Alice Murno

Dispelling rumors of their demise due to Layne Staley's heroin addiction, Alice in Chains is a sonically detailed effort that ranks as their best-produced record, and its best moments are easily some of their most mature music. Alice in Chains relies less on metallic riffs and more on melody and texturally varied arrangements than the group's previous full-length albums, finally integrating some of the more delicate acoustic moods of their EPs. The lyrics deal with familiar AIC subject matter - despair, misery, loneliness, and disappointment - but in a more understated fashion, and the lyrics take on more uplifting qualities of toughness and endurance, which were missing from much of their previous work…

Alice Cooper wasted little time following up the breakthrough success of Love It to Death with another album released the same year, Killer. Again, producer Bob Ezrin was on board and helps the group solidify their heavy rock (yet wide-ranging) style even further. The band's stage show dealt with the macabre, and such disturbing tracks as "Dead Babies" and the title track fit in perfectly. Other songs were even more exceptional, such as the perennial barnstorming concert standard "Under My Wheels," the melodic yet gritty "Be My Lover," and the tribute to their fallen friend Jim Morrison, "Desperado."

Formed in 1968, the original Alice Cooper band forged a theatrical brand of hard rock that was destined to shock and had never been seen before. Within five years they would release no fewer than seven studio albums, amongst them their international breakthrough School's Out (including the Top 10 hit of the same name) and the US #1 Billion Dollar Babies (1973). By 1974, the band had risen to the upper echelon of rock stardom… and then, it dissolved.

When Alice in Chains' debut album, Facelift, was released in 1990, about a year before Nirvana's Nevermind, the thriving Seattle scene barely registered on the national musical radar outside of underground circles (although Soundgarden's major-label debut, Louder Than Love, was also released that year and brought them a Grammy nomination). That started to change when MTV jumped all over the video for "Man in the Box," giving the group a crucial boost and helping to pave the way for grunge's popular explosion toward the end of 1991. Although their dominant influences - Black Sabbath, the Stooges - were hardly unique on the Seattle scene, Alice in Chains were arguably the most metallic of grunge bands, which gave them a definite appeal outside the underground; all the same, the group's sinister, brooding, suffocating sound resembled little else gaining wide exposure on the 1990 hard rock scene…

It's hard not to feel for Alice in Chains - all the guys in the band were lifers, all except lead singer Layne Staley, who never managed to exorcise his demons, succumbing to drug addiction in 2002. Alice in Chains stopped being a going concern long before that, all due to Staley's addictions, and it took guitarist Jerry Cantrell, bassist Mike Inez, and drummer Sean Kinney a long time to decide to regroup, finally hiring William DuVall as Staley's replacement and delivering Black Gives Way to Blue a full 14 years after the band's last album. To everybody's credit, Black Gives Way to Blue sounds like it could have been delivered a year after Alice in Chains: it's unconcerned with fashion; it's true to their dark, churning gloom rock; and if you're not paying attention too closely, it's easy to mistake DuVall for his predecessor…

Coming off such conceptual, theatrical, sleazy hard rock records as the massively successful School's Out (1972) and Billion Dollar Babies (1973), the Alice Cooper group decided that their next release would be more along the lines of their earlier, more straightforward work (à la Love It to Death). While Muscle of Love was a gold-certified Top Ten success, it performed below expectations (their previous two albums peaked at number two and number one, respectively) and would unfortunately prove to be the original Alice Cooper band's last studio album together. The album may not be as coherent as their previous classics (producer Bob Ezrin took a leave of absence), and more filler is present than usual, yet Muscle of Love is perhaps Alice Cooper's most underrated record - more than a few overlooked and forgotten classics reside here…

With this recital dedicated to German songs by Joseph Haydn, Alice Foccroulle and Pierre Gallon leave their familiar territory - that of Baroque music - and present a personal, thoroughly informed interpretation of these songs, free of the many layers of varnish that have built up over the centuries on these little treasures of vocal music. It is free of the many layers of varnish that have been applied to these little treasures of vocal music over the centuries. Alice Foccroulle is accompanied partly by harpsichord, partly by pianoforte, and leads us across the narrow ridge between the Baroque and the Classical periods. The listener is invited into the Viennese salons of the late 18th century, where love songs and little philosophical or religious tales in German are performed in domestic settings. They are characterised by tenderness, intensity and humour, sometimes with a touch of cynicism. All in all, Haydn shows himself here from an intimate side, impressively realising the zeitgeist of an epoch in a state of transformation.

After thousands upon thousands of gigs and easily a million miles traveled, iconic Rock and Roll Hall of Fame® Inductee Alice Cooper revs up as loudly as ever on his new solo album “Road”. Produced by longtime collaborator Bob Ezrin, it’s written, composed and recorded with his current touring band. Bringing everything full circle, it channels the spirit of old school Alice with instantly recognizable grit and plenty of gusto. It’s everything you’d hope for from him and more. And this time his trusted longtime bandmates— Ryan Roxie [guitar], Chuck Garric [bass], Tommy Henrikson [guitar], Glen Sobel [drums], and Nita Strauss [guitar]—are riding shotgun. Complementing the album’s theme, the bonus Blu-ray comes with Alice Cooper’s 2022 full live show at Hellfest 2022 and includes all the classics and rarely played gems.

The big task for Alice in Chains on their 2009 comeback Black Gives Way to Blue was to prove they could carry on battered and bruised, missing Layne Staley but still in touch with their core. They had to demonstrate the band had a reason to exist, and Black Gives Way to Blue achieved this goal, paving the way for another record just like it. Enter The Devil Put the Dinosaurs Here, a record that is pretty close to identical to Black Gives Way to Blue in its sound, attack, and feel. Where it differs is in the latter, as the overall album feels lighter and, at times, the individual songs do, too. "Scalpel" flirts with the acoustic bones of Jar of Flies and also has perhaps the richest melody here, working as a song, not a grind…