Black Diamond: Excerpts
Introduction:
"Why KISS?"
During the past eight years, in the course of casual conversations with people at parties and at work, I had sometimes mentioned I was writing this reference book on KISS. Besides the usual dirty looks, shielding of small children from my sight, and the appearance of hopelessness on my wife's face, one or two brave souls without fail would ask one of the following questions:
1) "Oh, yeah. Isn't that the group with the guy who stuck out his tongue? You know, Peter Criss?"
2) "I used to have their lunchbox when I was a kid! When did they break up?"
3) "Why KISS?"
The first two questions commonly produced a halfway sincere chuckle from me and were easily answered. "No, it was Gene Simmons who had the long tongue and spit blood." "No, KISS is still around making albums and touring." Those who have asked usually take the answers in stride, shake their heads, and quickly change the subject. Thus, the first two questions brought safe and swift answers. The third was never quite as easily explained.
"Why KISS?"
At first I had interpreted this question as, "Why are you bothering with a book about KISS?" I could readily explain my intentions, though it was long in telling. Several years ago I co-created a couple of KISS fanzines (fan-published magazines) called STRANGE WAYS and KISS FORUM, both of which have now gained a cult status among fans even though they have not existed for years. Because of that cult status and my articles for other fanzines, I had been fortunate in gaining several long-term friendships, meeting past and present band members on numerous occasions, and sharpening my writing skills in the process. Along with this also came letters from KISS fans who, seeing that I had worked on some fanzines, had questions about the band.
Several questions.
Tons of questions.
"What happened to the traveling amusement park KISS was supposed to have?" "Did they ever do another movie?" "What happened to MUSIC FROM 'THE ELDER'?" "Is it true they smashed a car on stage?" On and on, the questions came (and still come). Ideas that flashed from a quick comment, a joke, a throwaway line from one band member or rock critic suddenly became gospel according to a mention in some 15-year-old article a fan found. Which led the fans to the fan-press which again reported as facts such gossip.
One could not blame the fans for such errors. Most of them became fans after the band's greatest success of the 1970s, the loss of the makeup and the discarding of the superhero roles of the Demon, Starchild, the Cat and Space_Ace. That time before the band rose from the smouldering ashes of CREATURES OF THE NIGHT to the nonmakeup band of LICK IT UP. Most fans saw only the mythology that had formed around the actual history of the band.
It was not always that way. Early interviews with the band showed the members prepared to talk of their past, their work and what they wanted to accomplish. However, their popularity soon reached a pinnacle far outreaching that of just a rock and roll band, into that of a myth involving four superheroes who "happened" to play music. The stage presentation, then the album covers, the comic books, the movie -- all of these things led to a mass shaping of the group by the band, fans and the press alike. With the help of everyone in that bygone era, the magic and mystery of the band took hold and began to blur the line between reality and fiction.
The band members became secretive not only about their faces being exposed, but also of their pasts (until it became beneficial to reveal). Most fans and those less cynical of the press agreed; playing up the "bigger than life" atmosphere surrounding the band; helping and hindering the myth in the process.
Thus, coverage of the band appeared in two forms: the majority (especially in the 1970s) of "kid-gloves" criticism or faint praise from critics too frightened of an avalanche of hate mail or too confused to treat KISS as a real band; or, with outright disdain and disgust, from critics who did not understand the audience's appetite for candy-apple, hard rock music, and were probably fearful of a band succeeding without their critiques to sell the albums.
Most interviews from the late 1970s until now were of rehashed questions and poorly structured writing with few exceptions. As KISS' popularity dwindled in the early 1980s, the rock magazines took little interest in them and only at times of newly released albums did the magazines bother to write, usually in the form of a vastly under-written (and/or incorrect) retrospective. Any new articles came with the same answers to the same questions . . .the same photos to the same era.
Books that were published about KISS were of little improvement. Most of the biographies appeared in the late 1970s; thereby, even when written well, they dealt with only a fraction of the band's history. All were slapped together and sold quickly -- written to promote book sales more so than separate fact from fiction. More recent books depended heavily on those same 15-year-old articles used by fans, emphasing a "KISS can do no wrong" attitude, unable to answer some serious questions from fans, much less interest non-fans. Even the band's own book, KISSTORY, was more a picture-book (although, an ideal one for fans) than an examination of their history as an unit.
Thus, the fans had nowhere to turn but to the fan-press, a group of fans who had studied the band, their albums and tours, and wished to spread that information to others on a subject they all enjoyed. So the questions came. As I answered the letters I came to the realization that I was answering the same questions over and over. I felt that a standard list of answers would save time in getting letters out. And if I could package those answers into one book . . . .
Thus, this book is my answer to all those questions still to come. I felt confident in giving this conclusion to the question of "why KISS?" and thought it was the end of the discussion.
Yet, a new version of the question arose as well: Why did KISS succeed? Why is KISS remembered more so than many other bands of the 1970s? The makeup was not that unusual at the time, nor was special stage effects (uncommon, yes; but not unusual). Several bands were attempting similar theatrics in the 1970s, many from before KISS even got together, yet why is this band burned into the memories of so many people today? And why are people suddenly going nuts over the band again in 1996?
Even those who look down their nose at KISS, sneered at the commercialism, the hype, the simplicity of the music compared to the complication of the effects can still picture the band at their zenith. Perhaps in the dismal echos of the 1970s that presented the dilution of funk into disco, the twang of country into sugary pop, and the anarchy of punk into the sappiness of new wave, KISS is remembered as one of the few refreshingly clear piece of uncorrupted rock and roll. Or perhaps those who could not stand KISS now chuckle at the thought of that era and find that it was kind of fun and silly for some reason unknown even to them.
In a sense, the band holds the same fascination and cheap thrills that the summer carnival brought to the small towns of our youth: the rattling old ferris wheel that filled one with a combination of excitement and dread as the bolts creeked under the weight of the wheel turning around; the sideshow games that made us glad to spend too much to win a worthless kewpie doll; the ludicrous suspension of logical thinking as we believed that the woman bathed in reflective lighting in the glass booth might actually be a mermaid. All these feelings came together at the carnival and in the following and fandom of KISS.
Undoubtedly, for those who wish to see, there are questions to answer, tales to be told and tricks to be uncovered. All is to appear here. Yet, like a barker at the carny would say, those things you seek can only be found inside. Once you have been admitted, you may see some strings pulled, find the snacks to be just sugary confections, realize that the freaks are just normal men in costumes and in the end it will not really matter. The game may be exposed, but the illusion remains for all to see . . .
. . .As the music lingers in the warm summer wind.