Kiss News

Engineer/producer Greg Collins and Kiss are using Endless Analog�s CLASP System to record the band�s next album.

Commenting on the use of CLASP during the sessions, band leader/producer Paul Stanley stated, �CLASP allows us to go �back to analog� for all the warmth and classic sonic characteristics but with all the convenience and advantages of Pro Tools. It�s a no brainer and you just can�t lose with CLASP. I�m a believer.�

On their first collaboration, 2009�s Sonic Boom, music was recorded on analog tape and edited in Pro Tools, but the two processes were separate from each other, necessitating frequent extended pauses in recording for tape transfers. For the recording of the new LP, Endless Analog�s CLASP (Closed Loop Analog Signal Processor) system, which integrates analog tape machines into the digital audio production workflow, is allowing the band to use analog tape while tracking to Pro Tools in real time, opening up the sonic space of tape while providing the editing capabilities of the digital recording workspace.Engineer/producer Greg Collins and Kiss are using Endless Analog�s CLASP System to record the band�s next album.

Commenting on the use of CLASP during the sessions, band leader/producer Paul Stanley stated, �CLASP allows us to go �back to analog� for all the warmth and classic sonic characteristics but with all the convenience and advantages of Pro Tools. It�s a no brainer and you just can�t lose with CLASP. I�m a believer.�

On their first collaboration, 2009�s Sonic Boom, music was recorded on analog tape and edited in Pro Tools, but the two processes were separate from each other, necessitating frequent extended pauses in recording for tape transfers. For the recording of the new LP, Endless Analog�s CLASP (Closed Loop Analog Signal Processor) system, which integrates analog tape machines into the digital audio production workflow, is allowing the band to use analog tape while tracking to Pro Tools in real time, opening up the sonic space of tape while providing the editing capabilities of the digital recording workspace.

Collins recalls, �I went to Endless Analog�s web site and saw Bryan Lenox giving a pretty thorough description, and this was right around the time we were making plans for the new KISS album. We had done a majority recording for Sonic Boom using tape, and we loved the sound, but punch-ins were challenging at times, and getting the tracks into Pro Tools for editing took a lot of time. But mainly, we enjoyed the process of using tape, and everyone enjoys the convenience that digital recording offers. If there had been a way with that first record to get the best of both worlds at the same time, we would have done it. And now there is that reality [with CLASP], so we had to give it a try.

�I sat down with Paul, who is once again producing, while I am co-producing, engineering and mixing. Paul really knows his way around a studio, but he lets me manage the gear side of things. He gave the go-ahead to use CLASP, so we went for it.�

Once they acquired CLASP, Endless Analog President/Founder and CLASP inventor Christopher Estes made a personal visit. Collins continues, �I got in touch with Chris, and he was good enough to come out and set us up on the first day in the studio, and he stuck with us through the first few days of tracking to make sure that it was all going smoothly, which it did. And it was such a good experience. For me, the tape sound, for a hard rock band, is the ideal sound. It deals with the transients in a way that�s really nice and easy on the ears. Drums for instance � it keeps them sounding punchy and powerful, but not �painful,� like you might associate with a digitally recorded drum sound. Tape is an important part of the right sound, and CLASP makes it possible to not have to sacrifice any of the perks of digital.�

Collins also recalls how nice it was to keep things moving. �There was zero downtime needed for transferring the tracks into Pro Tools. The band is so tight and well-rehearsed, and it�s so great to just start a session and knock out a song in two or three takes. A few punch-ins and the track is pretty much there. It�s so efficient; it just keeps the creativity and performance going. And the band loves the sound. Honestly, every time the guys walked in the control room for playback, everybody was so impressed � they said, �It sounds even better than last time, and we loved what it sounded like last time.��

CLASP, Endless Analog President/Founder and CLASP inventor Christopher Estes made a personal visit. Collins continues, �I got in touch with Chris, and he was good enough to come out and set us up on the first day in the studio, and he stuck with us through the first few days of tracking to make sure that it was all going smoothly, which it did. And it was such a good experience. For me, the tape sound, for a hard rock band, is the ideal sound. It deals with the transients in a way that�s really nice and easy on the ears. Drums for instance � it keeps them sounding punchy and powerful, but not �painful,� like you might associate with a digitally recorded drum sound. Tape is an important part of the right sound, and CLASP makes it possible to not have to sacrifice any of the perks of digital.�

Collins also recalls how nice it was to keep things moving. �There was zero downtime needed for transferring the tracks into Pro Tools. The band is so tight and well-rehearsed, and it�s so great to just start a session and knock out a song in two or three takes. A few punch-ins and the track is pretty much there. It�s so efficient; it just keeps the creativity and performance going. And the band loves the sound. Honestly, every time the guys walked in the control room for playback, everybody was so impressed � they said, �It sounds even better than last time, and we loved what it sounded like last time.��

Frontman, 59, delights in entertaining fans that now span generations

By Glen Schaefer, The Province

Photo by Jay Gilbert

He likes it loud onstage, but KISS lead singer Paul Stanley is soft-spoken over the phone as he prepares to go on the road again with the band he has fronted since 1974 -a tour that brings them to Abbotsford Monday night.

