Original Album Series (5 Pack)

Great albums and a great price

I saw Alice's first UK tour when they were promoting "Killer" - with a lot of "Love it to Death" in the set. Truly excellent and before they'd really broken into the phenomena they were about to become. I still maintain, Alice were the band then, not the front man, and what an excellent band they were. I rushed out and bought "Love it to Death" and "Killer" - the former then on the Straight label before Warner bought it out. Quite different, in that the earlier was quite disturbingly manic, having an empathy for the craziness. 'Dwight Fry' and 'SunArise' (the first thing they did at that gig) were wonderful. "Killer" carries much more threat and darkness. With titles like 'Dead Babies' and 'Desperado' that's probably to be expected.I went out and got "Pretties" - a niaive, Zappa-esque offering, strange and way off beam to where the band finished up. A great insight into the times and a band struggling to find their genre. Certainly not typical Alice. 'Reflected' is an early variation of 'Elected' and it's interesting to see the roots of a song later to become a huge hit. Then it was "Easy Action" - a transitional album for sure, with both "Pretties" and "Love it to Death" in evidence. Some nice experimental distortions and effects. Both then on the Straight label of course.By the time "School's Out" arrived the band were really big. The title track was overplayed to the extent I'm still not too keen on it. When I first got this collection of CDs, the little heard 'Loony Tune' jumped out again at me - excellent to revisit it after so long. All in all it's a great value collection, to see an obscure band evolve and explode into Superstardom. It's a shame they couldn't include "Billion Dollar Babies" and give us everything that was produced by the band (except the dodgy "Muscle of Love")before Alice split and went solo .... but really musn't grumble at this price.It's all here and musically powerful, depite their fame being focused on the live stage show. Sure, that was groundbreaking and sensational, but it was based on solid rock and roll - some well crafted songs, wholly theatrical and with driving rhythms behind strong lyrics. If you're dipping into the samples I'd recommend 'Today Mueller', 'Refrigerator Heaven','Dwight Fry','Halo of Flies' and 'Loony Tune' as a pick from each disc. This is really good stuff. Pop it in your basket now.

These classic album sets are bargains. For this set, you get the first 5 Cooper albums for just a little over a tenner. Cannot go wrong. I had never heard any of these albums before and I am very impressed. Overall, the entire set is 5 stars however, the debut was a real joy to the ears. I had heard it was a hotch potch of styles and nothing like the AC from the School's out/BDB's era however, I like this album a lot. I expected it to be very much a debut but I think it's great. The second album is good, is a slight step down in my opinion, yet still great nonetheless, then once you hit the 3rd album, the classic Cooper sound is firmly there, another great album, followed by Killer and then School's Out. I would say, having listened to all 5 three times, School's Out isn't quite as good as I thought it would have been, but it's still enjoyable, maybe 3/5. I can't wait to get series 2 covering the following 5 albums.

Well, seeing as I paid only £10 for this on a pre-order special deal, I can't complain that's it's not great value for money.And it IS very nice to have the first 5 AC albums all in one place, and in card sleeves so you can play a selection of faves from the various albums without having to grapple with plastic CD cases.And, let's face it, if you're an old-school Alice fan from back in the day like me, then re-listening to these holy-grail albums is always a pleasure. What other band from that 69-72 era (presented here) showed so much invention and evolution in such a short time. Each of these albums differs in sound, song-writing styles, vocal styling, production and so on. Collectively they really do represent a treasure in the Rock canon.That's the upside. Now, there are a couple of niggles to point out.Firstly, though I'm no audiophile, these sound like they're taken from the same old Warners CD masters from the days of yore, replete with hiss here and there. I guess at this price we're not going to get nice remasters. But, I did live in hope.Secondly, the card sleeves and the box. The box seems ideal for 4 card sleeves, but jamming 5 in means they're a real pain to get out. Hence, I have taken to only putting 4 back in, as it would surely damage one or more sleeve to winch them out whenever I want to listen to one or more, if I put all five back in.And the card sleeves themselves. Why oh why have Rhino elected to put a coloured border around each of them? These are some of the most striking album covers of all time. And, even if a border were required, it would have been logical and easy enough to put a suitable colour around most of them that matched the original design (black for LITD etc.). That's another indication that little time has been spent on this reissue, or little time considering the consumer.But, for the price I paid, I can't really complain. I just thought I'd point these things out for potential buyers. ........It's still classic Cooper, Bruce, Dunaway, Smith, Buxton (and mostly Ezrin) at the height of their creativity. And maybe at this price some new listeners might be exposed to the joys of the Cooper group as they mutated from psych to psycho rock.

