Billion Dollar Babies ("Trillion Dollar" Deluxe Edition) (3LP)

“Hello Hooray,” a new version of BILLION DOLLAR BABIES, is on the way as Alice Cooper’s delightfully subversive sixth album returns in all its snakeskin glory for an extended 50th-anniversary celebration. After hitting #1 on the album charts in America and the U.K. in 1973, the record remains a highwater mark for the original lineup, featuring hits like “No More Mr. Nice Guy” and “Elected.”

BILLION DOLLAR BABIES: “TRILLION DOLLAR” DELUXE EDITION (3LP)features a newly remastered version of the original album, along with bonus material, including studio outtakes, single mixes, and an electrifying 1973 concert recording. The gatefold cover faithfully replicates the original’s textured snakeskin wallet design and comes complete with a $1 billion dollar bill tucked inside.

An instant smash when it was released in March 1973, BILLION DOLLAR BABIES delivered a theatrical mix of hard rock and glam laced with macabre lyrics that explored wealth, decadence, and fame’s darker side. Newly remastered, the platinum-certified album sounds better than ever. The set also features outtakes (“Coal Black Model T”), single mixes (“Mary Ann”), and “Slick Black Limousine,” which originally came out on flexi-disc within an issue of the British rock paper New Musical Express.

The “TRILLION DOLLAR” DELUXE EDITION also features a live show recorded in Texas in April of 1973, during the “Billion Dollar Babies” tour. The powerful performance includes live versions of many of the album’s tracks, highlights including “Elected” and “Hello Hooray,” along with several of the band’s earlier hits, including “I’m Eighteen” and “School’s Out.”

The LP and CD versions both come with an oral history of the album and the bonus tracks by the surviving band members – Alice Cooper, Dennis Dunaway, Michael Bruce, and Neal Smith – and Bob Ezrin, who produced the album. (Sadly, guitarist Glen Buxton died in 1997)

In the notes, Cooper recalls writing “I Love The Dead” and “Sick Things.” He says, “We were writing those songs looking at each other, and every time we’d write a line I’d say, ‘Oh, this is gonna kill them. Oh, they’re gonna hate us on this one.’ But at the same time, it was almost like an Edgar Allan Poe short story when you listen to ‘I Love The Dead.’ I tried to write that the way Vincent Price would sing it.”