"We'll be ready with guns blazing when we hit Abbotsford," Stanley said in an interview before a show Thursday in Everett, Wash.

He says the band -Stanley, original bassist-singer Gene Simmons, drummer (on and off for 20 years) Eric Singer and guitarist (for the past 10 years) Tommy Thayer -doesn't do the punishing 200-show-a-year schedule anymore.

"We might go out for two or three months at a time and average about four shows a week," he says.

"We can do 70, 80 shows a year . . . Quite honestly, as much as I love doing this, I don't understand the people who forget that they have a home. It works terrifically, because it means that every time we do go out, we want to be there and we're ready to do it."
Frontman, 59, delights in entertaining fans that now span generations

By Glen Schaefer, The Province

He likes it loud onstage, but KISS lead singer Paul Stanley is soft-spoken over the phone as he prepares to go on the road again with the band he has fronted since 1974 -a tour that brings them to Abbotsford Monday night.

"We'll be ready with guns blazing when we hit Abbotsford," Stanley said in an interview before a show Thursday in Everett, Wash.

He says the band -Stanley, original bassist-singer Gene Simmons, drummer (on and off for 20 years) Eric Singer and guitarist (for the past 10 years) Tommy Thayer -doesn't do the punishing 200-show-a-year schedule anymore.

"We might go out for two or three months at a time and average about four shows a week," he says.

"We can do 70, 80 shows a year . . . Quite honestly, as much as I love doing this, I don't understand the people who forget that they have a home. It works terrifically, because it means that every time we do go out, we want to be there and we're ready to do it."

The 59-year-old Stanley has kept his voice and his lean physique as other rockers -including former KISS bandmates Peter Criss and Ace Frehley -fell prey to the backstage temptations of the road.

No "Cold Gin" for Stanley, despite the title of one of their more famous songs.

"Well you know, everything is available and then it's a matter of what you want to do," he says.

"Backstage is a buffet and you don't have to indulge, or you certainly can. For me to do what I do at this point, it's important that I'm ready to go out there and give people what they're expecting, or more. That's a big responsibility, and the longer the band's been around the bigger the reputation is."

Or, to put it bluntly: "Nobody wants to see a fat guy in tights. At least not in this band, or at least not me. There's a certain discipline involved, and I'm as vain as the next guy."

He laughs over the phone. "When you're going to get up onstage and have spotlights on you, and you're going to be wearing something that shows what you ate for dinner, you better make sure that the dinner they see was yesterday's."

Which means that the Beverly Hills house he shares with wife Erin and a brood of three children -a teenage son from a previous marriage, a younger boy and a girl, with a fourth child due this August -has one room full of gym equipment.

No need for the exercise gear on the road, Stanley says.

"The show is the ultimate workout, I can't even replicate that in a regular workout," he adds.

"What I do onstage is fuelled by adrenalin, you'll do things in front of an audience you'd find impossible to do on your own or with a trainer."

All that while strutting in five-inch platforms, a trick he's mastered over the decades. "Once you get used to the thin air up where we are, it's what I've done my whole life, it really is second nature."

A KISS show involves loud, simple songs, big pyrotechnics and Simmons spewing blood and flying over the stage, ingredients that KISS crowds have come to expect over the years. If the show has changed, says Stanley, it's in the craft applied to everything, particularly the pyro, which seems hot enough to roast marshmallows in the front row.

"We have the best people working with us," Stanley says. "When we first started doing it, it was crude to say the least. There were no licensed pyrotechnicians, you had some guy who liked to blow stuff up and you put him on salary. It's come a long way since then."

Stanley says the band draws an allages crowd these days. Even entire families come to hear "Love Gun" and "Lick It Up."

"The great thing about a KISS audience is it's really more of a tribal thing than a rock concert. You have people of all ages. Most rock concerts are very age-specific, where you don't want to see your little brother or your father there.

"I think it's great. People want to share it with their children -it's a rite of passage that they went through."

The band is still coming up with new material, with the album Sonic Boom released in 2009 and another collection of songs ready for release in 2012. Some new songs make it into the show, but Stanley says it's heavy on the crowd favourites.

"To a degree, we want to play things from the most recent album, but our show tends to be a consensus of what our audience wants to hear. It's not self-indulgence that brings us to an arena."

Outside of KISS, Stanley has starred in a Toronto stage production of The Phantom of the Opera, which doesn't seem that far from a KISS show with the amps turned down.

He and longtime collaborator Simmons live near each other, although Stanley's offstage life happens out of camera range.

"He literally lives down the street from me, but we give each other a lot of space," Stanley says of Simmons, who stars in his own reality TV show. "We see each other and we have a great partnership and we don't take it further than is realistic."

And KISS fans can rest easy -Stanley says there's no end in sight.

"When it's no longer fun or I can't do it, I won't," he says. "I don't want to say the show evolves or progresses, it just mutates -it's the same thing but bigger and better.

