Deviant Youth

I've hung on to certain albums for forty years, but it's likely that I am the only one who will ever know why. Having set down to explain, I wonder if i can even come up with a good explanation. The Alice Cooper album Pretties For You has stayed with me for several reasons, including having stood the test of time. The reasons I first liked it are different from the reasons I like it now. I recall being repulsed by the front cover with its lavender and yellow clash, the suggestion of a wierd, disinterested sort of lechery, the calvacade of hearses in the background. The back cover was a different matter. Longhair freaks dressed up in sparkly outfits, a couple of steps along from what the Rolling Stones wore on the cover of Their Satanic Majesty's Request, a two-fingered style code that was both glamorous and caustic. It was clever. It was funny. No question about the appeal to deviant teenagers.

That was one reason for liking them.


More recently, I like it because I can hum along to the simple melodies, and the not-so-simple ones. I started out enjoying the simple rhythms of Today Mueller ('let it happen, happy slappin' patio') and Apple Bush ('apple tree, out to eternity') but have come to appreciate the angular but cheerful strains of Earwigs to Eternity and the trippy soundscape of Fields of Regret. Ain't nothin else like it.