Album Review: Alice Cooper - From The Inside

Alice Cooper - From The Inside

Warner Bros Records - 1978

9/10

Working as a bit of a recovery album, lyrically as much as career-wise, From The Inside is a  record I’ve always held close to my heart. So at the expense of possible biases, I’d probably say it’s my favorite Alice Cooper record between Welcome To My Nightmare and the glam era starting with Constrictor. Up front, I’ll admit that it’s patchy in progression, but the songs themselves are so well written that I can overlook it. Also, the common “asylum” theme certainly acts as a bit of a reinforcing adhesive.

So it can be easily said that you’ve got a concept album revolving around different institutional experiences that are expressed in unique ways. For that alone, From The Inside is almost like the rare example where this foundation is preferred. Heavy bangers are rare, making up little of the meat. “Serious” is a fast and catchy tune that reeled me in early on, and “I Wish I Was Born In Beverly Hills” has the hard rock energy that Alice has served up since the beginning of the decade.

Other tunes seem to take this and add a bit of a disco tinge, similar to what KISS would do in upcoming years. The extremely horny “Nurse Rosetta” dumps this on with warm synths (lol), caking on extra sexual tension into the music itself. Similarly, the opening title track drops bass and chanting lines that would fit right in with Saturday Night Fever. You may even see a bit of that in “For Veronica’s Sake,” but this one’s admittedly a bit more of a throwaway tune.

Strangely, this is another anomaly where the ballads carry the most weight. “Millie And Billie” is a tragic acoustic tale around a murderous couple that falls in love, injecting the classic horror tropes. Moreover, the vocal duet with Marcy Levy paired with the unsettling ending really drove this home. A piano ballad “The Quiet Room” pounds in the hopeless feeling of solitary confinement, and “Jackknife Johnny” similarly uses this approach for depressed vibes around the military vet gone insane. Being able to build so much foundation on softees like this is impressive.

The only real issues I have are “How You Gonna See Me Now,” reeking of similar problems of “You And Me” but not nearly as bad. Closer “Inmates (We’re All Crazy)” also feels somewhat forced, but I guess it fits plenty and continues the theme of throwing the weirder shit to the back. Anyone who lost interest before this album should give it at least one shot. I can understand issues people may have, but I also find them easy enough to overlook. There are very few albums with the weird tricks this one has that actually land smoothly.