally, things come full circle in the closing track "I Am The Spider / Epilogue", when an old, old friend pops in for a cameo.
He may have turned 60 this year but there's no sign of him fading away, as this really is a good Alice Cooper album, one that tries to tie in the various musical strands he's pursued over his career, and will be a delight for anyone whose followed him on the way.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Doesn't fulfill the promise of the concept and artwork, but it's worth a listen, 31 Jul 2008
As a long-time Alice Cooper fan, I was quite excited about this album, given some of the pre-release reviews and the title and artwork which references much of his 1975 masterpiece, 'Welcome To My Nightmare'. Knowing the man behind the great Black Grape album 'It's Great When You're Straight... Yeah!' (1995), Danny Saber, was involved in the writing of the songs brought a wildcard element into Alice's music and it was difficult envisaging what that particular collaboration would sound like, but - as Danny is an obviously talented musician and producer - it didn't make me at all sceptical. Of course, the legacy of Alice's 1970's albums make any attempt to re-create or reference that era lead to direct comparisons to some his best work so for Alice to stir up such nostalgia in fans must mean that he has an album we're going to love... or does it?
It doesn't start off well. The lyrically menacing but musically unexciting 'I Know Where You Live' is a bit of a lukewarm opening song and the following track, 'Vengeance Is Mine', isn't really developed beyond a very repetitive guitar riff, although there's some nice lead guitar work all throughout it. 'Wake The Dead' has a guitar sound which sounds like a wasp in a bottle, but it is blessed with a catchy chorus and an interesting bassline so, as far as I'm concerned, it's the first good track on the album.
'Catch Me If You Can' is a fast-tempo rocker which is the first of the album to mention the spider of this loosely-threaded concept album and it's just OK. So far, the musical invention is lacking somewhat, with only 'Wake The Dead' providing some genuine innovation. 'In Touch With Your Feminine Side' is a decent enough song, reminding me a little of Primal Scream's 'Rocks', and it does have a nice little melodic guitar solo. Not bad at all. Next up is the second of the spider-themed songs, 'Wrapped In Silk', which is perfectly fine but hasn't really got any special quality to really get excited about.
The first ballad of the album 'Killed By Love' is very nice and provides a welcome break from the very ordinary rockers, but it certainly isn't one of Alice's classics. Strangely enough, one of Alice's classics, 'Is It My Body' comes to mind straight away during the introduction and verse of the next song, 'I'm Hungry' which could have been a great track if the guitar sound wasn't so frustratingly anemic. There's something about the production of this album that doesn't quite sit right - it seems like they have gone for contemporary when they should have been thinking classic for some of these compositions.
'The One That Got Away', thankfully, is a great melodic rock song which hits all of the right spots and, even better, so does the following track, 'Salvation', the album's second and far superior (power) ballad - now these last two cuts are classic, brilliant Alice and, for the veteran fan, worth the price of the album alone, even though I'd have liked to have heard the lead guitarist cut loose a little on the latter track. The last track of the album, 'I Am The Spider', doesn't really work - the basic bones of the song just aren't there so all of the strings, effects and bombast don't raise the ante enough to disguise the fact that it just isn't that good a song, more is the pity. The 'Epilogue' sees an attempt to sew the album together as a concept, but - as a true concept album, such as 'Welcome To My Nightmare', 'Goes To Hell' or 'From The Inside', I'm sorry to say that 'Along Came A Spider' just doesn't compare.
So, what you have is an album which starts uneventfully, but grows in stature throughout eventually leading up to an anti-climax. Yes, it's a little disappointing, but it certainly has its moments. Unfortunately, it isn't a "return to form" (besides, I thought that Alice's last couple of albums were great), it doesn't even come close to being one of Alice's best albums and isn't even his best of the decade. What it has, though, is enough to satisfy Alice's army of loyal fans although I'm not sure that this album would convert anyone new to Alice's music. There are examples of some great work by the band, but some of the songs and production, frankly, fall short. I hope that this is Alice's one and only collaboration with Danny Saber because, for me, it just didn't work, and most of the songs I enjoyed the most were, co-incidentally, ones that Danny Saber didn't have a hand in.
Approach with caution.
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![Along Came a Spider [VINYL]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/616wyA9lhtL._SL500_SS90_.jpg)
