Paul Stanley: this IS it folks
By Cameron Adams, National music writer, Herald Sun
AS soon as KISS announced their farewell tour, frontman Paul Stanley knew there would be cynics.
Because The End of the Road tour, starting next year, is actually KISS' second goodbye.
The original KISS line-up reformed for a farewell tour that ran from 2000 to 2001, but lost drummer Peter Criss before it finished and guitarist Ace Frehley soon after.
“The first farewell tour was almost 19 years ago,” Stanley says. “Cynics be damned. Those people will always find something to say. That (reformed) line-up of the band was dysfunctional. People in the band weren’t showing respect to the fans or the band itself. We decided to put the horse down. The truth is we’ve carried on for 19 years (since the first farewell) because we realised people still wanted to see KISS, we just had to have a tyre change.”
For this farewell tour, dubbed The End of the Road, KISS will again be Stanley, Simmons and “new boys” Tommy Thayer (15 years in the band) and Eric Singer (27 years).
Stanley insists this will be it, despite bands regularly receiving raised eyebrows when they announce they’re splitting for good — Motley Crue had to sign a pact in public to prove to fans that their final tour was indeed the last goodbye.
“Not to take away from anybody else, but you can make up any piece of paper that makes people believe one thing or another,” Stanley says.
“It’s all about your intent. We’ve been thinking about how to do this for a while. With the band being really in top form and getting on terrifically, it’s time to take a victory lap. We made the conscious decision that this is it.”
Stanley, 66, says KISS have strategically planned their exit. Dates for The End of the Road have so far announced been announced for all of 2019, but they’ll potentially tour for up to three years.
“It’s a big world,” Stanley explains. “We want to go out and celebrate with every country and every city that we’ve been to and that will take some time. We planned this. We’re not getting any younger. If we were playing some rock and roll songs wearing blue jeans and T-shirts we could do this into our 90s. But we’re wearing 40 or 50 pounds (18 to 22kgs) of gear, running around on stage.
