Alice Cooper wrote a charming song for Harry Nilsson’s son, Zak Nilsson, who suffers from terminal colon cancer and chose to enter the hospice instead of continuing treatment.
Cooper’s music appeared in a recent episode of Coffee Talk With ADIKA Live, a live show on YouTube hosted by bassist Stefan Adika, writer Rolling Stone contributor Corey Levitan. Over the years, the duo became friends with Zak Nilsson and invited him on his program to talk about his battle with cancer, chemotherapy, end-of-life care and more.
To mark the occasion, Coffee Talk he reached out to some of the surviving members of Harry Nilsson’s former drinking club, the Hollywood Vampires, to see if anyone would like to share a message with Zak. Cooper, the founder of Hollywood Vampires, not only responded, but did it with an original song that Coffee Talk hosts surprised Zak with during the interview.
The melody sounds exactly like something Harry Nilsson would have done, with Cooper singing happily over a bouncy piano progression (and even trying to sing a little a capella). “So, Zak, your doctor can be a charlatan,” sings Cooper, “Considering all this, tomorrow morning you will see the sun!”