Tim McPhate | KISSfaq
Art director reveals the creative process behind the mysterious artwork for KISS’ 1981 concept album “Music From The Elder”
In conjunction with KissFAQ’s month-long NovElder retrospective, longtime KISS art director Dennis Woloch revealed the creative process behind the album artwork for KISS’ 1981 “Music From The Elder.” Among many other topics, Woloch detailed the challenges and design nuances inherent to working on this particular KISS album. Additionally, Woloch revealed that Manhattan Model Shop‘s Bill Finneran created The Elder” door, which is a never-before-revealed piece of KISStory. Finally, Woloch discussed the challenges of working with KISS and the band’s lack of acknowledgement of his work in recent years.
The following are excerpts from Woloch’s interview.
About the art concept:
KF: Once you learned about the album’s details, what was the process for developing the creative direction for “The Elder” album art?
DW: Well, I got as much information of what the album was about as I could stand. A lot of it seemed to me to be (pauses)… you know, it was ground that was gone over before by others. I mean to me, it would be like somebody coming out and saying, “I’m thinking of writing a book series or a movie about a little boy and a sorcerer that becomes his mentor.” And I say, “Well, wait a minute. Didn’t we just see that some place?” That’s kind of how “The Elder” felt to me, even though it was ’81. They weren’t breaking any new
ground. Maybe in their minds this was all very… if you want to make something sound important, you shroud it in mystery, even though it isn’t important. That’s kind of how “The Elder” felt to me.
KF: I know some fans would agree with you. But there is a group of fans who absolutely love the album.
DW: Yeah, I mean, this is before I heard a note of music or anything else. When the concept was being explained to me, I’m thinking, it’s like your eyes roll back in your head and you say, “Oh crap.” Not because KISS is not doing KISS music, I couldn’t care less. Let them stretch their creative wings but could you be a little bit more… unique. It just sounded like old stuff to me when I first heard about it. I got into it after a while.
KF: So how did you actually start in terms of a concept?
DW: I guess I looked at some of the titles. I didn’t hear any of the music. I had no idea… they just kind of tried to explain [it]. You know that paragraph… “In the beginning, The Elder…”
KF: The text in the gatefold.
DW: Yes, that thing. I may have had some of that verbiage. I’m not sure. But I guess I had some rough outline of what it was about and the feeling I was supposed to be evoking, a little bit of the story: the young boy, he goes to where “The Elder” resides and all of that stuff. Early on, I got the image of a little boy in front of a big dungeon-type door, or a castle door. And I looked through some of my illustrators annuals, samples of illustrators work and photographers work and stuff like that — just trying to get something going in my mind. I saw a picture of a little boy, about the right age — 10, 11,12 — and he had his back to the viewer but he turned around like if you said (whispers), “Hey, kid.” And he turned around looking over his shoulder, like a little cautiously. I don’t even know what the background was, I don’t know where the kid was standing or what situation he was in or anything. But the kid was the perfect age. He was a perfect-looking little boy. I loved the expression that the illustrator had on his face. So I said, “I’m going to use this image. I’m just going to rip it off for the layout.” Not that we would use it for the final or anything, you can’t do that. [It was] just for my layout, you know it saved me four hours of sitting there trying to draw a little boy when I could just do this. So I did that, I cut him out and I guess I got a dungeon door someplace and I put him in front of this scary wooden door, like he was just standing there just about to go in. But then he turned around, it’s like he was thinking, “Should I be doing this? I’m in a dangerous situation. This is spooky.” It looked great, it had a nice mood. And I showed that to the guys. I think that was the only layout I did and I don’t remember what they said really and I don’t want to invent things. Apparently they shot that down. I guess they just said, “Maybe just a hand and a knocker,” somebody must have suggested that to me.
Making “The Elder” door
KF: Where did you get the door?
DW: I had it made by a place called Manhattan Model Shop, I think.
KF: Was it a full-scale door?
DW: No, it was about half of a door. Full scale, but it was only about a half.
[Manhattan Model Shop] was on Great Jones Street, downtown. I don’t think it’s there anymore. The guy’s name was Bill Finneran, I don’t know how I remember that. I walked around Manhattan looking at churches because I figured old churches would have the closes kind of a door that I was looking for. Don’t forget: no computers, no Google, no Internet, no nothing.
