Billion Dollar Babies, the 1973 release by Alice Cooper, kicks off with a dark, bombastic performance of Canadian singer-songwriter Rolf Kempf’s “Hello Hooray.” The song, with its glam-rock roots and its plaintive anticipation of an evening’s performance is actually a cover.
In 1968, popular folk singer Judy Collins began her seventh album with the song, only she performed it as it was intended — as a folky ballad. Judy’s version is a wistfully light-hearted descant, more upbeat and far less foreboding than Alice Cooper’s take.
The song became a signature concert opener for Alice, introducing the shock-rocker to the stage over 600 hundred times.