Kiss News

Tonight's KISS hometown hero #roadiefortheday is 2nd Class Petty Officer James Martin!

By Kelley Simms / www.desmoinesregister.com

KISS�s Freedom to Rock Tour means just that.

Every night, KISS honors a hometown military hero, as they will do when it plays the Grandstand at the Iowa State Fair Friday at 8 p.m.

In addition, KISS will hire a current-serving member of the National Guard or Reserve force to be a �Roadie for the Day� for each of its scheduled 32 U.S. concerts, including the Des Moines show.

�Freedom to Rock? Yeah, it�s another opportunity for us to not only champion what we do, but to champion the people who make everyday life possible for all of us,� vocalist/guitarist Paul Stanley said. �There are people who sacrificed beyond our comprehension to give us that freedom, and secure that freedom. We make sure that we not only honor our military, but we bring them to the stage to make sure that they�re in people�s consciousness.�

In partnership with Hiring Our Heroes and Veteran Tickets Foundation, KISS will also donate a limited number of tickets to veterans, as well as making available discounted tickets for them and their family.

A typical KISS concert is a spectacular audio and visual experience, jam-packed with theatrics, explosions, confetti, lasers and loud rock �n� roll. Even after 40-plus years of worldwide stage destroying � Stanley, along with other original member bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons, guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer � still sound as explosive as ever.

�I love what I do and I love the band,� Stanley said. �I�m very proud of our legacy and I�m also proud to go out every night and not only live up to it, but exceed people�s expectations. For me, it�s life-affirming. If you believe in what you�re doing, regardless of the odds against you, then you cannot only come out on top, but you can spend decades celebrating it.�

Stanley and Simmons� friendship has had its bumps and bruises over the years, but when it comes to KISS, they wholeheartedly share the same passion.

�No matter what you choose to do, to make it work, you have to be pragmatic,� Stanley said. �A great partnership is usually based on knowing its limitations, and that�s the key to any relationship. We share a lot in common and our work ethic is strong. The years together have only made us more bonded; we�re family. We covet and protect fiercely KISS and have a sense of obligation to keep it at a certain level.�

The mighty KISS marketing machine also runs at a high level.

Stanley and Simmons have various investments and patents of everything from KISS coffins, to KISS pinball machines, to KISS condoms. They even co-own the Arena Football team LA KISS and have a partnership in the restaurant chain Rock & Brews, among other endeavors.

However, Stanley doesn�t wake up in the morning and say, �What can I make money on today?�

KISS�s Freedom to Rock Tour means just that.

Every night, KISS honors a hometown military hero, as they will do when it plays the Grandstand at the Iowa State Fair Friday at 8 p.m.

In addition, KISS will hire a current-serving member of the National Guard or Reserve force to be a �Roadie for the Day� for each of its scheduled 32 U.S. concerts, including the Des Moines show.

�Freedom to Rock? Yeah, it�s another opportunity for us to not only champion what we do, but to champion the people who make everyday life possible for all of us,� vocalist/guitarist Paul Stanley said. �There are people who sacrificed beyond our comprehension to give us that freedom, and secure that freedom. We make sure that we not only honor our military, but we bring them to the stage to make sure that they�re in people�s consciousness.�

In partnership with Hiring Our Heroes and Veteran Tickets Foundation, KISS will also donate a limited number of tickets to veterans, as well as making available discounted tickets for them and their family.

A typical KISS concert is a spectacular audio and visual experience, jam-packed with theatrics, explosions, confetti, lasers and loud rock �n� roll. Even after 40-plus years of worldwide stage destroying � Stanley, along with other original member bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons, guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer � still sound as explosive as ever.

�I love what I do and I love the band,� Stanley said. �I�m very proud of our legacy and I�m also proud to go out every night and not only live up to it, but exceed people�s expectations. For me, it�s life-affirming. If you believe in what you�re doing, regardless of the odds against you, then you cannot only come out on top, but you can spend decades celebrating it.�

Stanley and Simmons� friendship has had its bumps and bruises over the years, but when it comes to KISS, they wholeheartedly share the same passion.

