Kiss News

The 40 greatest KISS songs ever � as voted for by you! (Pt.2 30-21)

You wanted the best� you got the best. We asked you to vote for your all-time favorite KISS songs � and you did so in your thousands.

To celebrate the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame finally recognizing KISS, as well as the 40th anniversary of the band�s first album, here�s the second part of our KISS kountdown.

Words: Geoff Barton, Paul Elliott, Ken Sharp



30

I Want You

Paul Stanley: �I wrote I Want You at a soundcheck on stage in England. There was something about being on some of those stages that just felt so magical because my heroes all played on them, and you kind of summon the spirits to enter your body.�



29

Calling Dr Love

This Gene Simmons jewel from Rock And Roll Over found its inspiration in an unlikely place: the legendary comedy trio the Three Stooges. The infectious �calling doctor�� chorus was cribbed from dialogue pulled straight from Calling All Curs, a 1939 episode of their TV show.The 40 greatest Kiss songs ever � as voted for by you! (Pt.2 30-21)

You wanted the best� you got the best. We asked you to vote for your all-time favorite KISS songs � and you did so in your thousands.

To celebrate the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame finally recognizing KISS, as well as the 40th anniversary of the band�s first album, here�s the second part of our KISS kountdown. The first part, Nos. 40-31, is here.

Words: Geoff Barton, Paul Elliott, Ken Sharp



30

I Want You

Paul Stanley: �I wrote I Want You at a soundcheck on stage in England. There was something about being on some of those stages that just felt so magical because my heroes all played on them, and you kind of summon the spirits to enter your body.�



29

Calling Dr Love

This Gene Simmons jewel from Rock And Roll Over found its inspiration in an unlikely place: the legendary comedy trio the Three Stooges. The infectious �calling doctor�� chorus was cribbed from dialogue pulled straight from Calling All Curs, a 1939 episode of their TV show.



28

Crazy Crazy Nights

The band�s biggest hit of the 80s was Rock And Roll All Nite with a persecution complex, Paul Stanley proclaiming: �They try to tell us that we don�t belong/But that�s alright, we�re millions strong.� It�s as daft as it is brilliant.



27

I Love It Loud

As its title makes abundantly clear, this is the ultimate no-brainer rock anthem. Set to an earth-shaking drum beat, I Love It Loud is Gene Simmons�s hymn to heavy metal. �Rock on, I wanna be President!� he declares, that famous tongue firmly in cheek.



26

Creatures Of The Night

In 1982, Kiss delivered the heaviest album of their career in Creatures Of The Night. And it was the first song written for the album that became its title track and mission statement: a bombastic, balls-out heavy metal anthem.



25

I Stole Your Love

Paul Stanley: �I Stole Your Love came quickly. It was kind of like the sister song to Love Gun. Swagger and attitude. That song was influenced in some ways by the Deep Purple song Burn.�



24

Rock Bottom

A rare Stanley/Frehley collaboration, this 1975 classic from Dressed To Kill is the perfect example of Kiss� distinctive brand of light-and-shade dynamics, crazy-gluing a delicate, soft interlude into locomotive, piledriving rock thunder. The style was further explored on I Want You from 1976�s Rock And Roll Over album.



23

Hard Luck Woman

A little more country than rock�n�roll � and covered by Garth Brooks � this was allegedly written by Paul Stanley as a possible song for Rod Stewart. Which probably explains why Peter Criss sings it in a raspy style that apes Rod The Mod.



22

Got To Choose

Paul Stanley: �There was a band called Boomerang which featured some of the guys from Vanilla Fudge, and they did a version of Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won�t Do) by Wilson Pickett. I�m pretty sure that�s the riff I used in Got To Choose. It�s one of my favourite Kiss songs.�



21

Rocket Ride

Always a loose cannon, Ace Frehley appeared on only one of five studio tracks included on Alive II, but on that one track, Rocket Ride, he was smoking. Written and sung by Ace, it�s heavy and trippy� like Kiss on drugs.

To celebrate the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame finally recognizing KISS, as well as the 40th anniversary of the band�s first album, here�s the first part of our KISS kountdown.

Words: Geoff Barton, Paul Elliott, Ken Sharp



40

War Machine

One of the heaviest tracks Kiss have recorded was, surprisingly, co-written by Gene Simmons, Bryan Adams and Adams�s writing partner Jim Vallance. Also surprising is the fact that Simmons came up with the bones of the song while tinkering on a cheap miniature synthesiser. Bombastic, powerful and badass, The Demon�s foreboding vocals on War Machine are full of scowling menace.



