Rock icon Alice Cooper recalled the bloody incident in a new interview (Picture: Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)
Alice Cooper has recalled his audience killing a living chicken at a peace and love festival in 1969.
The shock rock veteran, 76, recalled throwing the farm animal into the crowd at Toronto’s Rock and Roll Revival Festival because he thought it would simply fly away.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case, and it led to a bloody death at the 20,000-capacity Varsity Stadium, at the University of Toronto.
Speaking about the incident that ruffled a few feathers on A&E’s Biography: Alice Cooper episode, Alice described how the bloody event was witnessed by a music legend – who somehow wasn’t offended by the slaughter.
‘You have to remember I’m from Detroit,’ Alice said. ‘I had never been on a farm in my life. It had wings, it had feathers, it should fly.
‘I picked up the chicken, and I flung it into the audience figuring it would fly away and somebody would take it and take it home and call it Alice Cooper.’
Alice said he wasn’t aware chickens couldn’t fly when he threw one into a crowd (Picture: Iwi Onodera/Redferns)
The rocker, who is famed for his dangerous stunts, said the animal was torn apart (Picture: George Stroud/Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
He was then faced with the realisation that chickens don’t fly as well as other birds.
‘I threw it out there, and it fell straight down into the audience,’ the Poison hitmaker continued.
‘The audience tears it to pieces. It was the peace and love festival. They tear it to pieces and throw it back up on the stage. So there’s blood everywhere. Feathers and blood.’
But the story gets even weirder, as the show was attended by the late Beatles icon, John Lennon, and his wife Yoko Ono, 91, who allegedly ‘loved’ the chicken fiasco.
‘They thought it was art ’cause it’s chaos,’ he claimed.
Alice claimed John Lennon and Yoko Ono witnessed the entire debacle (Picture: Cole Bennetts/Getty Images)
The unfortunate incident saw him catapulted to stardom (Picture: Jim Steinfeldt/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
His label boss, the late Frank Zappa, phoned him the next day and asked if he had killed a chicken on stage.
Alice remembered: ‘I said, “There was a chicken. I didn’t kill it though.”
‘He goes, “Don’t tell anybody. They love it.” He says, “It’s everywhere in the press!” I immediately went, “Perfect.” The chicken story then became huge. Who is this monster who would do this at a rock show?’
Alice – who is famous for performing with snakes around his neck – was faced with a protest by animal rights activists when they arrived in New York for their next show, and there was even a horrid rumour that he set a ‘German Shepherd on fire.’
‘My reputation was just insane,’ the School’s Out singer said.’I didn’t have to do anything. They were inventing their own Alice Cooper myth. People were just discovering Alice Cooper, and I was just discovering him, so we were all doing it at the same time.’
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