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Alice Welcomes Quatro to 'Nightmare' Tour

"I was very interested in a super-tour for her, to put her all across the country, to get her in front of like a million people." Leo Fenn, Suzi Quatro's American manager, was talking about her appearance as the opening act on Alice Cooper's 'Welcome to My Nightmare' tour. Just as important as attendance, mileage and prestige, though, was what he called the "chemistry" of the billing — Alice Cooper-Suzi Quatro, the kids who once shared "nobody" status in the Detroit rock scene.

Fenn, who was Shep Gordon's partner in Alice's management for 2 ¹/₂ years back then in Motor City, recalled two nights at Detroit's East Town Theatre during the Christmas season of 1970: "Alice was ending his set at the time with a song called 'Sun Arise" which had very nice vocal background harmonies on the record. We had Suzi come down, and a couple of other girls — I think it was a couple of her sisters in fact — and they came out and were guest backup singers for Alice."

Fenn said that the re­sponse of the Cooper camp to the suggestion that Suzi Q open their show was instantly favorable. "Shep is very interested in having Alice have a really good act on with him, so just the idea of the thing was really great. He just went, 'Incredible.'... Alice draws really heavily with the younger people, which is the age group that is really into Suzi Quatro."

Suzi, no stranger to large halls and huge crowds in other parts of the world, regarded the venture with serene confidence: "I think it's great. It'll be a hell of a lot of exposure. And I like everybody in Cooper's band. I've known them for a long time. It should be good fun." As for the 40 minutes to which her set would be limited, she foresaw only one minor adjustment: "We'll have to watch our jam, 'cause we always get carried away in that."

Suzi and band will meet with Mike Chapman in Detroit during a one-week break in the tour to consider material for her fourth album, which will be recorded in August, probably at the Record Plant in Los Angeles. She'll return for a U.S. tour ("I'd say there's a 90% chance she'll be headlining," says the optimistic Fenn) at the end of the year.