Ace Frehley‘s new album, ‘Space Invader,’ includes a song (‘What Every Girl Wants’) that makes use of the phrase “shakin’ sharp shooter.” As fans may recall, this isn’t the first time Frehley’s used those words in song — in fact, he originally tried to use them on his last album with Kiss, 1998′s ‘Psycho Circus.’
“‘Into the Void’ on ‘Psycho Circus’ used to be called ‘Shakin’ Sharp Shooter,’” Frehley tells Ultimate Classic Rock in an exclusive video interview, which you can watch above. “That was a song I originally wrote with that music, and [Paul Stanley] and [Gene Simmons] didn’t think it was working with the rest of the songs the the record.”
Determined to wrangle a songwriting credit onto the album, Frehley pressed on undaunted. “I said to Gene, ‘Give me half an hour,’ and I went up into another room in the studio and I wrote all the lyrics for ‘Into the Void’ — boom!” he laughs. “I work good under pressure.”
According to Frehley, his struggle getting that song onto the album was just one part of the band’s worsening environment in general. “‘Psycho Circus’ I had very limited involvement,” he says. “I wasn’t invited to the studio. When you hear Paul and Gene talk about it, it’s like I didn’t show up — the reason I’m not on any of the songs is because I wasn’t asked to be on them. I just wasn’t invited to any of the sessions.”
Frehley also shared the story behind ‘Hide Your Heart,’ a cut co-written by Stanley that ended up on Frehley’s 1989 album ‘Trouble Walkin” — and released the same month as Kiss’ ‘Hot in the Shade’ LP, which contained its own version of the song.
“Holly Knight, who was one of the co-writers of that song, was a friend of mine, and she recommended that song to me and sent me the demo when I was getting songs together for that album,” Frehley recalls. “Independently, Kiss decided to cut that song. I had no idea they were tracking it, they had no idea I was tracking it. After I had recorded it and spent thousands of dollars on the production, Gene called up and said ‘Could you please take that off your record, because we’re putting that out as our first single?’ I said no way.”