Killer

1	Under My Wheels 2:54
2	Be My Lover 3:23
3	Halo of Flies 8:25
4	Desperado 3:33
5	You Drive Me Nervous 2:28
6	Yeah, Yeah, Yeah 3:41
7	Dead Babies 5:46
8	Killer 7:03

Barnes & Noble

Best remembered for outrage -- the sleeve to Killer had a foldout poster of ghoulishly made-up frontman Alice Cooper hanging in a noose -- what this five-piece Phoenix band had in its favor was years of honing its chops in clubs and bars. This was a group that shocked and rocked, and did it years before Kiss and Iron Maiden, decades before Marilyn Manson. Having scored its first hit with the teen anthem "I'm Eighteen" (from Love It to Death), the band then scaled the album charts with this 1971 release, on which their love of theatrics, gore, epic arrangements, and good old rock 'n' roll was arguably never bettered. Only eight songs long, Killer boasts plenty of gratuitous violence in the title track and the so-tasteless-it's-charming "Dead Babies," but it also offers straight-up pool-dive anthems ("Under My Wheels," "Be My Lover") and a mini-rock opera, "Halo of Flies." Still to come were the major hits ("School's Out," "Elected") and over-the-top concepts (Billion Dollar Babies, Welcome to My Nightmare), but Killer was the one album on which Alice Cooper -- band and singer -- were shocking and amusing yet still totally credible. Tony Fletcher

All Music Guide

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." The long and winding "Halo of Flies" correctly hinted that the band would be tackling more complex song structures on future albums, while "You Drive Me Nervous" and "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah" showed that Alice Cooper hadn't completely abandoned their early garage rock direction. With Killer, they became one of the world's top rock bands and concert attractions; it rewarded them as being among the most notorious and misunderstood entertainers, thoroughly despised by grownups. Greg Prato