Go to Hell

Hey Zoo Freaks, it’s your starry-eyed Zoo Crew drifting in from the misty hollows of THE ZOO, where the bonfire crackles and the shadows lean in to listen. We’re unleashing Alice Cooper’s “Go to Hell” from the fever-dream concept album Alice Cooper Goes to Hell, and man, this one’s a carnival ride straight into the brimstone. Picture Alice waking up in a padded cell, realizing the last album’s Welcome to My Nightmare was just the warm-up—this time he’s the condemned soul, and “Go to Hell” is his snarling, swaggering anthem of defiance. Bob Ezrin, that wizard behind the boards, told Classic Rock they wanted it to feel like “a Broadway musical in Hell,” so they layered horns, harpsichords, and a choir of demons, turning the track into a twisted show tune. Alice himself laughed in a ’76 radio spot: “I wrote the song after reading the Bible backwards—turns out it’s just a really long set of stage directions.” Fans still cackle over the line “For criminal acts and violence on the stage,” a wink at the guillotines and gallows he’d been dodging since the early tours. On X, someone just posted a grainy clip from the ’76 tour where Alice descends on a hydraulic elevator into a pit of dry ice, middle finger raised, screaming “Go to Hell!” while the crowd loses its collective mind. And get this: the single’s B-side was “I Never Cry,” a tearjerker that hit the charts harder than the A-side, proving even Satan’s got a soft spot for a power ballad. Pure theatrical thunder, Zoo Freeks—lightning in a bottle of blood-red wine.

Now let’s hitch a ride back to the desert dust where this whole macabre circus first pitched its tent, ‘cause Vincent Damon Furnier didn’t just stumble into the role of rock’s ringmaster—he was born to it under a preacher’s roof and a Phoenix sun. Little Vinnie, born ’48 in Detroit, moved west with his lay-preacher dad and started running track at Cortez High, but the stage bug bit harder than any starting gun. By ’64 he’d roped his cross-country pals into a Beatles-parody act called The Earwigs for the school talent show—lip-syncing “She Loves You” with mops on their heads. One gig turned into real guitars, and by ’66 they were The Spiders, cutting a local single “Don’t Blow Your Mind” that actually cracked Phoenix radio. Name changes followed like molting snakes: The Nazz (until Todd Rundgren snagged it), then—legend has it—at a Ouija board séance in ’68, the name “Alice Cooper” floated up, a prim Victorian handle for their mascara-smeared mayhem. Frank Zappa caught wind of their chaos, signed them to his Straight label for three gloriously unhinged albums, then watched them explode when they moved back to Detroit in ’70 and started hanging fake babies and chopping heads on stage. Producer Bob Ezrin polished the diamond in the rough for Love It to Death, turning “I’m Eighteen” into a teen-rebellion anthem, and by ’73 Billion Dollar Babies was the biggest tour in America. Vincent legally became Alice in ’74, went solo with Welcome to My Nightmare, and even after the bottle tried to drag him under, he clawed back—sober, golf-obsessed, and still swinging that snake at 77. From track spikes to guillotines, the preacher’s kid built an empire on shock, swagger, and a whole lotta heart.

If the inferno’s calling your name, Zoo Freaks, slide over to the official Alice Cooper site for tour dates, nightmare merch, and that fresh Revenge brew. Gather the ghouls on Facebook—four million strong, swapping bootlegs and backstage blood. Peek the pandemonium on Instagram for guillotine glam and golf-cart grins, or howl into the void on X where Alice drops deadpan dispatches. For the die-hards, the Sick Things Fan Site is a crypt of collector confessions, while REAL Alice Cooper Fans trade rare reels and rally cries. Dive deeper at WelcomeToMyNightmare.co.uk, a fan shrine stacked with Dennis Dunaway diaries and cold-coffin curios. Crank the cauldron, raise the chalice, and let’s ride this highway to the danger zone, my midnight marauders.