From: Randi Radio
This was my first KISS concert, and my sadly my last too, but it was hands-down the best concert to ever roll into E-town!!!!! The hottest too-the only other concert that sold out at Skyreach center this year was Ricky Martin!!!! I thought THAT was the best concert ever at the time (no, I'm not a teenybopper, Ricky is the only teen pop I listen to!!!), but anyone would agree with me that KISS, even at their age, could wipe up the floor with Ricky any day!!!!

Before the concert I was hanging out at the Klondike Days exposition, which was RIGHT NEXT to the Skyreach Center!!!! I drove my friend nuts cuz I wanted to try to sneak in and listen for soundcheck or something!!!!! There were an awful lot of people with KISS t-shirts at K-days. In fact there was an article in the newspaper with the headline "Festival organizers hope to kapitalize on kommited fans of KISS and KoRn". (Korn rolled into Skyreach 8 days later!!! They don't call it K-days for nothing!!!!) A few days after the concert, I heard that there was this ride at K-days that they opened for KISS!!!!! I'm still wondering where I was at the time!!!!!!

Okay, enough exclamation marks. I arrived at Skyreach at 7:00 on the dot with my K-days buddy (a visitor from Italy), my mom (Who's not a KISS fan!!!! My family is probably the only one in the world in which the parents are over 30 and don't like KISS but their kids do.), and my little sister, who's as big a fan of Paul as I am of Gene. My KISS-loathing dad helpfully drove us but still refused to go. He's thrilled that KISS are over and he's eluded them. Of course, he thinks this farewell tour is all a sham so that fish (like me!) will buy lots of tickets and merchandise. We once got into a discussion about life after KISS, I said that Gene is producing movies and dear old dad says "He'll be preparing for the next tour" It would be sweet if he was!!!! ANYWAY, back to the concert-I had my makeup done like Gene, of course, and I wore my one-of-a-kind KISS shirt, which is a $19 black tank top from Garage Clothing with a $6 iron-on KISS patch ironed on the chest. Much cheaper than the $40 KISS shirts that only come in sizes L and XL!!!!! My mom and sis had Paul makeup, my sis brought her Paul teddy bear, and my friend refused to wear makeup except for black eyeliner so he looked like a Goth freak. Our seats weren't that great (section 209) but who cares, we were gonna see KISS!!!!!! Get this-this is a KISS concert, and among the KISS and Ted Nugent shirts I saw Metallica, Ozzy, AC/DC, Def Lep, Slipknot, and Misfits shirts!!!!!! No Korn, but I did see a KISS shirt at the Korn concert!!!!!! ANYWAY, we get there at 7:00 and I hear the words "You Wanted the Best, you Got the Best..." but it was for Skid Row, thank god. I'd die if I missed any minuite of my first and last KISS concert!!!!!

I'll get the negative stuff out of the way first-OPENING ACTS ARE SCUM!!!!!! I've been to 6 concerts in my 16 years and the only opening act I have ever liked was Powerman 5000, opening for Korn. If KISS HAD to have an opening act it should have been PM5K, and Korn should have had Slipknot, or neither of them should have had ANY opening act and we'd all have been happy!!! Ricky Martin didn't need an opening act, why do KISS need 2????!!!! It's interesting that the radio called Ted and Skid Row "special guests" instead of "opening acts", I guess to boost their status as Scum of the Earth a bit. Sorry for being harsh but it's just fact that with the exception of PM5K opening acts ALWAYS suck!!! Skid Row were just terrible-they're typical of the wannabe KISS bands of the '80's that ended up washed up. I liked the last song they played, but since the sound system was really bad I couldn't really tell if it was that good. That's my other negative point-the SOUND!!!!! Most concerts at Skyreach have awful sound, and I used to blame it on the arena itself but Korn had great sound, so now I'm blaming it on the band's sound system. For KISS, the sound quality didn't really matter cuz the show was awesome, but if the music is the focus of the show then a bad sound system just sucks!!!!! During Skid Row's set the arena was near-empty!! It wasn't too full when Nugent took the stage either. His music was better than Skid Row's but I think he should keep his mouth shut and just play music. He tried so hard to come across as offensive and controversial that he was just pathetic. I actually started having some respect for him when he mouthed off about drugs and stuff, but then he ruined it with his dumb-ass remark "In Canada, if you don't speak English, get the fuck out of town!" That doesn't really offend anyone here in Alberta, but could he really have had the balls to say that in Montreal?!?!?!?! Some Latino organization in the states is already boycotting him, he better watch it or what's left of his career is gonna crash. I heard he made some similar remarks at the West Ed shooting range and he did offend more than a few people.

