From: Ron Ivanjack
Champaign was my 12 show of the Farewell Tour and unless I get lucky enough to go to Madison Square Garden when that happens, this will be my final Kiss concert-the 21st overall. I consider myself so lucky to have seen the band I’ve loved for 22 years so many times.

The arena was fairly packed with over 8000 people. This was the first time that I’ve seen them in a college town where there was actually a good amount of college kids in attendance. The crowd was pretty loud and energetic. Skid Row went over quite well no doubt due to the demographic of the crowd. The changeover time between Skid Row and Kiss is barely 20 minutes. With Ted out, the crew has really stepped up.

Just before 9, the lights went out and heard those magical words one last time, “You wanted the best, you got the best, the hottest band in the world, KISS”. I’ve never heard truer words. Not once has Kiss disappointed and this was certainly no exception. No changes in the set list bit it didn’t matter much to me. Everything went off from a technical end as opposed to Chicago the night before when Ace’s guitar didn’t fly. He went over to find the hook and it wasn’t there. Peter forgot to stop playing at the end of Shock Me. Peter did have the black teardrop under his eye and before Beth mentioned this was the last time he’d sing this song for Chicago. When the band came out for bows, Paul corrected Peter in that we were in Champaign. Peter went back to the mic and apologized to the crowd. Also, when Peter tried to break into Black Diamond, Ace kept making noises with his guitar and Peter cracked up. In the “Got you under my thumb” line where he usually mentions Paul, Ace or Gene, he actually said “Catman’s got you under my thumb”. Gene also did the Budweiser “Wazzuppp” before 100,000 years as he did last night in Chicago.

With the final burst of pyro, Kiss left the stage. I still haven’t quite come to grips with the fact that there will be no more shows to look forward to but I can’t complain. Kiss has already given me so much. They are a part of my everyday life and I will never forget them.

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