Biography

Kane was in bands as early as Junior High and continued through High School, always playing guitar.Kane remembers a "cool band" he was a member of in High School called Raven whose sound Kane calls "trippy, weird, groove, acid, mind fuck."Unfortunately, the band broke up when the lead vocalist died of an alcohol overdose.

After the demise of Raven, Kane was in many different types of bands, from "soul" to "rock".  He was never satisfied with just doing cover tunes.  He was always the one that felt the need to create new original music.

After High School Kane attended Boston University where he studied . . . for about a week before quitting.  He then applied for and was accepted at the New England Conservatory of Music.  He was one of two guitar players that they accepted that year.  For the next two and a half years, while at the conservatory, he studied both classical and jazz guitar.  He then decided to take his chances in New York.

Once in New York, Kane formed a band called Criminal Justice and started doing studio work.  The band name was probably appropriate at the time.Kane was also dealing cards after hours for illegal blackjack games.  He says he "never saw so many guns".

Kane hooked up with Alice Cooper in 1986, when Alice was looking for a new guitarist who wasn't doing drugs or alcohol.  Bob Erzin was sent a copy of Kane's demo by Kane's publisher at the time, Screen Gems, which was later absorbed by EMI.Having heard the demo, Alice went to see Kane play live at a strip club.Kane says "It was weird cos the year before I had opened for him (Alice) at an arena in New York  . . . and now I see him at the bar while we're playing  . . ."  They hadn't actually met that night a year ago and Alice therefore didn't remember Kane but they hit it off personally as well as professionally.Kane heard from Alice the next day that he had the job.In addition to being an outstanding guitarist.  Alice has been quoted as saying that Kane was a "wonderful visual effect" and "kept getting bigger and bigger", since Kane was heavily in to bodybuilding at the time.

Alice also recently confessed that Kane is one of his all time favorite guitar players.  Alice says he was underrated because of the bizarre image.  When asked about the underrated issue Kane states, "I don't give a shit about ratings."

Meeting Alice was a big turning point in Kane's career.  He found he suddenly went from "playing in strip clubs and rubbing shoulders with gangsters to laying on the beach with Alice and friends in Maui".  They wrote and recorded for months before returning to Los Angeles.  This included travel around the world for different inspirations and hooking up with Alice's original band, "a strange but cool bunch of guys" Kane tells us, to do some writing.

Kane was working on his first solo venture at this time as well.In 1987, he released his self-titled "Kane Roberts".  This album was originally supposed to be called Criminal Justice, using Kane's original band name, but his manager Shep Gordon felt it would be better to stick with just Kane Roberts.  The record label was very much in favor of pushing Kane's image as "The Rambo of Rock", and the album cover shows Kane, shirtless, holding a guitar that was made to look like an Automatic M-60 machine gun.  Of the crazy looking flame-shooting guitar Kane says, "A guy came in my management companies' office with a whole bunch of gun guitars that shot flames.He gave me two or three and I started using them as a joke at first but people seemed to dig it so we kept it up."

Flame shooting guitars aside, Kane likes vintage Les Paul guitars and Gibson L7 series because "both can be raw or warm sounding".  He uses various guitars to do different things, unlike many artists who stick with only one brand.It is yet another example of Kane Roberts' incredible diversity.

Kane also had a small acting job in 1989.He appears as a "Road Worker" in Wes Craven's "Shocker".Kane has been a huge fan of Wes Craven since his 1978 movie "The Hills Have Eyes".He decided to audition for "Shocker" and was pleasantly surprised to get the part!He also auditioned for the terminator cop in the 1991 "Terminator 2, Judgment Day" movie and had three callbacks!Unfortunately, he didn't get the part.Kane enjoys acting, in his words, "it's fun" and if the right part came along Kane would definitely be interested.Maybe someday, we'll see him on the silver screen again!

The rest, as they say, is history.Kane became not only Alice's guitarist but his co-writer as well.He co-wrote and arranged Alice Cooper's "Constrictor", "Trash" and "Raise Your Fist and Yell".During the recording of the "Constrictor" album Kane relates; "I was jazzed to see Chaka Khan entering the recording booth every time I was soloing.She would dance behind me whenever I started recording.Her praise got me so hot!"

