Muscle of Love

Muscle of Love
Studio album by Alice Cooper
Released November 20, 1973
Recorded 1973 at Sunset Sound, Hollywood; Record Plant, New York and The Cooper Mansion, Greenwich, Connecticut
Genre Hard rock, glam rock, art rock
Length 39:31
Label Warner Bros.
Producer Jack Richardson, Jack Douglas
Alice Cooper chronology
Billion Dollar Babies
(1973)		 Muscle of Love
(1973)		 Greatest Hits
(1974)

Muscle of Love is the seventh studio album by Alice Cooper, released in 1973. It is the final studio album recorded by the original Alice Cooper band.

Background

Cooper stated in an interview at the time of recording that the album marked a return to a basic rock sound. "It's not complicated in any sense and there’s not a lot of theatricality on it. It's very basic rock & roll throughout." Cooper further explained, "Billion Dollar Babies was a studio effort all the way. So was School's Out. It was just so clean that after a few times of hearing it myself, it had no mystery to it. I really wanted this one to have more guts to it. More balls."[1]

Muscle of Love is the first Alice Cooper album without Bob Ezrin as producer since the pre-stardom Easy Action. The explanation given at the time was that Ezrin was recovering from illness.[1] However, bassist Dennis Dunaway revealed in a 2011 interview that the band split with the producer during an acrimonious rehearsal in which guitarist Michael Bruce stood up to Ezrin and refused to change the arrangement of "Woman Machine".[2] Jack Richardson and Jack Douglas stepped in to share co-production duties.

Dunaway recalled the album sessions as being very difficult. "The problems on that album were that we could tell that everything was being pulled out from underneath us. As hard as we tried to get it back to where it once was, we had that sinking feeling going on. We wanted to rekindle what the band was about but there was just too much exhaustion by then."[2]

Lyrical content

In a contemporary interview with Circus magazine, Cooper said that a loose concept of "urban sex habits" developed during the album's recording.[3] The title of "Big Apple Dreamin' (Hippo)" refers to the Hippopotamus club of New York City which the band used to frequent.[4] "Never Been Sold Before" is the retort of a prostitute to the man she is supporting,[3] and the title track is, according to Cooper, about "sexual awakenings. It's about the kid who just learned how to masturbate, and what all those dirty books his father used to hide are all about."[3] "Woman Machine" is a science fiction-themed song dating back to the band's early years[2] and is, as Cooper explained, "basically a chauvinistic song. It's about a female robot, like Julie Newmar was on that TV program with Bob Cummings. If we had women robots, they could do anything, even sexual things, just by changing their tubes."[3]

Not all of the songs have a sexual theme; "Crazy Little Child" tells the story of a youth criminal, and in "Teenage Lament '74", a teenager fails to find happiness even when doing everything to try to be "hip".[3] "Man With the Golden Gun" was written with the intention of having it appear on the soundtrack of the then-upcoming James Bond film of the same name. Cooper recalled in a 2011 interview:

It was supposed to be the Bond theme, but it actually came in a day too late, and by the time they heard it, they’d already signed for Lulu's song. I went, "You're gonna take Lulu over this?" [Laughs.] 'Cause it was perfect for The Man With The Golden Gun. It had helicopters, it had machine guns—it had the Pointer Sisters, Ronnie Spector, and Liza Minnelli doing background vocals! We went to every single one of those John Barry albums to try and invent the perfect James Bond song, and even Christopher Lee, who played Scaramanga in the movie, said, "Oh, man, why did we take the Lulu song? This song is the one!" [Laughs.] So, yeah, we lost out on that one, but I still put it on the album. I said, "I don't care, I’m going to do a James Bond track no matter what."[5]

Packaging

In place of the usual record jacket, the original LP was packaged in a shallow corrugated cardboard carton, with a "stain" intentionally printed along the bottom. On the inner sleeve, the band members appear dressed as sailors. In the "before" daytime shot, they are about to enter a nude wrestling emporium; in the "after" nighttime shot on the other side of the sleeve, they appear beaten and sprawled out on the street, having been thrown out of the club.[2] The front of the album cover design agency Pacific Eye & Ear was temporarily redecorated to serve as the setting for the photo session.[3]

The original release also included a paper "book cover" sheet that could be folded and used as a book jacket. A photo on the sheet depicts the band members in their sailor uniforms looking dejected while peeling potatoes.

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic link
Rolling Stone(mixed)
Robert Christgau(C) link

Reception and chart performance

Muscle of Love received an uneven reception from critics. Writing in Rolling Stone, Lenny Kaye gave the album a mixed review, describing its content as "hit-or-miss" and believing that the group had lost focus with regard to its musical direction.[6] Phonographic Record published a negative review and suggested that the group had been unable to overcome the loss of Ezrin.[7] Creem, however, gave the album a positive review, calling it "a magnificent effort".[8]

Although Muscle of Love went to #10 on the Billboard 200 and earned a respectable gold certification, it was considered something of a commercial disappointment in light of its predecessor Billion Dollar Babies having reached #1 and attaining platinum.[9]

Covers

The song "Muscle of Love" was covered by Fireball Ministry for their 2001 FMEP release. "Teenage Lament '74" was covered by Big Country on their 2001 covers album Undercover, and by Tyla on the 1993 Various Artists tribute album Welcome to Our Nightmare. "Hard Hearted Alice" was covered by Chris Connelly on the Mutations - A Tribute to Alice Cooper compilation.

Track listing

Side one
No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Big Apple Dreamin' (Hippo)"  Alice Cooper, Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, Dennis Dunaway, Neal Smith5:10
2."Never Been Sold Before"  Cooper, Buxton, Bruce, Dunaway, Smith4:28
3."Hard Hearted Alice"  Cooper, Bruce4:53
4."Crazy Little Child"  Cooper, Bruce5:03
Side two
No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Working Up a Sweat"  Cooper, Bruce3:32
2."Muscle of Love"  Cooper, Bruce3:45
3."Man with the Golden Gun"  Cooper, Buxton, Bruce, Dunaway, Smith4:12
4."Teenage Lament '74"  Cooper, Smith4:32
5."Woman Machine"  Cooper, Buxton, Bruce, Dunaway, Smith4:31

Personnel


Additional musicians from the LP liner notes:

Charts

Album - Billboard (North America)

Year Chart Position
1973 Pop Albums 10

Singles - Billboard (North America)

Year Single Chart Position
1973 "Teenage Lament '74" Pop Singles 48
1974 "Muscle of Love" Pop Singles -

References

  1. 1 2 Crowe, Cameron (1973). "A Chat With Alice". Circular Magazine (promo). Warner Brothers.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Wright, Jeb. "Interview: Dennis Dunaway". classicrockrevisited.com. Retrieved 26 February 2012.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Gaines, Steven (January 1974). "Alice Cooper's 'Muscle of Love' - A Shocking Course in Pop Sex". Circus: 4–9.
  4. ↑ "Muscle of Love". Sick Things UK. Retrieved 26 February 2012.
  5. ↑ Harris, Will (December 8, 2011). "Set List: Alice Cooper". The A.V. Club. Retrieved 26 February 2012.
  6. ↑ Kaye, Lenny (January 17, 1974). "Alice Cooper: The Motor Cools Down". Rolling Stone. Straight Arrow Publishers, Inc. (152): 49.
  7. ↑ Fowley, Kim (January 1974). "Muscle of Love Album Review". Phonographic Record.
  8. ↑ "Alice Cooper: Muscle of Love". Creem. March 1974.
  9. ↑ Whitburn, Joel (2006). The Billboard Albums, 6th Edition. Record Research Inc. p. 237.
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