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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Jan 1, 2021 16:04:06 GMT
The hottest band in the land:
Get the firehouse:
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Post by kds on Jan 8, 2021 15:26:09 GMT
I just started reading Paul Stanley's autobiography yesterday. I had no idea that he was born without his right ear.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 8, 2021 15:34:52 GMT
I knew that initially from some long-form interview he did several years back, I forget with who--probably either Joe Rogan or Steve Jones.
As for the autobiography, I listened to a bunch of it (as it is on YouTube) several months back. Pretty interesting, both his and Gene's. Whatever a person may think of them personally or musically, they are both smart people and thankfully were sober enough to recall things very well.
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Post by kds on Jan 8, 2021 15:39:23 GMT
I knew that initially from some long-form interview he did several years back, I forget with who--probably either Joe Rogan or Steve Jones.
As for the autobiography, I listened to a bunch of it (as it is on YouTube) several months back. Pretty interesting, both his and Gene's. Whatever a person may think of them personally or musically, they are both smart people and thankfully were sober enough to recall things very well. I've read Peter's a while back. And I read Gene's second book (got it as a gift), but have yet to read his autobiography. There was also one on Kiss's early days written by Gene and Paul that was pretty good.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 8, 2021 16:49:23 GMT
Coincidentally, I am listening to a recent interview with Phil Lewis and Tracii Guns of LA Guns, and Lewis was discussing that when he was in the band Girl (1979-83) in the UK, they covered KISS's "Do You Love Me?" on their debut album, which was a minor UK hit. And in the most Gene Simmons-like thing ever, while they were opening for KISS around that time, Simmons forbade them from performing it--despite it being one of their few songs and apparently a popular one--on stage.
Here is Girl's version of the song. (Note: Girl also included Phil Collen on guitar, who went on to join Def Leppard.)
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 28, 2021 23:36:34 GMT
Maybe a little weird putting this in the KISS thread, but in another way it makes sense. Here's an 8-minute in-studio mini documentary/trailer for the upcoming Paul Stanley's Soul Station album.
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Post by kds on Jan 29, 2021 13:27:34 GMT
Speaking of KISS, while reading Paul Stanley's book, I decided to listen to the KISS catalog. I'm finishing their 80s albums now. Some of them, I haven't listened to in full in over a decade. Others, I'd never listened to in full. I have to say that other than a few songs here and there, they're extremely generic, especially from Lick It Up to Hot in the Shade. In Paul's book, he refers to these albums as essentially solo albums since Ace and Peter were long gone, and Gene's primary focus wasn't really on the band at the time.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 29, 2021 13:46:20 GMT
Absolutely, that was a rough time in some ways for KISS (although they also did have some commercial success in that era).
It was rough from an identity standpoint.
- They abandoned their visual identity right as visuals became more important than ever in the industry.
- They lost original members in a band that had always presented itself (however manipulated that image was) as a band of four strong individuals who wrote, sang, and played. - They lost the key songwriting team of the original band (as Gene became distracted with Hollywood, management, etc.). - They came off a few years of chasing trends to settle in to relatively generic hard rock/lite metal.
I actually think there are some very bright spots throughout those years: you can especially find a lot of strong hooks, shout-along choruses. But a lot of it could have been anyone, and certainly doesn't resemble the classic material or style. Consider something like "Reason to Live": is there anything about it that makes it hard to imagine co-writer Desmond Child doling it out to any other band of the time, so long as its singer had Stanley's range? Is there anything "KISS" about it?
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Post by kds on Jan 29, 2021 13:55:08 GMT
Absolutely, that was a rough time in some ways for KISS (although they also did have some commercial success in that era).
It was rough from an identity standpoint.
- They abandoned their visual identity right as visuals became more important than ever in the industry.
- They lost original members in a band that had always presented itself (however manipulated that image was) as a band of four strong individuals who wrote, sang, and played. - They lost the key songwriting team of the original band (as Gene became distracted with Hollywood, management, etc.). - They came off a few years of chasing trends to settle in to relatively generic hard rock/lite metal.
I actually think there are some very bright spots throughout those years: you can especially find a lot of strong hooks, shout-along choruses. But a lot of it could have been anyone, and certainly doesn't resemble the classic material or style. Consider something like "Reason to Live": is there anything about it that makes it hard to imagine co-writer Desmond Child doling it out to any other band of the time, so long as its singer had Stanley's range? Is there anything "KISS" about it?
