The following report is courtesy of IcWales

If your father smeared black greasepaint round his eyes, wore his hair long and `entertained' the neighbours with his pet boa constrictor, would you be embarrassed? Probably. Worried? Definitely.

But then your father isn't ALICE COOPER. And black make-up, pretend beheadings, snakes and all kinds of other rock'n'roll shenanigans are just part of normal life for the three children of the veteran shock rocker. And, boy, do they love it.

"My kids have got the greatest statement in the world about having me as a father," says the 57-year-old.

"They say, `I would rebel against my dad, only he's cooler than all my friends'. How can you rebel against your dad when he's cooler than all of your friends put together?" he laughs.

Alice's impressive 29-year marriage to his wife Sheryl ("You just got to know what you're doing," he shrugs) has given him three children - his 24-year-old actress daughter Calico, son Dashiell, 20, and the baby of the family, 12-year-old daughter Sonora.

"She owns me," he says fondly. "When you're 12 and you're a little girl, you own your dad."

Alice Cooper the family man is a hard image to reconcile with his more familiar `scary' persona. This is a man who played Freddy Krueger's father in the 90s films and whose current live show features a pretend Paris Hilton (played by his elder daughter) being mauled by a dog.

But the golf-playing, Wayne's World-starring Alice has never been too worried about challenging his public persona.

"My kids just have fun with me," he says. "I can be a liberal parent, I can be permissive and I can be very strict. I always come back to the point - you don't want to lose my trust.

"I tell them, `If you say you're going to be here, be here. If you get in trouble, call me, I'll take care of it. If you get in trouble and have an attitude behind it, then we're going to have problems'.

"But with all three kids I've never had a problem with drugs, alcohol, sexual problems, anything. They're all pretty hip kids.

"And they've seen everything. When they were little kids Guns'N'Roses were opening for us and they'd be backstage wandering around looking for Uncle Axl and Uncle Slash. There's not much my kids haven't seen."

Like the Osbournes, the Coopers have had no problem mixing rock'n'roll with family life and Alice puts it down to one very simple thing.

"It's the fact that we're a very stable family," he says. "My wife and I have been married for 29 years now and I think that shows right there that my kids have been given a real sense of stability.

"Would I do a reality show like the Osbournes? I would hate that. But I did think it was funny. It was basically Beverly Hillbillies. They don't belong in Beverly Hills, that's what made it funny. It's not for me but it worked."

Even without the leg-up of a reality show, two of his children are following Alice into the world of showbiz. Elder daughter Calico is a budding actress who performs at her father's live shows and has four films coming out next year.

Son Dashiell is following his father's footsteps more closely, having formed his own band, Runaway Phoenix. He continues to study at Arizona State University as well, near where the family live in Phoenix.

"Somehow he's getting straight As," says Alice. "I don't know, [his intelligence] must not be from my part of the family, it's got to be from my wife's."

Despite the hard slog of his current world tour, Alice is full of energy. He's proud that the tour, which hits British arenas in November, has been another huge success.

"Before it started we were talking about what we were going to do and I said, `Britney's pregnant so we can't pick on Britney'," says Alice, whose live show for some years featured an effigy of the pop singer being beheaded.

"But there was Paris Hilton in our sights so I said, `We'll get Paris to come out and I want to see her chihuahua attack her and rip her throat out'. It's hysterical," he laughs.

Detroit-born Alice, who was born Vincent Damon Furnier before legally taking on the name Alice Cooper when his band split in the mid-70s, has been in the rock music business for 40 years.

His career began when he formed the Earwigs aged 17 and, after a few name changes, they settled on Alice Cooper.

In 1969 they were discovered by Frank Zappa, and in 1971 they had a huge worldwide hit with School's Out. Alice became a huge celebrity, but in 1978 he admitted to chronic alcoholism and spent time being treated in a New York hospital.

"I haven't had a drink in 24 years," he says. "I quit drinking all that time ago. The only reason I'm on the road now is because I haven't had a drink.

"If I had one drink, believe me, I would be in the hospital, because one drink would be 20 drinks. I can't even have a sip of beer. But that's fine. I don't miss it one bit.

"Of course my band drink a lot on tour but it doesn't matter. I can sit and watch my guys drink beer all night, and I don't have any problems with it."

After 30 albums he's now back with another, the back-to-basics Dirty Diamonds. It's a method of writing and recording that Alice returned to with his last album, The Eyes Of Alice Cooper.

"Before that I had done three albums that were very produced and had all these big apocalyptic concepts," says Alice. "I decided I really wanted to go opposite of that.

"I was listening to the radio and hearing the White Stripes and Jet and all these garage bands and I'm thinking, all these bands sound like where we were in the late 60s.

"At that time we were playing with the Stooges and MC5, it was exactly what we sounded like then. So I said, `Let's go do that, that sounds like fun'."

With a successful world tour in full flow, Alice shows no signs of slowing down.

"I look at it this way," he says. "Mick Jagger's six years older than me, and he's about to go out touring for 18 more months. So I figure when Jagger quits I've got six more years."

Current release dates for Alice Cooper's Dirty Diamonds, are set as July 4th for Europe and August 2nd for North America through New West Records/RED.