The Billion Dollar Babies

In 1977, three of Alice Cooper's former sidemen recorded a little known album without the influential shock rocker and called themselves the Billion Dollar Babies. That year, ex-Cooper employees Mike Bruce (guitar, vocals), Dennis Dunaway (bass) and Neal Smith (drums) teamed up with keyboardist Bob Dolin and guitarist/ singer Mike Marconi and named themselves after Cooper's Billion Dollar Babies album of 1973, which was among his biggest sellers. Offering competent but unremarkable hard rock and arena rock that wasn't nearly as distinctive or as interesting as Cooper's own music, the Billion Dollar Babies recorded Battle Axe for Polydor in 1977. The LP bombed commercially, and the Billion Dollar Babies never recorded a second album. Battle Axe has been out of print since the late 1970s and is unlikely to ever be reissued on CD, although Tendolar (a bootleg label) swiped three of its selections (&"Too Young,"&"Need Your Love" and &"Dance With Me") in the 1990s for the Cooper bootleg Camelback Kids. ~ Alex Henderson, All Music Guide