It's funny when Lick It Up became a success, in his book, Paul says (paraphrasing), "the fans were tired of the gimmick," they wanted us. I don't think that's the case at all. Coming off the Elder and Creatures, Lick It Up's title track was just the first accessible Kiss song in awhile. But, you're right, many of those hits from that era could've been by any band. I do think you could put together a very strong non makeup years comp for KISS though, even if it would be hardly recognizable as KISS.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 29, 2021 14:12:17 GMT
Absolutely: in fact I think it could be a VERY strong comp. Multi-disc, even. Not that such a thing would be loaded with the kind of hits everyone would recognize (though there would be a few of those, too), but there are plenty of good ones.
In fact, without giving it a lot of thought, I'd warrant a guess that KISS's best-of from the decade of Creatures through Revenge isn't bested by many similar bands in those years. (A lot of those bands had better albums, but usually just one or two really good ones. KISS in that era didn't have any great albums, but had something worthwhile on almost everything.)
That comp might be too poppy for some people's taste, too heavy for others', but just across the board there is a lot of quality ... it's just confused, schizophrenic, and semi-hidden amidst the anonymous mediocrity.
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Post by kds on Jan 29, 2021 14:26:22 GMT
Absolutely: in fact I think it could be a VERY strong comp. Multi-disc, even. Not that such a thing would be loaded with the kind of hits everyone would recognize (though there would be a few of those, too), but there are plenty of good ones.
In fact, without giving it a lot of thought, I'd warrant a guess that KISS's best-of from the decade of Creatures through Revenge isn't bested by many similar bands in those years. (A lot of those bands had better albums, but usually just one or two really good ones. KISS in that era didn't have any great albums, but had something worthwhile on almost everything.)
That comp might be too poppy for some people's taste, too heavy for others', but just across the board there is a lot of quality ... it's just confused, schizophrenic, and semi-hidden amidst the anonymous mediocrity.
Yeah, I'd agree with everything here. Other than Paul's, and sometimes Gene's, vocals, there's really nothing distinctly KISS. But, I'm kind of the same way with Black Sabbath. Once you get past the first two Dio albums, you get an array of albums from 1983-1995 with a ton of different lineups (often with several musicians from the Purple / Rainbow / Whitesnake family tree) which tend to sound progressively less like Sabbath with each one, but there's still a lot of strong material.
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Post by Kapitan on Mar 27, 2021 21:06:15 GMT
Because NPR's Terry Gross came up in the Beach Boys forum of the board (hey, we do post there sometimes!), I took the opportunity to listen to the infamous 2002 Gene Simmons interview.
What's really interesting to me now is that it sounds like it could have come from our current cultural divide: Gross--one of the great interviewers of our era--literally sounds idiotic to me in, this situation (not overall! never!), because she clearly has no ability to find any common ground whatsoever with Simmons.
For his part, Gene does have the ability to connect with Gross (just meaning he's not dumb and lives among a class who lean very much toward her and NPR's sensibilities), but chooses not to, and instead delights in pushing buttons and raising hackles.
So what could have been a really good discussion instead was a moderately entertaining train wreck. Two very intelligent Jewish Americans, almost exactly the same age, both working in media, with wildly different political and professional situations. Should have been fascinating, instead was pretty awkward and cringeworthy.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 27, 2021 22:11:10 GMT
OK, Terry Gross is my new hero, er, heroine. Where has she been all my life? THE BEST interviewer I've ever heard. Guts and brains. She's prepared, fearless, and has an understated sense of humor. She knows when to pursue something or when to let it go and pursue something else. I would've loved to have heard a knock down, drag out, not argument, not debate, but a free-for-all "exchange of words and topics" with Gene Simmons. She's probably the only interviewer he ever faced that was smarter than him.
And, speaking of Gene Simmons, for a long time I thought I heard some Mike Love in him. They definitely have a lot of the same values. And, while Simmons can be refreshingly honest, thought-provoking, and occasionally kind (at least when he talks about his mother), he is also the most insulting, vulgar, lewd, and egotistical rock star I think I've ever heard. Some of his...values...I can appreciate; others make me not like him very much. I got that impression with Terry Gross, too, while she was interviewing him.
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Post by Kapitan on Mar 27, 2021 23:25:10 GMT
OK, Terry Gross is my new hero, er, heroine. Where has she been all my life? THE BEST interviewer I've ever heard.
Glad to have helped facilitate this, because I agree that she's fantastic. You can find a billion interviews of hers online from the past 25-30 years.
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Post by kds on Mar 28, 2021 1:13:27 GMT
I think Gene is Mike Love times 100. Ace and Peter have been out of KISS for nearly 20 years, but Gene (and Paul too) goes out of his way to talk shit about them. Nothing Mike has ever said about Al or The Wilsons even comes close.
And, replacing Ace and Peter might have been the best thing for the band since their playing suffered at the end of the reunion, but having Tommy and Eric dress like them and do their old gimmicks is a cheat.
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