By SoDak
Whatever the market gimmick, in the mid- to late 1970s, Kiss seemed to be everywhere. When I was five years old, I received Alive II (1977) for a Christmas present. I sat in my bedroom, listening to the vinyl on my suitcase record player, as I stared at the back cover, wondering who these people were. Gene Simmons looked possessed with his makeup smeared and fake blood dripping down his chin. The songs were simple, easy to remember. I sang along to almost every song. I really liked “Shock Me,” on which Ace Frehley sang lead vocals. Whenever we went to Woolworth’s, I begged my mother to buy me another Kiss record. Within the next two years, I had Kiss (1974), Destroyer (1976), Rock and Roll Over (1976), Love Gun (1977), and all the Kiss solo records from 1978. I also had Kiss trading cards, a model of a Kiss van, and Kiss posters covering my bedroom walls—remember I was five to six years old.
At the time, I was captivated by Ace’s 1978 solo record. The opening track “Rip It Out” has a very catchy guitar riff. Ace’s voice, with the slight echo, is melodic and rough. Sitting on the floor, spinning the record, I would bob my head to the rhythm. “Speedin’ Back to My Baby,” with its bluesy-glam vibe, was not as interesting as “Rip It Out,” but the lines “maybe I should turn around, maybe I should stop,” were creepy. (Today, the cadence of these lines make me think about some mid-Black Flag songs, strange, but true.) At six years old, I did not know what “Snow Blind” was about, which is probably a good thing. While I liked the slower “What’s on Your Mind,” I loved Ace’s cover of “New York Groove.” I also thought the instrumental “Fractured Mirror” was quite beautiful. I would often drop the needle at the start of side two to hear the cover song, and then skip to the closing instrumental.
Between 1977 and 1979, I devoted a lot of time listening to Kiss records, then I mostly stopped, as there were so many other bands to hear. In many ways, Kiss were/are clowns, yet they were part of my musical journey. At school fairs in the 1970s, my brother and I would have our faces painted as members of Kiss. While Ace was then my favorite member, the face painter never had silver, so we had to opt for the makeup of Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, and even Peter Criss.
Ace was generally a fucking mess, a sloppy performer, and an idiot. I saw him “perform” once as a solo artist, as he mumbled through the set. Ace stupidly celebrated the tyrant in the White House. And, today, December 7, 2025, his bandmates in Kiss have the shame of gracing the stage with the fascist Trump at the Kennedy Center, where sexist pigs and dipshits will shake hands.
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