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BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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Castaway guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

BBC Radio 4 LW

Kirsty Young

Alice Cooper

Desert Island Discs: Alice Cooper

21/11/2010

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Alice Cooper

American rock singer and showman Alice Cooper joins Kirsty Young.

American rock singer and showman Alice Cooper joins Kirsty Young to choose his Desert Island Discs.

Kirsty Young's castaway is the rock musician Alice Cooper.

As a teenager he says it was British music that he tuned in to - listening to The Beatles, The Yardbirds and The Who.  He realised that while rock music had many heroes, there were few villains - that was the territory he marked out for himself.  He developed his trademark look - blackened eyes, straggly hair and glamorous clothes - and set about designing live shows that were gleefully gory and macabre.  

While critics have described him as 'the world's most beloved heavy metal entertainer', it took him a while to untangle himself from his creation.  "For a long time I honestly didn't know where I began and Alice ended.  My friends at the time were Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and I was trying to keep up with them.  And I realised when they all died that you didn't have to be your character off stage."    

Record:    Work Song - The Butterfield Blues Band
Book:       Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut
Luxury:     An indoor golf driving range

Producer: Leanne Buckle.

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