The 1st Concert That Blew My Mind and Melted My Face

SHREVEPORT, 1977 — You’re in 7th grade.  Hormones are raging, bell bottoms are swaying and your parents gave you permission to join your friend Ronnie (driven by his Mom from Longview) have no idea what they just dropped you into.  Inside Hirsch Memorial Coliseum, the lights go black and then BOOM.  A thunderclap of guitars and fire explodes across the stage.  

Enter:  Alice Cooper.

Let’s get real, as far as first concerts go, this wasn’t some mellow folk act or polite radio hit parade.  This was shock rock royalty at the peak of theatrical madness.  You’re standing there, 12 years old, as Alice struts out in a top hat and blood-stained tuxedo, dragging a fake corpse across the stage.  There are snakes.  Guillotines.  Strippers with fangs and you’re thinking, “Is this even LEGAL?”.

But the music?  Absolute bangers.  “School’s Out” felt like a personal rebellion anthem.  “I Never Cry” hit you right in your budding teenage angst and “No More Mr. Nice Guy”?  That was a declaration of war on boring adult life.

Other kids were stuck with Barry Manilow or Neil Diamond for their first shows.  You got the full horror-glam-metal spectacle of Alice Cooper’s King of the Silver Screen Tour, complete with pyrotechnics, movie projections and enough eyeliner to make your grandma faint.

It wasn’t just a concert, it was a baptism by fire into the world of rock and roll.

Ask anyone who was there:  That night changed my DNA.  It made you cooler.  Tougher. Ready to handle anything, because if 7th-grade you could survive decapitations, fire and a snake-wielding rock god, you could survive middle school, your first heartbreak and your first hangover.

Alice Cooper, 1977.  Shreveport.  Best first concert ever.  Period.