�No matter what you choose to do, to make it work, you have to be pragmatic,� Stanley said. �A great partnership is usually based on knowing its limitations, and that�s the key to any relationship. We share a lot in common and our work ethic is strong. The years together have only made us more bonded; we�re family. We covet and protect fiercely KISS and have a sense of obligation to keep it at a certain level.�

The mighty KISS marketing machine also runs at a high level.

Stanley and Simmons have various investments and patents of everything from KISS coffins, to KISS pinball machines, to KISS condoms. They even co-own the Arena Football team LA KISS and have a partnership in the restaurant chain Rock & Brews, among other endeavors.

However, Stanley doesn�t wake up in the morning and say, �What can I make money on today?�

Happy birthday, Kameron. Great KISS #FreedomToRock birthday cake! See you in west Virginia.

WNEM TV 5

www.mystateline.com

A Stateline area National Guardsman will be honored as 'Roadie for a Day' for the rock band KISS during their concert Saturday.

Sergeant Jim Leffel will not only help set up equipment for the Saturday concert at the BMO Harris Bank Center, but will be able to enjoy the concert backstage and meet members of the iconic rock and roll band.

The 'Roadie for a Day' program is meant to highlight the 'Hiring Our Heroes' program, which helps find jobs for veterans and their families.  During the concert, KISS will also present a $150,000 check to the program.

"KISS is stepping up to the plate and they're getting the message of  military hiring and veteran hiring out there and they're hiring the heroes of the military and national guard across the country," Jack Norton of 'Hiring Our Heroes' tells 'Eyewitness News'.

Rockford-area veterans can also get discounted tickets to the Saturday night show.  To apply, a veteran or service member just needs to sign up as a Vet Tix member at www.vettix.org.

By James Currie / In The Loop Magazine

KISS is currently on tour this year with the �Freedom To Rock� tour. They�ve got a new live DVD coming out soon called, �KISS Rocks Vegas� soon as well. Lead guitarist, singer songwriter, producer, editor and current Space Man � Tommy Thayer � has a lot on his plate but still entertains thousands of fans daily on the road with KISS.

In The Loop Magazines writer, Christopher David caught up with the masked man and talked all about his amazing life on the road and behinds the scenes.

Christopher David (In the Loop Magazine): There�s a lot going on with KISS this year, and the �Freedom to Rock� tour is well underway! How have things been going this time around?

Tommy Thayer: The tour�s going really well, and the interesting thing is all the new people coming to see us, younger kids, new recruits to the KISS Army! Every night onstage Paul asks how many people have never seen KISS before, and it�s amazing how many people raise their hands.   It�s inspiring, honestly, because any band that�s been around a long time, you have to constantly attract new fans, and we�re doing that, so it�s an inspiring and gratifying thing to see.

ITLM: That�s great to hear. It�s interesting, too, because there aren�t a lot of bands now that have been around for as long as you guys, and it seems to be a bit unique to KISS, that you�re clearly bringing in a lot of new fans and pushing forward a lot more actively than many of the �older� rock bands. From a fan�s perspective, that seems to be the case.

TT: I think that�s true, and I think part of the reason is the wide demographic. At our shows, it�s a wide demographic of age, from the youngest to the oldest and everyone in between, and that�s also great in terms of the life of the band. There�s not just a certain window of ages or a certain age group, and I think one things that adds to it is that people bring their friends, fathers bringing their kids, you know, and it�s this whole generational passing of the torch kind of thing. You see teenagers, you see everybody � I think that really adds to the surge of new fans.

ITLM: What�s cool about that is that you bring up word of mouth being one of the attracting factors � and ultimately, that�s how KISS became big in the first place, word of mouth, people talking about the band.

TT: Totally! That�s what it�s about. These days, it�s definitely a different world, and attracting new fans and that sort of thing, it�s a different approach. It�s not like making a new record, promoting the record, going to radio � those conventional types of outreach aren�t there anymore, and you have to think of new ways to get the band in front of the people. Touring is a big part of that, obviously, and other projects that we do, outside-of-the-box projects, they lend to that as well.

