kiss

Kiss strutted off of the streets and into the limelight with the theatrical glam rock of this rough hewn black diamond.  The band was formed in New York when Paul (Eisen) Stanley, Gene (Klein) Simmons, and Peter (George Peter John Criscuola) Criss from Wicked Lester decided to form a different band with Paul "Ace" Frehley.  Criss had been in Lips before joining Wicked Lester, which gave Stanley the idea to name their new band Kiss.  The band adopted makeup and pyrotechnics in their live performances to establish a distinctive style.  They recorded a demo with producer Eddie Kramer that would lead to them being the first act signed to the new Casablanca Records that was started by Buddah Record exec Neil Bogart, who had been a teen pop star under the name Neil Scott.  They recorded their eponymous debut at Bell Sound Studios in New York with producers Kenny Kerner and Richie Wise.  The sessions featured Paul Stanley on vocals and rhythm guitar;  Ace Frehley on lead guitar;  Gene Simmons on vocals and bass guitar;  Peter Criss on drums, percussion, and vocals;   with Bruce Foster playing piano on "Nothin' to Lose" and Warren Dewey adding the fire engine on "Firehouse".  

Simmons reveals:   ”When we met Kerner and Wise, they were assigned to us by a brand new label called Casablanca, we were the first act on Casablanca, and nobody was particularly awed by the talent or the direction. We just tried to be who we are.  I think the first two records were ok, sonically they’re not great, but the one thing we were able to maintain was our soul. This is who we are. Not as ‘fidelic’ as it could have been, because live, the band sounded much better. In the studio we sounded smaller and less ambient and less ‘live.’ So, in a way, it sort of helped , the ‘fidelics’ weren’t high level, so when people saw us live, we were better than we were on record. Often, the bands that spent a lot of time in the studio sounded better in the studio than they did live ... For us it was Alice in Wonderland. Four knuckleheads off the streets of New York who didn’t have a clue what was going on or that they were about to scale the heights of Mount Olympus. Or that one would become the actual God of Thunder, you’re damn right I am...There was this spectacular innocence in the band, Ace and Peter were healthy, happy and couldn’t believe their luck. You find the Genie lamp, the Genie Simmons lamp of course, you rub it and out comes the Genie and says, ‘Whatever you’d like, you can have it.’ You say, ‘I like to be a rockstar with more fame and whatever than you could imagine.’ And you get it...We were hard task masters on ourselves. Everybody was equally important in the band and there was an us against the world feeling because everything we did, people laughed at. ‘You have a song called ‘Strutter’? What the f*** is that? What about love and broken hearts?’ We’d say, ‘F*** that!’ Black Diamond is about a prostitute, they’d say, ‘Sing something romantic’, that just isn’t cool.”

Stanley says:   "We were totally committed to what we were doing. We believed in it against all odds. People said it would never work. We were four guys and we were a nation. Nothing was going to get in our way and when you watch early footage it’s absolutely undeniable the band was going to succeed in spite of what everybody said about it. Most of the people who were the naysayers feared what we were doing. Rock n’ roll in its purest form is always feared. Whether it was Elvis Presley, The Beatles or The Stones. You’re doing something right when people say “This is crap,” or “It has no redeeming value.” It’s rock n’ roll. And we were the essence of that and delivered the goods. We were the guys in the audience who went up on stage and said “Let us show you how it’s supposed to be done.” ... We were clearly a product of New York and the streets. We came up during a time where British music was looked upon as the music of the gods. There was a glitter scene in New York. A lot of bands who really were better looking and better dressed than they were at playing music were our contemporaries at the time. I don’t think we ever wanted to be a New York band. We wanted to be a world band. Perhaps that’s why we became a bit disassociated with New York because we’re bigger than New York. We are of the world ... [In those early days] it was one long tour. We would see a day or two off on a calendar but for the most part we were always gone. We would sometimes be doing two shows in a night because a show would sell out so quickly...Most of those [other bands from New York City] were more concerned with hanging out than actually rehearsing. That’ll get you so far. At the end of the day you’re going to have to play a song and do it well. For a lot of those bands the music became the soundtrack for their fashion show. They looked great. There’s no arguing. When Gene and I saw The  [New York] Dolls you just looked at them and said 'These guys kill us at looking androgynous.' We looked like football players. We went “We can’t beat The Dolls at being The Dolls but we sure as hell play better than them. Now let’s find out who we are.” And that was really the start of us finding the Kiss look."

'Kiss' charted at number eighty-seven in the US, eighty-two in Canada, and thirty-eight in New Zealand.  It only moved about seventy-five thousand copies during the first year; but three years later it was certified gold with over five hundred thousand copies sold.    






http://www.kissonline.com/








'Kiss' 
full album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9AJUjlep4I


00:00 01.Strutter
03:12 02.Nothing' to Lose
06:39 03.Firehouse
09:58 04.Cold Gin 
14:20 05.Let Me Know
17:20 06.Kissin' Time
21:14 07.Deuce
24:20 08.Love Theme from Kiss
26:44 09.100,000 Years
30:08 10.Black Diamond


https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLg6tYYDm8NjnCdOv4ntiwRr2Q5dDnG5Ap




"ABC In Concert" 1974
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bF-jjaBMHcw





Interview / Firehouse - Mike Douglas Show - 1974
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yfGvsGEou0