The challenges of working with KISS and the Glickman/Marks agency’s lack of recognition in recent years:
KF: How do you view the state of album art and design creativity in the digital age?
DW: I’m no expert to comment. I can’t even think of any current CD designs that are out there now. I wouldn’t even know where to look. Who do you look at? Who is popular now? The music today leaves me cold… totally cold.
What’d you think about “Sonic Boom”?
KF: There are a few songs that I like. The album design I didn’t particularly like.
DW: Yeah, that’s Michael Doret, who did “Rock And Roll Over.” But this is a case, see these guys have had no contact with me since they fired Howard Marks. And frankly I don’t know why.
KF: That’s a natural question.
DW: I don’t know, because they’re assholes, maybe. Could be. (laughs)
You know, I think in their mind… and they were all friendly with me. I had no problems with any of these guys. I mean, privately I had a couple of problems with Gene. I wanted to beat him up but thank God I didn’t. But he doesn’t know how close he came…at least twice. (laughs)
They fired my boss, I guess they wanted nothing to do with anything from that era or that office. If you notice, all their interviews, and their KISStory, and all the crap they put out about themselves, they don’t mention the agency. They don’t mention Howard Marks or Dennis Woloch. They don’t. And I’m someone who worked slavishly hard for almost 15 years, you know because half the time there was a KISS project on my drawing board. The other half the time, I was trying to do my other work, which was the advertising agency work. So they got the best of me and I tried real hard for those guys. I think I did very well under the circumstances but they’re like [trying to] rewrite history.
It’s like, “Oh, that never happened. What are you talking about?” Where do you think you got all that creativity and all that marketing stuff, that didn’t come out of their heads. That came out of the agency’s head. It came out of the agency. When did they take off? When “Alive!” came out. Who did “Alive!”? The agency, it was the first one we did. It’s not a coincidence.
KF: With some interviews that Gene and Paul give nowadays, they really don’t mince words when talking about Ace and Peter. That is difficult for some fans to take.
DW: Yeah, yeah. I mean I think Peter and Ace were really impossible at times. They were part of the original thing and nothing can change that and they always feel that they have to put them down somehow. I just think they’ve just ignored us in their history. Which I guess they have every right to do but they can’t misrepresent because if they do that then they’re just being wrong. But they should give credit where credit is due, I think. But they don’t.
KF: My take has always been that KISS have gone a long way, but they had a lot of help along the way. A lot of help.
DW: They most certainly did. They had a lot of help from Bill Aucoin, who was a creative guy. They dumped him after awhile, and us. But we were the guys that got them there. We really were.
KF: Neil Bogart and Casablanca, too.
DW: That’s right. Neil really believed in them. He was very excited and he did his thing. I liked Neil, I didn’t know him well, but I knew him a little bit. I went out to his house in California one time, he invited us. He was a nice guy
KF: Howard Marks passed away in 1990, correct?
DW: 1990. Yes. That’s when he died. The office closed very shortly after that because we just had no business at that time. He was sick for a couple of years so he wasn’t around a lot. So Roseanne Shelnutt, that was his girlfriend, and the other vice president of the agency and me, who was the creative director and vice president — we tried to get business and tried to hold it together. But basically it was just a money pit, paying very expensive rent there on Madison Avenue. And you know, we had no clients so we just had to close it up. So we did after he died. That was sad man, it was the end of an era.
Full Dennis Woloch interview:
http://kissfaq.com/novelder/interview_dennis_woloch.html
About NovElder:
Through a series of brand-new KissFAQ interviews, original features and related special content, NovElder will shine a spotlight on “Music From The Elder” like never before throughout the month of Novemeber. More than 10 hours of interviews were conducted with various individuals who either worked on the project or have a connection of sorts, including professionals who have never told their “Elder story.” These interviews will provide interesting insights and unique perspectives regarding the album’s creative process and this fascinating period in KISStory, in addition to fun anecdotes and personal recollections. A series of topical features will shed more light on KISS’ activity in 1981 and early 1982 and dissect the album further with in-depth musical analysis, biographical information on the album’s participants, a revised KissFAQ Album Focus, and much more. NovElder will also take a look at the climate of the rock genre in 1981 and look at the bloodline of rock concept albums.
The odyssey continues this November at http://www.kissfaq.com/novelder/