School's Out (song)

"School's Out" is a song first recorded as the title track of Alice Cooper's fifth album. It was released as the album's second single on April 26, 1972. It has been regarded as the band's signature song[1] and reached number 7 on the Billboard Hot 100.

This article is about the Alice Cooper song. For the Gary U.S. Bonds song, see School Is Out.

"School's Out"
Cover of the 1972 US single
Single by Alice Cooper
from the album School's Out
B-side"Gutter Cat"
ReleasedApril 26, 1972 (1972-04-26)
Recorded1972
Genre
Length3:29
LabelWarner Bros.
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s)Bob Ezrin
Alice Cooper singles chronology
"Be My Lover"
(1972)		 "School's Out"
(1972)		 "Elected"
(1972)
Alternative cover
Cover of the 1972 German single

Inspiration and writing

Cooper has said he was inspired to write the song when answering the question, "What's the greatest three minutes of your life?". Cooper said: "There's two times during the year. One is Christmas morning, when you're just getting ready to open the presents. The greed factor is right there. The next one is the last three minutes of the last day of school when you're sitting there and it's like a slow fuse burning. I said, 'If we can catch that three minutes in a song, it's going to be so big.'"

Cooper has also said it was inspired by a line from a Bowery Boys movie. On his radio show, Nights with Alice Cooper, he joked that the main riff of the song was inspired by a song by Miles Davis.[2] Cooper said that guitarist Glen Buxton created the song's opening riff.

The lyrics of "School's Out" indicate that not only is the school year ended for summer vacation, but ended forever, and that the school itself has been literally blown up. It incorporates the childhood rhyme, "No more pencils, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks" into its lyrics. It also featured children contributing some of the vocals. "Innocence" in the lyric "...and we got no innocence" is frequently changed in concert to "intelligence" and sometimes replaced with "etiquette." The song appropriately ends with a school bell sound that fades out.

Later performances saw Alice Cooper incorporate parts of the first verse of "Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2", a song by Pink Floyd (also about school, and produced by Bob Ezrin) into "School's Out."

Release and reception

"School's Out" became Alice Cooper's first major hit single, reaching #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 pop singles chart and propelling the album to #2 on the Billboard 200 pop albums chart. It was the highest-charting single for the Alice Cooper band, and its #7 peak position was matched only by "Poison" among Cooper's solo efforts. Billboard ranked it as the No. 75 song for 1972.[3] In Canada, the single went to #3 on the RPM Top Singles Chart[4] following the album reaching #1.[5] In Britain, the song went to #1 on the UK Singles Chart for three weeks in August 1972. It also marked the first time that Alice Cooper became regarded as more than just a theatrical novelty act.

The single version of the song is a slightly sped-up narrow stereo remix of the album version with one major difference — the "turn-off" effect used upon the school bell and sound effects at the end of the album version is not used on the single version, allowing the school bell and effects to simply fade out.

Some radio stations banned the song from their airwaves, stating that the song gave the students an impression of rebelliousness against childhood education. Teachers, parents, principals, counselors, and psychologists also shunned the song and demanded several radio stations ban the song from ever being played on the air.

"School's Out" was ranked #326 on Rolling Stone's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.[6] In 2009 it was named the 35th best hard rock song of all time by VH1[7] and the song appeared on the TV show American Idol in 2010. The Guardian placed it as number 3 on its list of "The 20 best glam-rock songs of all time."[8] In 2018, Ian Chapman and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette have called it a "glam rock anthem."[9][10] Nick Talevski has called it a "hard rock anthem" on his book Rock Obituaries: Knocking On Heaven's Door.[11] The Independent named the song at tenth in the list "Gold Dust: Glam rock's top 10 singles."[12]

The song has been used in movies including Scream, Dazed and Confused, Rock 'n' Roll High School, and I Love You, Beth Cooper.

In 2004, the song was also used in a Staples television commercial for the back to school retail period in which Cooper appeared as himself.[13] A young girl with black hair, obviously disappointed that school is starting soon, says, "I thought you said 'School's out forever.'" Cooper (who's pushing a shopping cart full of her school supplies) replies, "No, no, no ... the song goes, 'School's out for summer.' Nice try though." The song was also used in a 2009 Arby's commercial. In 2018, a commercial for Phoenix-based Desert Financial Credit Union used the song, as Cooper grew up in Phoenix.

The title of the 1992 Degrassi movie, School's Out, comes from this song.

In 2012, the song was featured in musical TV series Glee, episode "Choke" (aired on May 1), in its third season. The song was performed by Mark Salling as his character Puck.[14]

The Simpsons episode "Kamp Krusty" had an excerpt of the song's refrain used during Bart's dream sequence with the destruction of Springfield Elementary on its last day of school before summer vacation, and in the episode "I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can", Principal Skinner sings his own version - "School's back in session, let's begin our lesson!"

Cooper performs the song as the closing act of his episode on The Muppet Show where he dances with various large Muppet monsters who gleefully act out his lyrics, including causing numerous explosions. The song was also performed in the finale of the ninth season of American Idol by Idol contestants and Cooper himself.

The live version from Classicks is featured as downloadable content in Rock Band 3.

Personnel

Cover versions

Daphne and Celeste version
"School's Out"
Single by Daphne and Celeste
from the album We Didn't Say That!
ReleasedAugust 21, 2000 (US)
Recorded1999
Length3:23
LabelPhantom Sound/Visi
Songwriter(s)
Daphne and Celeste singles chronology
"U.G.L.Y."
(2000)		 "School's Out"
(2000)		 "You & I Alone"
(2015)

Pop duo Daphne and Celeste released a cover of the song in 2000, although much of this cover is original, in a pop-rap style. The chorus is based on that in Alice Cooper's version, and some other elements of it have been retained as well. The single is remixed from the version released on their album We Didn't Say That!, removing a prominent synthesizer line from the chorus among other, more minor changes. The B-side, "The Camp Song", was the only non-album D&C song available until the release of their fourth single almost 15 years later. School's Out was their first and only single released in Japan.

