Wednesday, January 8, 2014

40 Year Itch : The Selling of Kiss




[Purchase]


On January 8, 1974 Future Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Kiss performed a special dress rehearsal for the press at Fillmore East in New York City. A representative from Rolling Stone wrote:

The four Kissers play very heavy, loud and ultimately monotonous rock in the Black Sabbath tradition; they wear sheet-white makeup and black leather and studs. Midway in their act, dry ice overtakes the stage and the bassist flashes a flaming torch in the air. And they finish in a rain of firecrackers. A sure crowd-pleaser. For crowds of kiddies, that is...

Kiss originally only sold 75,000 copies of the debut album despite heavy touring and publicity. This strange appearance on The Mike Douglas Show probably did not help matters. Before playing "Firehouse", Gene Simmons tries to convince Douglas he's evil incarnate. But comedienne Totie Fields says beneath all that make up Simmons is just a nice Jewish kid. "You can't hide the hook", she says in reference to his nose.



 

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