But enough about the crappy opening acts...on to the good stuff!!!! I remember almost every single detail (I wrote everything in my journal so I'll never forget) but I don't wanna ramble on for 10 pages so I'll just say the important stuff. After about 15 minutes after "The Nuge" dragged his sorry ass off the stage, the giant KISS curtain was lowered over the stage. A short while later, the place was packed-like I said, the only other time I've seen Skyreach this full was at Ricky Martin. Then those magic words I was convinced I'd never hear came-"All right Edmonton!!! You wanted the best, you got the best!!!! The hottest band in the world...KISS!!!!!" Then the curtain was ripped away, and Gene, Ace, and Paul were on a platform lowering them on stage while Peter was at the drums (I think-I hardly saw Peter because these huge speakers were in the way.), they blasted their way into "Detroit Rock City", and the crowd just went nuts!!!!! I screamed louder than I ever had in my life. EVERYONE, even us poor souls in the stands, stood up right away. I have NEVER seen this at any concert, where everyone in the entire arena jumps to their feet without the band asking them to, not even for Ricky Martin!!!!!

I remember all the songs they played, but not the order. I know "Deuce" came right after "Detroit Rock City". The other songs, in no particular order, were "Calling Dr. Love", "Do You Love Me", "Shout It Out Loud", "Black Diamond", "Psycho Circus", "2000 Man", "Love Gun", "Lick It Up", "Heaven's On Fire", "I Love It Loud", "God of Thunder", "Shock Me", "Cold Gin", "Suck Me", some Paul song I didn't know (it was his solo number), "100 000 Years", "Firehouse", "Beth", and "Rock and Roll All Nite".

Like I said, I don't want this to go on forever, so here are just the main highlights.

"God of Thunder" was THE coolest number!!!!! I might just be saying that cuz I'm the world's biggest Gene fan and "God of Thunder" is my favorite song, but no one could say that it wasn't cool!!!!!!! Gene came out on stage, did the bass solo, and spat blood, then was raised up onto the platform, where he looked down at the audience and saw someone who, God forbid, wasn't standing!!!! So Gene growls, "Get up! Get up or get out! Just because you have a little dick don't take it out on me!" I sure screamed during this song. As far as I'm concerned Gene owes me a new set of vocal cords. My throat is still raw, tho' maybe I can blame the Korn concert a little. My seats were on the side of the arena that Gene was nearly always on, so I shrieked almost every time he looked over at our section.

"Heaven's on Fire" come close to being equally cool. Before they started the song, Paul commanded the audience to act like animals (Animalize!) and make an animal mating call, which meant the "oooooh!" Paul sings at the beginning of the song. He made us sing (or scream, depending how good you are) "oooooh!" like 5 times before they started playing the song. Every time they sang "Heaven's on fire!", four huge flames would shoot up from the stage. It was the coolest thing, and all the way up in the stands I could feel the intense heat!!!!! I can only imagine how KISS felt on stage!!!!!!

During one song (I think it was "2000 Man") they played this really cute computer animated cartoon on the screens. It showed KISS getting whisked off stage by some portal during a concert and being transported to a fantasy world where this scantilly clad woman challenges them to a fight and kicks their asses!!!!!

You people on the floor, you don't know how lucky you are!!!! The people around Paul's mini-stage just went nuts when Paul flew out there for "Love Gun". Ricky? Who's Ricky? Forget hip-wiggling, Paul wiggled everything!!! If it was 1977 I'd have gone insane watching Paul do that, but hell even for someone his age he looks pretty damn good! When Paul ordered us to make noise to let him know that he was wanted down there, there was more noise in that arena that I've heard anywhere!!!!! But that noise meter is fake!!!!

