Alice Cooper original drummer Neal Smith remembers Akron
No more pencils. No more books.
No more teacher’s dirty looks …
SCHOOL’S OUT FOR SUMMER!
SCHOOL’S OUT FOREVER!
Believe it or not, it’s been 50 years since Alice Cooper released the hard rock classic “School’s Out.” The iconic song, which celebrates the jubilation of students on the last day of classes, debuted April 26, 1972, on Warner Bros. Records.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame group’s original drummer, Neal Smith, who grew up in Akron, still marvels at the success of the song he co-wrote with his bandmates, including guitarist Glen Buxton, another former Akron resident.
”There was no way in the world to predict that 50 years later it would still be the national anthem for the day that school lets out,” he said. “It’s unbelievable. And I’m still humbled by that.”
In celebration of the landmark anniversary of “School’s Out,” we invited Smith to reminisce about his old hometown and talk about the creation of a rock classic.
If that don’t suit ya, that’s a drag.
A drummer is born
“I had a great childhood,” Smith said.
The son of June and Walter Smith was born Sept. 23, 1947, in Medina and spent his early years in Sharon Center. He and his sister, Cindy, moved to Akron with their mother after their parents divorced. They lived on Hardesty Boulevard at Diagonal Road near Wooster Hawkins Shopping Center.
He has a lot of happy memories of Ohio. He stayed at Camp Manatoc as a Boy Scout, enjoyed roller coasters at Cedar Point and attended football games at the Rubber Bowl.
Smith went to Schumacher Elementary, Perkins Junior High and Buchtel High School and remembers watching “American Bandstand” every day after class.
“There’s a lot of musical influence for me in Akron,” Smith said. “That’s where I got my informal and formal training in percussion.”
He started in grade school with a snare drum that he borrowed from Margaret and Avery Clapp, his aunt and uncle who lived on a dairy farm in Chatham Township. His uncle could play many instruments, including piano, bassoon, oboe, trumpet and coronet.
“I played snare drum for a solid two years until I got a set of drums for Christmas in 1961,” he said. “That was one of the happy days of Christmas that you hear about.”
Thanks, Mom!
Smith performed in the school band and orchestra at Simon Perkins, played at the All-American Soap Box Derby and marched at Buchtel football games.
“I loved it,” he said. “The fall weather is a little crisp around the Midwest. It was always wonderful.”
He also took private lessons from John Crow at the University of Akron.
“I considered myself at that time a rudimentary drummer,” he said. “I learned all the rudiments and mastered them.”
That training eventually worked its way into Alice Cooper songs — like those flams in the beginning of “Billion Dollar Babies.”
That’s totally Akron.
“There’s a lot of that influence from the early days there,” he said.
Smith also played drums in two musicals, “The Fantasticks” and “The Threepenny Opera” at Weathervane Community Theater.
“So that’s what sort of opened me up to combining theater and music together,” Smith said. “When the Alice Cooper band started and we really pushed the limits of theatrics, I was way, way, way ahead of the game by that point.”
Smith was 15 when his family moved to Phoenix. He attended Camelback High School — later immortalized in the Alice Cooper song “Alma Mater” — and quit the band after two games because it was no fun to march in a uniform in 100-degree heat.
Alice Cooper band forms
Rock music was calling. The lanky 6-foot-3 drummer played in The Holy Grail, a Phoenix band, until a rival group, The Nazz, recruited him in 1967.
In addition to Smith, the band featured Glen Buxton on lead guitar, Dennis Dunaway on bass, Michael Bruce on rhythm guitar and Vincent Furnier on vocals. The group soon changed its name to Alice Cooper, a moniker that Furnier also adopted for himself.
In a strange coincidence, Buxton was also from Akron. The son of Thomas and Geraldine Buxton grew up on Davies Avenue and attended David Hill Elementary and Roswell Kent Junior High.
“We became instant friends,” Smith said. “Even more like brothers. We just had the same mentality.”
The group moved to Los Angeles, landed a deal with Frank Zappa’s label, Straight Records, and released the albums “Pretties for You” (1969) and “Easy Action” (1970).
