{"id":15204,"date":"2019-07-08T15:54:29","date_gmt":"2019-07-08T20:54:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/?p=15204"},"modified":"2019-07-17T15:00:39","modified_gmt":"2019-07-17T20:00:39","slug":"alice-cooper-madison-key-to-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/alice-cooper-madison-key-to-city\/","title":{"rendered":"When Alice Cooper got the \u201ckey\u201d to Madison from Paul Soglin"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today he\u2019s a harmless, golf-loving<\/a> old guy, but Alice Cooper was once the scourge of middle America.<\/p>\n

The shock rock legend \u2014 born Vincent Furnier \u2014 made several appearances in Madison throughout the 1970s, around the time he was reaching peak popularity. (\u201cSchool\u2019s Out,\u201d probably Cooper\u2019s best known song, was released in 1972.) Cooper was christened \u201cAlice in Dairyland\u201d in 1979 by the actual Alice in Dairyland<\/a>. This was at the opening of a record shop on Madison\u2019s west side, where Cooper also competed in a cow milking contest with then-Mayor Paul Soglin. But his relationship with Soggy actually began a few years earlier.<\/p>\n

Before a \u201cSchool\u2019s Out\u201d tour stop at the Dane County Coliseum, on Dec. 11, 1973, Soglin awarded Cooper \u2014 who wore a WISM<\/a> t-shirt \u2014 the \u201ckey to the city\u201d in the form of a giant bottle opener (or \u201cchurch key\u201d). The 28-year-old \u201cRed Mayor<\/a>\u201d also gave the rocker a much smaller, more traditional key, he said years later<\/a>. Cooper himself fondly recalled the event in an Aug. 28, 2005 story by the Wisconsin State Journal<\/em>, ahead of another Madison visit that week.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe gave us the key to the city. It was like a giant key to open a beer,\u201d joked Cooper, who plays The Sylvee<\/a> on July 10. \u201c…I said \u2018You\u2019re the mayor\u2019s son.\u2019 He said \u2018No, I\u2019m the mayor.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Throughout his tenure as mayor, Soglin also awarded keys to Bob Dylan, Charles Mingus and Arlo Guthrie. Those were presumably not giant bottle openers.<\/span>\n

\"Alice
Wisconsin State Journal: Feb. 15, 1979<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/span>Something so lighthearted seems out of character for Soglin, whose final(?) term as mayor was highlighted by a war against Taco Bell<\/a>. But at the time, he as much a countercultural icon as Cooper. Soglin\u2019s political career began with his anti-war activism in the 1960s. When he first campaigned for alderman, a poster by his opponent painted him as a mustachioed hooligan<\/a>, out to disrupt the city\u2019s values.<\/p>\n

A few years later, during the 1973 mayoral election, incumbent Madison Mayor Bill Dyke spoke about how \u201cdecent people\u201d shouldn\u2019t vote for Soglin, as if he was the one chopping off mannequin heads on stage. (\u201cI don\u2019t care if you\u2019re decent or indecent,\u201d Soglin countered. \u201cI hope you\u2019ll support me on election day.\u201d)<\/p>\n

\u201cBill violated the cardinal rule for all politicians, which is, \u2018Never attack the voter,\u2019\u201d Soglin told Madison Magazine<\/em><\/a>\u00a0in 1985. \u201cThe next day lawn signs started popping up saying, \u2018Another decent family for Soglin.\u2019 And that was it.”<\/span>\n

\"Cap
The Capital Times: Dec. 12, 1973<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/span>Incidentally, the 1973 appearance that saw Cooper receive his church key to Madison was positively reviewed by The Capital Times<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome say Alice Cooper is our foremost example of the absolute prostitution of a human being,\u201d began writer Robert LaBrasca, before ultimately deciding \u201cCooper and his accomplices may not be great artists but great art…\u201d<\/p>\n

Together, Cooper and Soglin represented a scary time for what some politicians now like to call \u201creal America.\u201d A popular leftist politician and a rock star who went through stage blood like it was water, bringing their oddball agenda to the masses. Now it seems almost quaint.<\/p>\n

Alice Cooper, now 71 but still rocking as hard as ever, will play The Sylvee on July 10<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today he\u2019s a harmless, golf-loving old guy, but Alice Cooper was once the scourge of middle America. The shock rock legend \u2014 born Vincent Furnier \u2014 made several appearances in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":15207,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5151],"tags":[10289,5620,9132,54,4666,6155],"yoast_head":"\nWhen Alice Cooper got the "key" to Madison - The Bozho<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Before a 1973 tour stop at the Dane County Coliseum, Cooper was awarded the "key to the city" by Mayor Paul Soglin in the form of a giant bottle opener.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/alice-cooper-madison-key-to-city\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"When Alice Cooper got the \u201ckey\u201d to Madison\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It was actually a giant bottle opener.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/alice-cooper-madison-key-to-city\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bozho\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/thebozho\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-07-08T20:54:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-07-17T20:00:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/AliceCooper-Soglin-fb.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"630\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"When Alice Cooper got the \u201ckey\u201d to Madison\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"It was actually a giant bottle opener.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/AliceCooper-Soglin-tw.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@thebozho\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@thebozho\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Tom Whitcomb\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"The Bozho\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/thebozho\/\",\"http:\/\/instagram.com\/thebozho\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/thebozho\"],\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/#logo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/logo.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/logo.png\",\"width\":600,\"height\":280,\"caption\":\"The Bozho\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/#logo\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/\",\"name\":\"The Bozho\",\"description\":\"Seeing things. 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