Band:	Alice Cooper
Album:	Brutal Planet
Style:	Hard rock, Heavy metal, Glam rock
Release date:	June 05, 2000
Guest review by:	ScreamingSteelUS

01. Brutal Planet
02. Wicked Young Man
03. Sanctuary
04. Blow Me A Kiss
05. Eat Some More
06. Pick Up The Bones
07. Pessi-Mystic
08. Gimme
09. It's The Little Things
10. Take It Like A Woman
11. Cold Machines

Alice Cooper began the 21st century by releasing his 21st studio album, Brutal Planet. Since his very first record with the Alice Cooper band, 1969's Pretties For You, Alice the man has evolved and experimented and free-wheeled all over the musical spectrum. Alice has adopted many personae over the years, but the side of himself he presented on this album is unlike any he had ever shown before. He was always one of the most powerful influences on heavy metal, but on this album he fully embraces it, shows the kids how it's done, and becomes truly brutal.

This album is Alice's heaviest to date, and is in very much the same vein as two of his own disciples, Rob Zombie and Marilyn Manson. Brutal Planet feels cold and industrial; the guitars are heavy and forceful, the drums mechanical and driving, the vocals pained and vindictive. Songs like the title track, "Blow Me A Kiss," and "Pick Up The Bones" are creepy and powerful, the sort of thing you might expect to hear in a horror movie. Brutal Planet is infected with a dismal realism, a grim seriousness that was not present in Alice's previous albums. Alice Cooper used to be a somewhat comical villain; he was a vaudevillian, a cartoon character, just as cheesy as he was evil. Not anymore. Brutal Planet's Alice is deadly and vicious. He doesn't sing about school being out, he sings about shooting it up. No more "No More Mr. Nice Guy"; he left that behind long ago and is currently conducting a holocaust.

Lyrically, Brutal Planet is about as jarring and sinister as it gets with Alice. "Wicked Young Man" sounds like it was written for A Clockwork Orange, "Eat Some More" for Se7en, and "Brutal Planet" as a condemnation of the entire human race. "Dead Babies" is practically camp next to these songs. More than a mere horror show, however, this album is a moral judgment of modern society, influenced by Cooper's Christianity and dressed up as another romp through the wicked and horrific hosted by his dastardly alter ego.

Brutal Planet has the sound of a man who left the garage a lifetime ago, casting the rock and roll guitars and 1970s mentality by the wayside. This is not your father's Alice Cooper. Actually, my father loves this album, but it's just a figure of speech. This is a new breed of Alice. A heavy, destructive, brutal Alice Cooper. This is easily his best album so far, solo or otherwise.