John Lennon Couldn’t Make Alice Cooper Go Political

Alice Cooper recalled the times John Lennon tried but failed to make him more political in public, saying he was more interested in watching Keith Moon’s antics than taking the ex-Beatle’s advice.

The shock-rock legend, Lennon, Moon and Harry Nilsson – among others – were members of a drinking club known as the Hollywood Vampires in the ‘70s. In a recent interview with the BBC, Cooper outlined how an average night played out.

“The Hollywood Vampires would meet at the Rainbow Bar and Grill every single night,” he said. “And we would go up there, and I don’t remember anybody ever talking about music. Because I think this was our escape from music. You had all these guys that would just like to drink. And Harry and John, after they drank five or six drinks … I’d have to sit between them. Because if John said ‘black,’ Harry would say ‘white.’ If Harry would say ‘Republican,’ John would say ‘Democrat.’”

He added that the pair behaved that way “on purpose because they loved to fight with each other,” and it was his role to “sit them both down and go, ‘Stop, stop, stop!’”

That led him to recall a regular discussion with Lennon: “The one thing about John was he always tried to get me more into politics. And I told him, ‘John, you’re trying to save the world. I’m just trying to entertain them.’” Cooper said that, instead of politics, the “most important” thing about each evening was Moon’s arrival. “One night he would show up as the Queen of England, full outfit,” he recalled. “One night he would be Hitler. One night he’d be a Viking. One night he be a French maid. He was the most entertaining human being on the planet and the best drummer I’ve ever heard in my life.”