On his first record in nearly six years, Alice Cooper tries updating his sound a tad to very mixed results. Paranormal is quite disappointment and not much of a worthy record in his long and very distinguished catalog. There are some interesting tracks, however. “Dead Flies” sounds a bit like early era Alice: very weird, creepy, and pretty damn good. “Private Public Breakdown” continues with more of that classic sound and ends up being one of the more memorable tracks here. Same goes for “The Sound Of A,” a slower song that really works well and is probably the best track here.
Unfortunately, the whole album is not full of more of these types of gems. The opening title track goes on way too long and never really does much of anything to grab the listener’s attention. It almost seems like throughout the record Alice is stuck in a hard rock frame of mind when he should’ve been going harder and trying to keep up with the newer bands out there.
The lyrics to “Fireball” really aren’t that great and it ends up bringing the whole song down. “Fallen In Love,” featuring Billy Gibbons, sounds like a song that would’ve been on Hey Stoopid or one of those lesser records of his. “Holy Water” sounds like something from the original Welcome To My Nightmare updated for the 21st century, but it isn’t very notable or interesting; it just sounds like someone trying too hard to regain past glories.
The last two songs start full of promise by bringing together the surviving members of the classic Alice Cooper band. But the hype isn’t enough to make these cuts any good. “Genuine American Girl” is just bizarre. Sung from the perspective of the lead, it just comes out of left field and doesn’t work at all. “You And All Of Your Friends” is just okay but it really could’ve been so much better and been one of the more memorable tracks of the year.
Overall, the record came across as very weak and not as great as it could’ve been. Paranormal is a misstep but it is definitely less satisfying than some of his better work.