Alice Cooper has surprised Zak Nilsson with an original song.

The moment comes courtesy of Coffee Talk With ADIKA Live, a YouTube Live show hosted by bassist Stefan Adika and former Rolling Stone writer Corey Levitan. Nilsson, the adult son of late singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson, is suffering from end-stage colon cancer and has regularly appeared on the show discussing his chemotherapy treatment and care. He recently decided to enter hospice rather than continue treatment, a choice that spurred Coffee Talk to reach out to Harry’s old drinking club, the Hollywood Vampires, for some uplifting words.

Cooper, who was a member of the drinking club with Harry before founding the band Hollywood Vampires decades later, responded by performing an original song.

The bouncy tune features Cooper singing over a bubbly piano piece, adding levity to the otherwise disheartening situation.

Zak, there’s nothing that you lack / When everything looks black, remember you’re a son of a gun,” Cooper sings before getting personal midway through the song. “Your dad would write a song about you that everyone could sing / It’d be a hit, no doubt about it, and to him you were everything.”

You can watch Cooper’s Coffee Talk performance in the video below.

Zak was clearly touched by the tune, noting that the moment was “pretty awesome” as he beamed from ear to ear. Still, the ailing Nilsson did have one note. "He did say in the song that there's nothing that I lack, and I would argue the only thing I really lack is a functioning gastrointestinal tract,” Zak wryly joked. “But other than that, spot on."

 

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