39

Tomorrow

Paul Stanley has dismissed 1980�s Unmasked as �a pretty crappy album�, but there is one track on the record that he still loves. �Tomorrow is a really great song,� he says. He�s right � it�s a pop-rock classic, and the hit that never was.
To celebrate the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame finally recognising Kiss, as well as the 40th anniversary of the band�s first album, here�s the first part of our Kiss kountdown.

Words: Geoff Barton, Paul Elliott, Ken Sharp



40

War Machine

One of the heaviest tracks Kiss have recorded was, surprisingly, co-written by Gene Simmons, Bryan Adams and Adams�s writing partner Jim Vallance. Also surprising is the fact that Simmons came up with the bones of the song while tinkering on a cheap miniature synthesiser. Bombastic, powerful and badass, The Demon�s foreboding vocals on War Machine are full of scowling menace.



39

Tomorrow

Paul Stanley has dismissed 1980�s Unmasked as �a pretty crappy album�, but there is one track on the record that he still loves. �Tomorrow is a really great song,� he says. He�s right � it�s a pop-rock classic, and the hit that never was.



38

Forever

Although the 1989 album Hot In The Shade is now all but forgotten, this masterful, acoustic-based power ballad was a Top 10 hit in the US. Paul wrote it with the king of power ballads � and of bad hair � Michael Bolton.



37

Unholy

Gene Simmons: �I got the idea for Unholy from a song that [Kiss collaborator] Adam Mitchell wrote that Doro Pesch recorded called Unholy Love. I just loved the word �unholy�. Vinnie Vincent and I wrote the lyric together.�



36

Sure Know Something

For 1979�s Dynasty album, Paul Stanley wrote this brilliant pop song with producer Vini Poncia, co-writer of Leo Sayer�s hit You Make Me Feel Like Dancing. With its smooth funk vibe and killer chorus, Sure Know Something is high-class Kiss.



35

Modern Day Delilah

From 2009�s Sonic Boom, this track incorporates all the hallmarks of a quintessential Kiss tune: a fiery, muscular riff hot-wired to a soaring lead vocal by Stanley (the song�s writer), and sporting tough, kiss-off lyrics to a love gone bad. The band�s first single in 11 years, the song was the opener on the Sonic Boom tour.



34

Makin� Love

A cast-iron classic of Kiss�s sexually charged oeuvre, this torrid tale of a marathon all-night �session� was co-written by Paul Stanley and Sean Delaney (who also helped develop the band�s on-stage choreography). Special mention for Ace Frehley, whose guitar playing here is at its most loose and lethal.



33

100,000 Years

Gene Simmons: �I read a book called 100,000 Years where 100,000 years ago we were visited by aliens. Also Einstein�s theory of relativity. I was reading all kinds of space and time continuance stuff, and it was all swirling around my head. I showed this stuff to Paul, and he�s going: �What�s 100,000 years?� I said: �Let�s just try it.� And then Paul came up with some stuff and I added the riff.�



32

Nowhere To Run

It�s Kiss�s lost classic � a great song pissed away as a makeweight on the stopgap �best of� album Killers. It�s powerful and melodic � vintage Paul Stanley � and its thrumming intro echoes The Who�s Pinball Wizard.



31

Heaven�s On Fire

Beginning with Paul Stanley yodelling, this is one of the great Kiss songs of the 80s. Assisted by �hit doctor� buddy Desmond Child, Paul based Heaven�s On Fire around a huge chanted chorus and created a hair-metal masterpiece.

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KISS is everywhere!

Cheers!
Daniel Basurto

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame continues to attempt to restore its questionable credibility and glimpses behind the facade with nonsense and half truths.

The truth is Joel Peresman and the rest of the decision makers refused to consider the induction of ANY former KISS members and specifically the late Eric Carr and Bruce Kulick who were both in the band through multi platinum albums and worldwide tours and DIDN'T wear makeup.

There is no getting around the reality that the Hall of Fame's favoritism and preferential treatment towards artists they like goes as far as ASKING the Grateful Dead how many members THEY wanted the hall to induct and following their directive while also including a songwriter who was never in the actual band.

Let's just accept the truth as it is and move on.

- Paul Stanley


Billboard Article:

By Gary Graff

With the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction ceremony looming closer, neither Kiss nor the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation seem ready to relax the entrenched positions that led to the group's decision not to perform April 10 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Kiss, according to frontman Paul Stanley, is upset that the Rock Hall plans to induct only the group's founding lineup and tells Billboard that discussions about subsequent members "was shut down as a non-starter."The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame continues to attempt to restore its questionable credibility and glimpses behind the facade with nonsense and half truths.