Track listing
  1. "School's Out"
  2. "The Camp Song"
  3. "School's Out" (Gridlock Mix)
  4. "School's Out" (video)
"School's Out"
Single by Gwar
from the album Beyond Hell
Released2006
Recorded2006
Length3:23
LabelDRT Entertainment
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s)Devin Townsend & Cory Smoot
Gwar singles chronology
"A Soundtrack to Kill Yourself To"
(1997)		 "School's Out"
(2006)

Gwar version

"School's Out" was also covered by the band Gwar. It was the first release from their 2006 album Beyond Hell. It was released as a digital download through services such as iTunes and eMusic, and as a promotional CD sent to radio stations. The band has stated in several interviews that they had not intended on recording a cover song for Beyond Hell, but the record company insisted that they do a cover that might get some airplay, and would be accessible to a wider audience than their first choice for a single, "Eighth Lock".

Other covers
  • Rob Zombie and Slash, live with Alice Cooper at the 2007 Scream Awards. Zombie also performed a cover of the song during several dates of the Twins of Evil tour in 2012.
  • Foo Fighters performed the song as well as "I'm Eighteen" live with Alice Cooper at their 2011 show at the Milton Keynes Bowl.
  • New York City indie rock band Les Savy Fav performed a version of the song in July 2011 for The A.V. Club's A.V. Undercover: Summer Break series.[16]
  • Cretu & Theirs released it as a single in 1987.
  • Krokus, released a cover version and music video in 1986.
  • A-Teens in 2002, on the albums Pop 'til You Drop! and New Arrival - their version was a duet with Alice Cooper himself. To avoid any references to violence, and to also reflect the band's key audience, the line "School's blown to pieces" was changed to "I'm bored to pieces". The song was released as the B-Side of the single "Let Your Heart Do All the Talking".

Chart performance

References
  1. ""School's Out" Forever: The Secret History Of Alice Cooper's Classic". Deadspin. May 21, 2015. Retrieved June 2, 2020.
  2. Originally stated May 4, 2008; clarified as just a joke on June 3, 2008.
  3. Billboard Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1972
  4. "Item Display - RPM - Library and Archives Canada". Collectionscanada.gc.ca. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  5. "Item Display - RPM - Library and Archives Canada". Collectionscanada.gc.ca. Archived from the original on October 20, 2012. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  6. "500 Greatest Songs of All Time". Rolling Stone. April 7, 2011. Retrieved April 23, 2019.
  7. "spreadit.org music". Archived from the original on August 27, 2010. Retrieved February 7, 2009.
  8. Savage, Jon (February 1, 2013). "The 20 best glam-rock songs of all time". The Guardian. Retrieved February 5, 2016.
  9. Chapman, Ian (2018). Experiencing Alice Cooper: A Listener's Companion. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 26. ISBN 9781442257719.
  10. Mervis, Scott (October 27, 2018). "Alice Cooper is the perfect master of ceremonies for WDVE Halloween party at Stage AE". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved April 23, 2019.
  11. Talevski, Nick (2010). Rock Obituaries: Knocking On Heaven's Door. Omnibus Press. p. 64. ISBN 978-0-85712-117-2.
  12. Pepinster, Catherine (August 16, 1998). "Gold Dust: Glam rock's top 10 singles". The Independent. Retrieved August 8, 2019.
  13. "Staples Unveils Back-to-School Commercial Starring Alice Cooper; 'School's Out' - Or Is It - For Veteran Rocker in New Ad Campaign". Business Wire. July 8, 2004. Archived from the original on July 15, 2012.
  14. "Glee Songs Report Card - Season 3 Episode 18 - Choke". Top40.about.com. January 7, 2014. Archived from the original on January 13, 2016. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  15. "Neal Smith Rocks". Rockhall.com. April 29, 2020. Archived from the original on May 30, 2020. Retrieved May 30, 2019.
  16. "Les Savy Fav covers "School's Out" by Alice Cooper on a yacht". Retrieved April 6, 2013.
  17. ""Go-Set Singles Chart Page with "School's Out" Peak Position"" Retrieved on November 5, 2009.
  18. ""Austrian Singles Charts Search for Alice Cooper"" Austriancharts.at. Retrieved on August 10, 2009."
  19. ""German Singles Charts Search for Alice Cooper"" Archived September 27, 2012, at the Wayback Machine musicline.de. Retrieved on August 11, 2009."
  20. ""Irish Singles Charts Search for Alice Cooper"" irishcharts.com. Retrieved on August 11, 2009."
  21. ""Norwegian Singles Charts Search for Alice Cooper"" norwegiancharts.com. Retrieved on August 11, 2009."
  22. ""Dutch Singles Charts Search for Alice Cooper"" dutchcharts.nl. Retrieved on August 11, 2009."
  23. Flavour of New Zealand, 9 October 1972
  24. Rice, Jo; Tim Rice; Paul Gambaccini; Mike Read (1979). The Guinness Book of British Hit Singles (2nd ed.). Enfield, Middlesex: Guinness Superlatives Ltd. p. 56. ISBN 0-900424-99-0.
  25. "Alice Cooper - Charts & Awards - Billboard Singles" Allmusic. Retrieved on August 10, 2009."
  26. Cash Box Top 100 Singles, August 19, 1972_
  27. "Top 100 Hits of 1972/Top 100 Songs of 1972". Musicoutfitters.com. Retrieved October 7, 2016.
  28. "Cash Box YE Pop Singles - 1972". cashboxmagazine.com.
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