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Daily Archives: August 7, 2013
Renowned R&B/jazz guitarist John Tropea Discusses Sessions For Peter Criss’ 1978 Solo Album
Tim McPhate | KissFAQ
KissFAQ has launched Back In The Solo Album Groove: The KISS Albums. 35 Years Later…, an ambitious multi-week retrospective dedicated to arguably the biggest milestone in KISStory: the 1978 KISS solo albums. Today, the site has published an interview with renowned R&B/jazz guitarist John Tropea, who added his six-string talents to select tracks on Peter Criss’ 1978 solo album.
The following are excerpts from Tropea’s interview with KissFAQ’s Tim McPhate:
On the direction of the material
KF: Peter’s solo album draws heavily upon R&B and traditional rock and roll flavors. And of course, KISS are very much straight-ahead hard rock. Do you recall that the material on this project reflecting a different direction than KISS’ typical musical blueprint?
JT: Oh, I absolutely was aware of that. I mean, playing acoustic guitar on Peter Criss’ record definitely takes it out of a hard rock kind of thing. It was definitely understood that it was not the same thing as a KISS record. It was his solo album. Today, we would call it a vanity project. But not a vanity project that’s vanity like, but for somebody who’s a star.
Recollections of the tracking process
KF: You’ve mentioned some of the other musicians on the tracks you played on were drummer Allan Schwartzberg and bassist Neil Jason. At these session, I believe there was also guitarist Elliott Randall, and pianist Richard T. Bear. Do you recall tracking with the band live? Or were your parts an overdub situation?
JT: As I remember, I think it was Elliott and myself together with the rhythm section. There may have been a day when we went in and either fixed guitars or did some acoustics on top of what we did. I’m sure there was a day like that because we usually did the rhythm section first with the percussion and then we would sweeten it with any additional guitar solos, doubling and whatever.
His impression of the tracks he played on:
KF: John, I sent you the three tracks you played on: “I Can’t Stop The Rain,” “Easy Thing” and “Rock Me Baby.” In listening back to these tracks 35 years later, what’s your take?
JT: My first impression is their really good. I think going into digital recording today, they really had a nice production. Everything was good. I was proud to be on it.
Three Sides of the Coin #35 – Gene Simmons & Paul Stanley open up…
Michael Brandvold
Former KISS Publicist Carol Kaye Recalls When KISS Were On Top Of The World In 1978
Tim McPhate | KissFAQ
KissFAQ has launched Back In The Solo Album Groove: The KISS Albums. 35 Years Later…, an ambitious multi-week retrospective dedicated to arguably the biggest milestone in KISStory: the 1978 KISS solo albums. Today, the site has published an interview with Carol Kaye, who worked as the band’s publicist at the Press Office, a subsidiary of Aucoin Management.
The following are excerpts from Kaye’s interview with KissFAQ’s Tim McPhate:
On the scope of the solo album project:
KF: In the context of the 1978 record industry, just how big of an event was the KISS solo albums?
CK: It was huge. It was huge. The buzz, the momentum and the excitement leading up to the releases and then the actual releases. And of course, people were like, “Is Gene selling more than Paul? Is Peter pissed off? What about Ace?” It was really crazy. But that wasn’t coming from the band; they were happy for each other. It wasn’t an internal “let’s see who sells more” [competition]. It wasn’t that way at all. But it was an amazing thing.. They were on top of the world and being part of it, we were just thrown into this with them. From the minute we got into the office in the morning, the phones were ringing off the hook. We did crazy, crazy things. We did fun things. I remember doing events like the one where there was a painted Volkswagen on display at Sotheby’s with all of the KISS faces on it and we had a big press event about that and [wrote] press releases about it. It was so creative and that’s how I still think of my business. I try to be an extremely creative publicist, which I learned from the greatest band in the world.
KF: The press kits for the solo albums have been described as comparable to those put together by major Hollywood studios to promote movies. Just how atypical were they for a music release at the time?