ALICE COOPER

Since he never really left, Alice Cooper's 24th album can't be called a comeback. But it's definitely a return to form for the 57-year-old shock rocker who had become a caricature of himself through nearly two decades of steadily declining sales and irrelevant releases that tarnished the reputation he'd established in the '70s.

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While there are no "Dead Babies"-styled epics, Cooper rediscovers his garage roots for such imaginatively titled, pedal-to-the-metal rockers as "Woman of Mass Distraction," "Sunset Babies (All Got Rabies)" and "Your Own Worst Enemy." "Steal that Car" is a follow-up of sorts to "Under My Wheels" and would fit in just fine on 1972's School's Out, a compliment that couldn't be bestowed on many Cooper tracks from the past two decades.

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A lovely and refreshingly un-ironic cover of the Left Banke's "Pretty Ballerina" and the John Lennon-ish "Six Hours" show that Cooper is as effective fronting ballads as the tougher material that dominates the album.

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His current band is no Billion Dollar Babies, but carries the torch effectively as the guitars avoid the overblown nu-metal clichés that marred much of his '90s material.

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Not everything works, though. "The Saga of Jesse Jane" sports juvenile lyrics about a cross-dressing truck driver, and the closing rap with Xzibit should have stayed an Internet-only track.

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Yet for those who abandoned the Coop after the '70s, Dirty Diamonds offers more than a glimmer of hope for redemption.

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Alice Cooper plays Chastain Park Amphitheatre, with Cheap Trick, Fri., Aug. 26, 8 p.m. $27.84-$57. 4469 Stella Drive. 404-733-5000. www.classicchastain.org.