Paul sure heaped the flattery on E-town! About 3 songs into the show he says, "Edmonton, you know what we look like! We know what you look like! But, Edmonton, you have no idea what you look like! Take a look at yourselves, Edmonton! You are beautiful!" Then the cameras turned on the audience and crowd shots (and topless women) were projected on the big screen. Later in the show, Paul says, "When I returned home from Toronto (BTW, Paul, in Canada, the second T in Toronto is silent!!!!), instead of flying back to California, I decided to drive through Canada! (crowd roar!) I admit it, I stopped in Ottawa. (crowd boo!) I admit it, I stopped in Winnipeg. (crowd boo!) I admit it, I stopped in Calgary. (crowd BOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!) But I admit it, I spend a week in Edmonton! (crowd is happy again!)" More flattery...Paul said stuff like "I never knew coffee could taste so good until I went to Second Cup!" After the concert I made fun of Paul, imitating him while pretending to read off names taped to the back of a guitar. Nice that KISS love E-town (it WAS their very first out-of-state gig in 1974, of course), but I'm pretty sure Paul says similar things to every city. I loved how KISS interacted so much with the audience!!!!! No band I've ever seen before said much more to the audience that "Stand up" or "Sing along" or "Thanks, we love you!" At the Korn concert 8 days later the band did not say ONE WORD to the audience (except, "Thanks, good nite"), the most interaction they did was stand there and glare at us in between songs until the crowd volume was raised adaquatly. KISS genuinely love and respect their fans, and that was one of the big things that made their show so great.

Before the encore KISS left us to wear out our throats (are they trying to ruin the careers of aspiring rock stars before they start???!!!!) for like 10 minutes (okay, it was less) before Peter came out and sang "Beth". It sounds so sweet live, I nearly cried (apart from Our Lady Peace's "4am" and Everclear's "Wonderful", rock songs do NOT make me cry!!!!). Peter threw roses to the lucky people in the front row (he's so sweet, it's hard to believe he's the group psychopath!) and a big disco ball lit up the arena. After that beautiful number, the crowd screamed for another extended period before the band came out and took a bow. This was interesting...it took them like 3 minutes to sort themselves into a line, and it looked like Gene and Peter were arguing over where to stand!!!!! After they got that done with, they got their instruments again and Paul made one last speech, "Too many bands today get up on stage in jeans, sneakers, t-shirts, messy hair, looking like your next-door neighboor! And no one should have to pay to see their next-door neighboor! A band like that doesn't deserve your time, money, or affection! (Now I feel guilty for liking Our Lady Peace) So the next time you're at a concert by a band who do nothing but whine about how miserable their life is, say to yourself, I wish I was HERE tonight, where I can ROCK AND ROLL ALL NIGHT AND PARTY EVERY DAY!!!!!!!" The crowd went nuts for the 500th time that night, and "Rock and Roll All Night" started. There were tons of fireworks, Gene and Ace were raised on platforms, Paul smashed his guitar, Ace had a twirling sparkler on his guitar, and confetti was sprayed out over the floor seats (lucky floor people!). Too cool.

So could anything have been better? Well, it would have been nice if I had front-row seats (I had floor tickets to the Korn show and I'm still aching! If I could have switched the KISS and Korn tickets life would be perfect, but perfect's no fun anyway!!!!), but I'm thrilled that I was actually at the concert, I got to breathe the same air as Gene and the others, and I now I've experienced the stuff I heard so many KISS fans gush about which I was convinced I would never see!!! When the concert was over and the lights went up, my sister turned to me and said, "I can't believe we saw KISS!" and I shrieked, "I don't wanna leave!!!!!!!" I would have gladly spent another two hours having my eardrums blasted!!!! On the train ride home I heard some guys bragging about making eye contact with Gene!!!!! I wish I were them, but at least I was in the same room as Gene (and I made eye contact with Jonathan Davis while getting squeezed, pushed, and kicked 8 days later!!!)!!!! Public service announcement: LEAVE YOUR LASER POINTERS AT HOME!!!!! KISS do not like laser pointers!!!!! Don't learn the hard way by having Paul shove it up your ass (although having Paul touch you doesn't sound so bad!!!!!!)!!!!! So yeah, I have to say this was the perfect concert!!!!!!

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