ITLM: Yes, and in talking to different bands�new bands, established artists�it does seem to be a bit of the �wild west� right now, like the reset button got hit on the music industry and everyone�s trying to figure out the best approach.

TT: Yeah, and it can be tough. I was actually misquoted recently, that I said that �making new records was a waste of time.� That wasn�t the sentiment of what I said at all, I was saying that it was more of a challenge to do a record, and then not selling records, that makes it difficult, but I applaud new groups that are out there making records, other groups making new music and getting it out there and I�m all for it.   That�s the only way that things are ever going to move forward. I don�t think it�s out of the question that we�ll do another record at some point, but it�s not something we�re going to do every year or anything.

ITLM: The role of the �album,� that piece of the process, has really changed, regardless of where a band is. It used to be a regimented process�album, single, radio, tour�a cycle that was just perpetuated, and you�re right that a record doesn�t really figure in to the overall scheme in the way that it once did.

TT: Right, this is a day and age when kids pack arenas watching gamers. You have to adapt, because it�s not a conventional path anymore.

ITLM: You mentioned the �rite of passage� as parents introduce their kids to KISS, families, friends. That�s how I became a fan back in the �70s, my parents were into KISS from day one. Who were some of the bands that really hooked you when you were young and led you to where you ended up with a career in rock?

TT: Well, you know, when you�re thirteen or fourteen, that�s a very impressionable time, and that�s when you really attach yourself to a certain type of music. When I was that age, it was the early �70s, and to me, that was a golden age of hard rock, though it was kinda second generation, because you had that first wave of the more blues-based rockers in the �60s like Cream and Led Zeppelin. By the time I was there, it was more Deep Purple and Black Sabbath, even KISS, Aerosmith. And then a little bit later, one of your hometown�s finest � Cheap Trick.

ITLM: Absolutely!

TT: One of the greatest bands of all time. I�m a huge fan of Cheap Trick. All those great early to mid-70s hard rock bands had a huge impression on me.

ITLM: That really was a golden era of defining music. I wonder if we�ll ever see a time period like that again that sets the tone so much for what comes after it.

TT: It�s all in the eyes of the beholder, you know, it�s subjective. If you asked Paul and Gene, they�d tell you it was the mid-to-late 60s, so I think it depends on how old you are, it�s all generational. You meet other KISS fans, and they�re like, �oh, man, when I grew up it was (1992�s) Revenge� or something like that. That�s when they grew up, and they were discovering music and girls and learning to play guitar. It really depends on how old you were when you were enlightened!

ITLM: I�ve seen the light�and it was the KISS logo, onstage! So you�re doing a really cool thing on this tour � many KISS fans already know how extensive your work has been with veterans and how dedicated to charity you are as a band, so tell us a little about the �Hiring Our Heroes� program and how it got started.

TT: Well, first off, it�s very genuine, it�s not just a shtick or something, it really comes from the heart.   I grew up in a military family � my father is a retired Brigadier General in the Army, and Paul, Gene, and Eric are all true supporters of our veterans and their care, and we�ve done different types of things before on tours where we�ve donated so much per ticket to things like Wounded Warriors, and now we�re doing this Hiring Our Heroes program so that we can bring awareness to veterans coming back from overseas in need of jobs and giving people opportunities to work. At the end of our show, we honor the veterans onstage, and we�re doing �The Star-Spangled Banner� again, and it really gets everyone fired up.

ITLM: It�s been very cool to watch the veterans work with you backstage and as roadies over the course of the tour so far! (Note: videos and info on HOH can be found at www.kissonline.com.)

With regard to the tour, at this point in your life as a band, how do you go about putting together a setlist for a tour, especially when you�re not supporting a specific record?

TT: Coming up with a setlist is always a bit of a challenge, because different fans have different perspectives on what they want to hear. We really want to cover the classics because most of the people want to hear those, and then you have some diehard fans who�ve been around for years who want to hear some deep cuts from Dressed to Kill or something, and you want to try to keep everyone happy to a certain degree. At the end of the day, we follow our own instincts, and I think a big factor for us is the dynamic of the show � you want to keep it exciting, so there are certain songs or certain orders that keep the shows exciting.