Kane left Alice Cooper's band in 1991, but the friendship and the business partnership remains to this day.Kane designs graphics for Alice as well as the design and maintenance of alicecoopershow.com, Alice's official website.Kane says, "Alice is the "man" . . . he has my reverence because he owns 100% of a moment in music history".

Alice is only one of many well-known people in the record industry who has been a big influence in Kane Roberts' music.  More than a decade ago, Michael Wagener became Kane's producer.  Michael first caught Kane's attention because of the work he had done with DOKKEN.  Desmond Child has been another staple artist assisting Kane's creative muse, having co-written numerous songs with Kane.Kane says he recently visited Desmond at a recording studio in Hollywood and "he's as wild and creative as ever.  He sent me some songs for one of my new projects."

Other artists Kane has worked with include: Gene Allen, Berlin, Sam Blue, Jon Bon Jovi, Steve Borden, Danny Boy, Devlin 7, Laughing Boy E., Vinny Burns, Viv Campbell, Bubba Cashdollar, Mike Davis, Steve Deboard, Lita Ford, Arthur Funaro, Vassell Fundell, Guns 'N Roses, Mike Inez, Jim Jetski, Davis Jonzz, Ken Mary, John McCurry, Greg Morgan, Motley Crue, Jim Peterik, Jack Ponti, Cha Cho Rodriguez, Richie Sambora, Sir A. Payson, Chang Shapiro, Mike Slammer, Paul Stanley, Steve Steele, Rod Stewart, Paul Taylor, Diane Warren, and Kip Winger.

Kane clearly likes to surround himself with the best and most talented artists.  As far as writing his music, Kane says, "New music is the most inspiring thing for me.  Emotions stirred up by unseen events . . . it's the best way to evolve."

After leaving Alice's band, Kane released his 1991 solo album "Saints and Sinners", which gained him a Top 20 single "Does Anybody Really Fall in Love Anymore".  The single "Twisted" from that album received a great deal of video play as well.  An amusing piece of trivia of the song "Fighter" from this album is, the Dallas Cowboys football team in the 90's used to play this song in the locker room before their games.

  Kane then decided to try his hand at something completely different, video games and graphic art.  In 1996, he released his video game "The Lords of Tantrazz" which featured Kane's art and Alice Cooper's voice.  In 1999 he also released his first interactive comic book CD ROM "Bamboozle".  He continues to design games, computer graphics, artwork and websites.

   Kane's graphic work is very diverse, from hot looking women and crazy creatures for "The Lords of Tantrazz" to the children's comic book figures for "Bamboozle".  Not to mention graphic art for things such as the cover to Alice Cooper's 2000 release "Brutal Planet".  Kane sites Robert Williams and Joel Peter Whitkin as "my favorite sources for inspiration".  He also says "John Kricfalusi (the creator of Ren and Stimpy) and Shag are unbelievably gifted."  You can view some of the art that Kane finds inspirational at Spumco and Shag Art.

In 1999, Kane was contacted by Now and Then Records to do another solo album.Kane was hesitant at first, and said "Bruce Mee contacted me three times before I agreed to record . . . I got the guys I wanted at the time and presto change-o, a record resulted."

Kane has also been working on a side project for about three years, a band called Flesh FX.Kane describes it as "more groove oriented".  What does that mean?  Kane calls it "a collection of musicians and songs and drum loops and feels . . . It's . . . darker, and more visceral in terms of what it's trying to express."It features: "Ponyboy" Bernstein on vocals, "Mr. Gizmo" on guitars, "Spaz 45" on bass, "djanGO 8i8-x" on vocals, "L kabong>>U8" on guitars, and "alias the Doctor" on drums.  In September 2000 Kane had just purchased digital studio equipment and "started recording in earnest for the first Flesh FX CD."

On a personal level, Kane admits he's a big fan of video games, "looking forward to PSX2" and an "avid hockey fan".  He prefers Macintosh computers and says "linux OS kicks major ass"!  He plans to "record and write voraciously for a while".

I think Kane's fans will all agree.  We hope he will keep following his artistic dreams for many years to come!

by Antoinette Avalon

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