Cheap Trick singer is thrilled to help Alice Cooper fundraise: 'He's just a wonderful man'

It couldn't have been more obvious that Cheap Trick singer Robin Zander was having a blast the last time he performed at a fundraiser in Mesa for Alice Cooper's Solid Rock Teen Centers in April 2019.

He'd even applied a hint of early Alice Cooper makeup, grinning his way through an extremely animated performance and taking particular joy in the fact that he could point to Kiss guitarist Tommy Thayer when he hit that classic moment in "Surrender" where mom and dad "got my Kiss records out."

It's rare to see an entertainer exude the unadulterated joy that lit up Zander's face that day at Las Sendas Golf Club.

It comes as something of a shock, then, to hear the singer suggest that the fun he was having on stage was not, in fact, his favorite part of the experience.

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'Just meeting those kids was fantastic ... They're so talented'

"It’s weird," he says. "You’d think just going out there, having fun and playing would be the pinnacle of things. But for me, just meeting those kids was fantastic."

He's referring to the kids who spend their afternoons at Cooper's Solid Rock Teen Centers in Phoenix and Mesa, honing their skills in music, art and dance through the center's free programming.

"They’re so talented," Zander says. "And they work so hard at what they’re doing. It was just a wonderful experience for me."

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Zander was a fan of Cooper's music long before they started playing shows together.

"I’ve idolized Alice since I was a kid, really," Zander says. "My brothers took me up to see Alice when he played the Midwest, so I saw him when he dressed in drag back then. But he was always such a performer and obviously theatrical as well."

Zander was the perfect age for "I'm Eighteen," the breakthrough hit that launched the Cooper group's career. It was released in mid-November 1970, two months before the Cheap Trick singer's 18th birthday.

Zander and his bandmates hit the U.S. mainstream as the '70s were ending, thanks to an iconic live recording capturing the teen hysteria that greeted their arrival at the Budokan in Tokyo, Japan.

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Robin Zander on Alice Cooper: 'He's just a wonderful man'

It's only natural that he and Cooper would go on tour together, although Zander isn't sure exactly when the first time may have been.

"I’ve known Alice for a long time," Zander says. "He's just a wonderful man."

Cheap Trick and Cooper were touring together in Germany when COVID-19 hit and forced them off the road.

"I toured the golf course with him recently, too," Zander says, with a laugh. "We played golf when he came through my town."

In addition to Zander and Cooper, this year's Coopstock benefit includes performances by Thayer, Collective Soul's Ed Roland, Sister Sledge and Dave Jenkins of Pablo Cruise.

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Zander will be joined at Coopstock by his son, Robin Taylor Zander

Zander is bringing a plus-one — his son, Robin Taylor Zander, whose debut album, "The Distance," is set to be released on April 21.

"You know, it’s unbelievable," Zander says. "I never really sat with him and taught him how to play an instrument or anything like that, unless he had a question or something he wanted to ask me. But there were always instruments around the house. So he just picked all that up on his own. He happens to be a great songwriter, too."

Zander's son has toured with Cheap Trick, sitting in for every member of the current band except his father.

It was shortly after the pandemic shutdown lifted that guitarist Rick Nielsen contracted pneumonia.

"So we lost him for about a month," Zander says.

"Then our drummer Daxx (Neilsen, the guitarist's son) had a baby and we lost him while we touring South America. Then (bassist) Tom (Petersson) had heart surgery last year and was gone for the whole year. But that’s where Robin came in handy because he can play all those instruments and he just replaced each one as they went down."

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They’re all back now and raring to go just in time to celebrate a major anniversary

"Next year is gonna be our 50^th anniversary, so we’re thinking of doing some kind of recording for that," Zander says.

"Also, we have a woodpile kind of album in mind that we’d like to do, which would be all the outtakes that didn’t make the records over the years. That might be interesting for fans and maybe everybody else who cares to listen. So those are a couple things we have in mind."

In the meantime, Zander says, he's really looking forward to Coopstock. And getting some golf in while he's there, of course.

"This fundraiser is really important," he says.

"I only wish it was bigger. I wish they would once a year take it for about two weeks around the country. That would be very cool. It’s a lot of fun. And right now, it’s fairly small. You could really make it into something that’s five times as big if you were to expand it to raise funds for the charity. It would be fairly easy to do at golf courses."

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Alice Cooper's Coopstock 2023

When: 5 p.m. Sunday, April 2.

Where: Las Sendas Golf Club, 7555 E. Eagle Crest Drive, Mesa.

Admission: $69-$400.

Details: eventbrite.com.

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4495. Follow him on Twitter @EdMasley.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Cheap Trick's Robin Zander thrilled to play Alice Cooper's Coopstock