Alice Cooper is writing a concept album called Road, about life on the road

(Image credit: Alice Cooper - Bryan Steffy/Getty Images for Keep Memory Alive / Road - Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Having delivered an audio love letter to Detroit with 2021's Detroit Stories, Alice Cooper's follow-up, the 22nd solo album of his career, will be a concept album based on life on the road, cunningly-titled Road.

The legendary shock rock king revealed his plan in an exclusive interview with UltimateClassic Rock.

Produced by Cooper's long-time trusted collaborator Bob Ezrin (also known for his work with Pink Floyd, Kiss and more), Road will showcase Cooper’s touring band.

"I wanted to show this band off a little," he says. "So we wrote the songs and did them live in the studio with very, very little ... if there's any overdubs, it's minor, and only because that little bit could be a little better here or there. But 95% of this album is live in the studio. I did that on purpose to show off how good the band is."

The songs on Road, Cooper explains, will have a unifying thread.

"It's things that happen on the road," he says. "There's a lot of humour in it. There's a couple of heartbreakers, but it's very guitar-driven because that's what I look for in an album. I love writing the songs with Bob and the guys, and we really emphasize that the main instrument is gonna be guitar. It's not gonna drift off into any other land out there."

There is, as yet, no scheduled release date for Road. But for those craving a hit of Cooperman in the coming months, the singer's cover of I'm Always Chasing Rainbows, from his 1976 album Alice Cooper Goes to Hell features on the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3: Awesome Mix soundtrack, while his supergroup side band Hollywood Vampires are releasing their Live in Rio album in June.

A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne's private jet, played Angus Young's Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.