If you look up Kiss merchandise, you will begin to understand just how much of a musical monolith they are. What started as the desire to impress audiences with make-up and pyrotechnics has become a global empire, with the image becoming something separate from the music altogether. The characters they embody have their own backstories, taking on a life of their own outside of the musical outfit, and the band is unlike anything we have ever seen before as a result.
When they were originally asked why they decided to wear make-up, Kiss explained that it was because they didn’t feel as though bands had much of a sense of identity anymore. It seemed to them like there wasn’t the unity that bands had in the ‘60s, and so they wanted to try and make a band where it was clear that they were all united.
“The Beatles, in many ways,” said Paul Stanley when asked what band he modelled Kiss on, “Those ‘60s British groups all looked like real bands. No member of The Beatles could have fit into the Stones. No member of The Who could have been in the Dave Clark Five. You had unified images of those bands, and at the same time, there was an emphasis on the individual members.”
It wasn’t just that they looked like a unit with their make-up, though. Gene Simmons noted that by having such an individual identity, Kiss was able to make music that dabbled in various genres. “We also took pride in having the same freedom The Beatles had,” he said, “Their philosophy was, ‘No matter what kind of music we do, it’s still The Beatles’. That’s what was amazing about them… The Beatles were not trapped in that way. They could do music hall, psychedelia – anything – and they did. Yet somehow it always sounded like The Beatles.”
Of course, as is the case with any band, Kiss wasn’t always a united front. In fact, the only two original members still in the band are Gene Simmons and Paul Stanely. The other two original members, Ace Frehley and Peter Criss, left long ago. There are a number of reasons why the band split; for Frehley, it’s because he wanted to start a successful solo career. Meanwhile, Criss had internal struggles that were starting to impact the band. Since then, there have been a number of new members playing rhythm guitar and drums for the band, which leads us to the other impact that their make-up has.
“If there was a red light, he’d go through at full speed. It just seems to be in his DNA.”