ITLM: I have to say that my jaw dropped when I saw that you guys had recently added �Flaming Youth� (from 1976�s Destroyer) to the show.

TT: Yeah, �Flaming Youth� is a song that hasn�t been performed live much at all, and a good example of a cool song and a great singalong that we wanted to throw in there to spice things up a little bit!

ITLM: Before we go, what can you tell us about this KISS Rocks Vegas package you have coming out this month?

TT: KISS Rocks Vegas will be out on DVD and Blu-ray, and I produced it, actually! There are different packages available, there�s a deluxe package that has a 60-page hardboard book, vinyl. True KISS fans will really want to check it out!

For more on KISS, click here

For more on Tommy Thayer, click here

For more on the current tour, click here

Written By: Shadow Editor /Myglobalmind Online Magazine

Rating     10/10

What is there to fulfill if you are one of the most iconic Rock bands of all time? Is there something left to achieve after an iron clad career that has spanned four decades? If you are KISS, you do what you do best, and keep rocking until you can�t rock no more. Go ahead raise your eye brows. Sure, you may have your own preconceived notions of the KISS marketing army and the empire these guys have built selling eponymous merchandise in pretty much any market they can get into, but to be honest if you are a global Iconic band like KISS, why not? Why not use that avenue to inject even more flavor to your fan base and feed the fire? But the reality is these guys also have done tons of work with charitable foundations such as the �Wounded Warrior Project� and �The USO� among many others, is not a life fulfilled if you don�t touch others, I hope they have done that indeed.

Not only does the band do this part of their jobs well, but in the end a big part of it still comes down to their musical legacy, and the fact that they have sold over 100 million records worldwide, and are the #1 Gold Record Award Winning band of all time. They are resilient and their Army of Kiss Fans follow suit from generation to generation and encourage the next in line to watch these Rock heroes before they call it quits once and for all.

With this we come to what some may refer to as �yet another� Kiss live concert, and in true form I answer yes, in fact it is. It�s KISS in fine form once again, staging bombastic live antics, an exuberant will to Rock Out with their explosive stage pyrotechnics, and again reminding folks that yes, we are still around and you will not soon forget that. It�s hard to argue with the impact their music has left on the Rock world, even to this day. In a new millennium filled with excess, an inter connectivity of all things NOW, and the desire to have things done instantly, KISS still reminds us all that it is okay to be old school, it is fine to still wear make up on stage, and it is perfectly acceptable to try to be a �god of thunder and rock and roll�.

Kiss Rocks Vegas comes your way during their residency at The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in November 2014, soon after being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, something Paul Stanley reminds the rabid Vegas crowd about during this live set. Distributed by leader of Audio and Video, Eagle Rock Entertainment, this Blu-Ray Package comes with a CD, and not only do you get a classic set from Kiss, you also get a nice acoustic performance featuring 7 extra songs, featuring little gems like �Plaster Caster� and �Hard Luck Woman�. In this package you also get a cool booklet featuring some amazing photos. As you to come to expect from a Kiss experience, this live performance is impeccable.

KISS (Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Tommy Thayer, Eric Singer) start their set with their live staple �Detroit Rock City�, which gets the party Vegas fine folks going right from the git-go. Nice to hear �Psycho Circus� a personal favorite of mine, as well as the thunderous and never old riff fest of �War Machine� and �God of Thunder�.

Of course, no KISS set would be completed in proper fashion without �Love Gun� or �Rock and Roll All Night�, but it�s classics like �Black Diamond� that draws you back into the renaissance period of the 80�s where big hair and demonic make up made these guys a staple in every average Joe�s home, and moms everywhere preached to not let their kids listen to this �devil� music.

What you get here is a high quality Blu-Ray featuring the signature theatrics that only KISS can provide and an unfathomable taste of their live experience. The quality of this Blu Ray is a far cry from the early days of Kissology, Vol. 1: 1974-1977, even though their performances then were just as extraordinary. This is a nice career retrospect of an iconic band that will no doubt be missed when the dust has settled and will leave an palpable effect on yesterday�s and today�s Rock culture.

Tonight's KISS hometown hero #roadiefortheday is Major Loren Easter!

Photo by Keith Leroux