The truth is Joel Peresman and the rest of the decision makers refused to consider the induction of ANY former KISS members and specifically the late Eric Carr and Bruce Kulick who were both in the band through multi platinum albums and worldwide tours and DIDN'T wear makeup.

There is no getting around the reality that the Hall of Fame's favoritism and preferential treatment towards artists they like goes as far as ASKING the Grateful Dead how many members THEY wanted the hall to induct and following their directive while also including a songwriter who was never in the actual band.

Let's just accept the truth as it is and move on.

- Paul Stanley


Billboard Article:

By Gary Graff

With the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction ceremony looming closer, neither Kiss nor the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation seem ready to relax the entrenched positions that led to the group's decision not to perform April 10 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Kiss, according to frontman Paul Stanley, is upset that the Rock Hall plans to induct only the group's founding lineup and tells Billboard that discussions about subsequent members "was shut down as a non-starter."

Nevertheless, Stanley says Kiss feels that honoring the other six musicians who have played in the band is "a very valid argument considering that there are people who played on multi-platinum albums and played for millions of people and were very important for the continuation of the band. And clearly when you've got a busload of Grateful Dead (members) who have been inducted and guys in the Chili Peppers who nobody knows who they are because they played on the very earliest albums are inducted...The list goes on and on of the inconsistencies. Now, I'm not pointing fingers at any of those people, but I'm certainly pointing a finger at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The only consistencies are inconsistencies and the rules clearly are there are no rules because the criteria for how and who gets in is purely based upon a personal like or dislike. And when I feel we're being treated unfairly, I have issues with that."

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation CEO Joel Peresman says that the decision about who to induct from any band is made by the Rock Hall's nominating committee as well as an adjunct group of "scholars and historians" familiar with specific inductees and genres. "This isn't chemistry or physics; it's not an exact science," Peresman acknowledges. "Sometimes there's an entire body of work up until (the artists) are inducted, other times it's a specific period of time that established the band as who they are. With Kiss there wasn't one person here who didn't agree that the reason Kiss was nominated and is being inducted was because of what was established in the 70s with Ace (Frehley), with Peter (Criss), with Paul and Gene (Simmons). That's what put them on that map."

Peresman adds that Kiss "is a unique situation where you have artists who wear makeup as part of what the band's about," but the Rock Hall felt that the later members -- including current guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer, who are wearing Frehley and Criss' makeup, respectively -- "are fine musicians who...basically have the same makeup and are the same characters that Ace and Peter started. It's not like they created these other characters with different makeup and playing different songs. They took the persona of characters that were created by Ace and Peter." Persman notes that last year Heart was in a similar position, where the Rock Hall chose to induct the original 70s sextet and not later musicians that played in the band.

But Stanley feels the situation with Kiss is a bit more personal. "That it's 14 years on (of eligibility) and we're getting into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is a clear indication that the people who hide behind that moniker don't like us, but it reached a point where it was so absurd and ludicrous (to exclude Kiss) that they caved," he says. "It's like them swallowing a teaspoon of medicine they don't want. It's a bitter pill for them to swallow, so they're making it as small as possible."

Stanley says that the Rock Hall asked Kiss to perform as the original quartet, in make-up, but he and Simmons -- who have been playing with three-time Kiss member Singer again since 2002 and Thayer since 2004 -- were not confident the performance would be up to standard. "Honestly, I don't want to roll the dice and possibly negatively impact on what I personally have been involved in building for 40 years," he explains. "I have too much invested at this point. It really is a can of worms that I feel is better off left closed." Peresman, meanwhile, says the Rock Hall has no plans for a performance stand-in for Kiss at the ceremony. "We have other artists, other inductees showing up and performing when they can," Peresman says. "We're very hopeful that Ace and Peter and Paul and Gene come and accept their award. We're obviously honored to have them inducted."

And Stanley expects that to be the case.

"There's been a lot of issues, and perhaps the best way to deal with them is to celebrate the four original guys and go there and get our award and to look past the differences that will always be there," he says. "It doesn't change the big picture; we have differences and we will continue to have differences. It doesn't change who I want to play with and who represents Kiss. There are a lot of people who are great inspirations to me, and still are, who are in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and for that reason and the fact that fans want us in there, I graciously and vigorously will be there to accept the award. We should salute and enjoy an evening that celebrates what the four of us started. But just because I'm getting inducted doesn't mean it's turned into a love fest."

This week, Kiss announced a co-headlining tour with Def Leppard. Stanley, meanwhile, publishes his autobiography "Face The Music: A Life Exposed" on April 8, with book signings being put together throughout the month.