“We were touring and we were keeping our heads barely above water,” Smith recalled. “But we were starting to get a reaction.”
The group made quite an impression with its macabre makeup, outrageous costumes and stage theatrics, a garish kaleidoscope of boa constrictors, baby dolls, strobe lights and guillotines. All but ignored on the coasts, Alice Cooper resonated in the Midwest.
“Glen and I are from Akron, and Alice is from Detroit,” Smith said. “That’s the Rust Belt of the United States, and I’m proud of it.”
The band relocated to Pontiac, Michigan, and enjoyed its first hit, “I’m Eighteen,” off the 1970 album “Love It to Death,” produced by Bob Ezrin.
Ezrin really understood the band’s music and knew what to do with it. “I’m Eighteen” was an eight-minute song before Ezrin turned it into a three-minute hit.
“Genius is an overused term, but he’s very much a genius when it comes to song arrangement,” Smith said.
Alice Cooper reunited with Ezrin at Warner Bros. Records for the platinum-selling album “Killer” (1971), which featured the hit “Under My Wheels.”
“By that time, Bob was pretty much the sixth member of the band,” Smith said.
Recording a smash hit
In 1972, Alice Cooper relocated to the Galesi Estate, a 40-room mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut. With Ezrin producing, the group recorded a couple of tracks at the estate but finished its next album, “School’s Out,” at the Record Plant in New York City.
The entire band shared songwriting credit on the title track. With its driving guitars, thunderous drums and infectious chorus, the song had hit written all over it.
Did Smith know it was going to be so huge? Absolutely not.
“We thought it had a good chance, but there was no way to predict what was going to happen,” he said.
The timing of the subject matter is critical, he said, and this song just struck a chord. It climbed to No. 7 on the Billboard chart and embedded itself in pop culture.
Released in June 1972, the album soared to No. 2 and went platinum. Its distinctive cover features a wooden school desk carved with the band’s initials.
“I always knew if there was going to be a big hit song, Glen Buxton would be a huge part of it,” Smith said. “My Akron brother!
“Glen was the one that came up with the opening riff on ‘School’s Out.’ Everybody knows what song it is when they hear that intro.”
The East Coast and West Coast radio markets finally surrendered. “School’s Out” was so big, stations had to play it in New York and Los Angeles, Smith said.
It was a life-changing song. The group became a major headliner whose 1972 tour included an Aug. 5 stop before 30,000 fans at the Rubber Bowl.
“I still have the T-shirt that I got from one of the security guards,” Smith said. “It’s my No. 1 favorite T-shirt in the world. It’s black and red and says ‘Akron Rubber Bowl’ on it. I will never get rid of it.”
The band hit No. 1 in 1973 with the platinum album “Billion Dollar Babies,” whose hits included the title track and “No More Mr. Nice Guy.” The next two albums, “Muscle of Love” and “Greatest Hits,” also made the Top 10, but the group broke up in 1974 and lead singer Alice Cooper went solo.
Reunited at rock hall
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted the band in 2011. It was bittersweet because Buxton wasn’t there. The guitarist died of viral pneumonia Oct. 19, 1997, at age 49.
“Way before he should have,” Smith said.
The surviving members reunited at the induction ceremony in New York and played three songs, including “School’s Out.”
“It was an amazing night,” he said.
In his speech, Smith dedicated the award to Alice Cooper’s fans. “This statue is because of you, it’s about you and it’s for you,” he told them.
Smith, who divides his time between homes in Connecticut and Arizona, recently retired from selling real estate in New England.
He continues to record and perform and occasionally reunites with Cooper, Dunaway and Bruce. They all wrote and played songs on Cooper’s three recent albums, “Welcome 2 My Nightmare,” “Paranormal” and “Detroit Stories.”
“We’re all great friends,” he said. “I love those guys.”
Warner Bros. and Rhino Records are releasing a 50th anniversary edition of “School’s Out,” but Smith said no other events are planned to commemorate the milestone.
Cooper will tour with his band…
Read More: Alice Cooper original drummer Neal Smith remembers Akron