I listened to all five albums in a row and enjoyed them all.

A very good price for 5 CD pack. Alice Cooper early years from 1969-1972

Great compilation of albums during his golden period. Very pleased with the tracks and, as always with 'Original Album Series', very good value

I have all of these discs on vinyl and love the care that has gone into the re-created artwork.Most of the songs on the third, fourth and fifth albums in this collection will be well known to most rock fans and many are still live staples to this day.The first two you could easily refer to as curiosities but taken in context they show a progression toward the later classics.If you're thinking about getting into Alice Cooper then this is a very good place to start.

ザッパレーベルからのデビューと２作目、その後のメジャー移籍後の全米ブレイクはまさにハイスクール仲間バンドならではの友情サクセスストーリー。デビュー当時は一軒の古びたマンションで全員が同居していたらしい。そして名手ボブ・エズリンとのコラボで世界的な成功を手にする。同時代的に追いかけて来たファンからすると、２作目の裏表紙のジャケ写のメンバー全員の半裸の背中フォトの長髪の美しさ、３作目のモノクロジャケ写、そしてブレイク作Schools Outのアナログアルバムに同梱されていた紙製のピンクのショーツが懐かしい。小学校の木製の学校の机の中に入っているんだもの！曲作りもカラフルでツボをしっかり押さえてるし、アリスクーパーのボーカルは高音の伸びが正統派ロックシンガーそのもの。聖飢魔IIなどキワモノと一緒に捉えてるあなた、めちゃくちゃ損してると思うよ！奇才ザッパの目に叶った、ザ・フーに対抗しえたかもしれないアメリカン・ドラマチックロックバンドだったアリスクーパーの初々しさを是非とも！

"LOVE IT TO DEATH" has to be ranked as one of the best albums to be released in the 1965-1975 years, and no doubt launched THE ALICE COOPER rock group on an enviable trajectory of stellar success. KILLER and SCHOOL'S OUT were also commercially successful with each possessing highly memorable hits. To acquire these three albums for the price of this collection represents incredibly good value. However, be aware that the other two albums, "PRETTIES FOR YOU" and "EASY ACTION", are essentially garbage and verily not worth listening to, at least in my opinion.

Alice Cooper is easily one of the most greatest, yet underappreciated icons in rock pantheon. Sure they have a few hits in popular society like "School's Out", "I'm Eighteen", and "No More Mr. Nice Guy" that are common on the radio and films (the first two available here in this collection), but this band has a ton of deep cuts that I'm shocked as to why are not heard more often on the radio and media. These guys created Shock Rock, and paved the way for many rock/metal/Punk bands.So I'm happy, and a bit startled, to see this fine collection of music at less than $20. I really am. I lost a good chunk of my CD collection over the years and have been buying up these discounted collections lately to catchup and, while I much prefer jewel cases with the sleeves that describe the history/content of the album on my shelves, I do admit having these vinyl-like sleeves is still neat though not the same. Still, I'm here for the music first and foremost, and regardless of the aesthetics of these collections, you still get a phenomenal array of music for dirt cheap in physical media, and that's all that matters.Back to the content at hand and why I'm sort of peeved about this collection is because Alice Cooper's first two albums included here 1969 PRETTIES FOR YOU and 1970 EASY ACTION are not bad and worth a few spins as it shows the band in it's early musical phases, it's the other three albums here that are legendary and worthy full price individually. Early 1971 LOVE IT TO DEATH, late 1971 KILLER, and 1972's SCHOOL'S OUT are quintessential rock/metal albums. Honestly, I could make the case each song on these records three could be a greatest hits and I'm sticking to that. So many deep cuts it's crazy. SCHOOL'S OUT only ever plays the title track to death within the culture, but I would argue every other song on that album is better(?!) than it ay day of the week. Yep, I feel that way.So yes, for such 5 albums to be less than $20 is a criminal shame not to buy if you already don't own these albums. Two burgeoning albums and three classics of LOVE IT TO DEATH, KILLER, and SCHOOL'S OUT are easy full price albums by themselves, and here they are as basically $3-$5 a piece. So do yourself a favor and get this (and volume 2) of some utterly solid classic rock/metal for a steal.

Non conoscendo i primi album degli Alice Cooper mi aspettavo qualcosa di più entusiasmante a livello musicale; al di là dei gusti la qualità musicale su CD è veramente retrò e sembra provenire veramente da vinile; per il resto la confezione è carina, buona l' idea di dividere ogni album in confezioni singole.

Mostly killer some filler all our heroes are slowly dropping off the perch. Sounds great Hi-fi in a Lo-fi kind of way.Priced right get it while it lasts.