"Do we blow stuff up? Hell yeah. Do we play real loud? Hell yeah. That's what we do, we entertain. We're a killer rock band that prides itself on being entertainers."

Spokane Boy's KISS Wish Comes True
Annie Bishop | KXLY4 Reporter

A Spokane boy's lifetime wish came true Friday night when he met the members of KISS at the Spokane Arena.

Dilan Kohn has cystic fibrosis which requires him to spend weeks and sometimes months at a time in the hospital.

Through it all, the magic of music has inspired Dilan to remain positive.Spokane Boy's KISS Wish Comes True
Annie Bishop | KXLY4 Reporter

A Spokane boy's lifetime wish came true Friday night when he met the members of KISS at the Spokane Arena.

Dilan Kohn has cystic fibrosis which requires him to spend weeks and sometimes months at a time in the hospital.

Through it all, the magic of music has inspired Dilan to remain positive.

He became a KISS fan at 9 years old and has never looked back.

"Every time I listen to it I just imagine being at a Kiss concert," Dilan said.

"His face just perks up, he immediately sticks out his tongue," said Paul Kohn, Dilan's Dad.

So, when Dilan's dad scored floor seats to see KISS in concert at the Spokane Arena Friday Dilan began counting down the months, weeks and days.

What he didn't know is that his dad and the staff at the Spokane Arena were working behind the scenes to make the evening even more special.

On Thursday, a day before the concert, arena staff got the green light to arrange KISS and Dilan meet backstage.

Just after 8 p.m., Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer, in their concert costumes, walked through the doors of a room backstage to meet Dilan.

"I'm excited," said Dylan

The band spent about ten minutes with Dilan and a few other fans taking photos and signing autographs before heading onto stage.

It was a night Dilan will never cherish forever.

Kiss has not just helped Dilan feel better but it has also helped his father as well. Last year Paul was in the hospital for weeks so Dilan decided to make Paul Kiss dolls to help cheer him up. Paul said that for Dilan "to make something for me to make me feel better while I was sick, just made me feel great."

Dilan and Paul sure have a strong bond but this bond is going to be made even stronger tonight at the concert.

"It's going to be a once in a lifetime thing!" Paul said.

The best part of all is that Dilan and Paul are going to get the opportunity to meet Kiss tonight at the concert backstage.

Fans don makeup and air guitar along with iconic band.

By Jackson Holtz, Herald Writer

With huge flames shooting up from stage, the iconic heavy-metal band KISS opened its Thursday night concert.

The crowd at Comcast Arena Everett roared with approval.

"We don't have to go to Seattle to rock out," said Paul Stanley, the rhythm guitarist.

Bassist Gene Simmons delighted the audience with his thundering bass and long, red tongue.

At the end of "Firehouse," Simmons spit fire from the stage, his signature move for nearly 40 years.

The crowd ate it up, and many fans played air guitar along with Stanley and Tommy Thayer. Some people played air drums in time with Eric Singer.Fans don makeup and air guitar along with iconic band.

By Jackson Holtz, Herald Writer

With huge flames shooting up from stage, the iconic heavy-metal band KISS opened its Thursday night concert.

The crowd at Comcast Arena Everett roared with approval.

"We don't have to go to Seattle to rock out," said Paul Stanley, the rhythm guitarist.

Bassist Gene Simmons delighted the audience with his thundering bass and long, red tongue.

At the end of "Firehouse," Simmons spit fire from the stage, his signature move for nearly 40 years.

The crowd ate it up, and many fans played air guitar along with Stanley and Tommy Thayer. Some people played air drums in time with Eric Singer.

KISS played the guitar-heavy songs from their first album through to their latest, "Sonic Boom," the 2009 album that has inspired new life in the act.

The band wore its trademark outfits: platform shoes, black, silver-studded skin-tight outfits and, of course, painted faces.

Throughout the show, pyrotechnics lit the stage, smoke billowed out and the heat of the flames could be felt rows from the front.

Several fans painted their faces to match the comic-booklike characters on stage.

"It's Halloween in the middle of the summer," Michelle Russell, 40, said.

She came to the show with her best friend since grade school, Stephanie Walker, wearing matching vintage KISS T-shirts and faces like Stanley and Thayer.

"I just want to rock it," said Walker, also 40.

Rich Frien brought his daughters, Melissa, 10, and Fiona, 12, from Anacortes.

The girls, both metal heads, wore big black wigs and carefully painted faces.

"KISS is a family thing," he said.

Brian Thiel of Auburn first saw KISS in 1979, and hasn't stopped worshiping the band.

"As long as the band keeps playing, I want to keep seeing them," he said.

The Spandex and spikes of his outfit, a replica of Simmons' "Alive" costume from 1975, took him three weeks to put together.

Other fans posed for photos, as he towered high on platform shoes.

"It's an experience," Thiel said. "I can't really describe it in words."

Thursday night's show was the first rock concert for 11-year-old Bryce Carabello of Everett.

He came to the arena with his face painted like the characters in the band.

"They're great," he said. "And, they're really fun to watch."