Category Archives: KISS News

The Kiss Kruise to Rock Again in 2018

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Music Desk News

merica’s #1 Gold Record Award winning group of all time and iconic Rock and Roll Hall Of Famers, KISS have once again partnered up with the industry leaders in music festivals at sea, Sixthman to announce the upcoming voyage of The KISS Kruise VIII. The cruise is set to sail on Halloween October 31st 2018 on Norwegian Jade leaving out of Miami, FL.. For more information and to register for the pre-sale visit TheKissKruise.com.

The announcement comes on the heels of the recent return of the sold-out KISS Kruise VII. The KISS Kruise VII left from New Orleans, LA on Norwegian Pearl visiting Cozumel and Costa Maya, Mexico. Along the way, the KISS Navy was treated to a first-ever KISS storytellers sail away set as well as 2 full-scale KISS masked concerts in the ship’s indoor Stardust Theater. Joining the musical legends on board were Bruce and Bob Kulick, Extreme, Steel Panther, Derek St. Homes, Big Rock Show, BITERS, Led Zepagain, Hard Day’s Night, Sophie Simmons, The Dives, Jake J and the Killjoys, and Ki.

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Gene Simmons Praises Women for talking about sexual harassment

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John Kennedy | Klite

Gene Simmons said Tuesday he’s glad women are speaking out about sexual assault and harassment in the entertainment industry.

“I want all the jackasses to go to jail for being improper,” he told Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford on Today. “It’s just that woman have finally stood up on their two hind legs and said, ‘You only get the respect you demand.’”

The KISS bassist, who has two adult children with Canadian wife Shannon Tweed, said his daughter Sophie is “nobody’s girlfriend.”

Simmons also defended his recent comments about women using their sexuality to get ahead.

In an interview with the New York Post, the 68-year-old rocker said: “”Women have a choice. They can dress in potato sacks, (but) as soon as they pretty themselves up with lipstick, lift and separate them and point them in our general direction, they’re gonna get a response. Guys are jackasses — we will buy them mansions and houses…all because of sex.”

Simmons didn’t back down. “Here’s the reality,” he said on Today. “I am aware of the rules. I didn’t create them, so you can try this yourself. I’m not saying life is fair. What I’m saying is the male of the species is visually stimulated.

“That’s life, and so you have power, the power of being a female, and you can access that power to make more money.”

New KISS Mobile Digital Game Now Available To Download Worldwide

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udiscovermusic.com

 

Leading, Austrian-based game developer Sproing has announced the release of new mobile game ‘KISS Rock City’. The game will be available to download for free from the App Store and from Google Play worldwide and it was developed in close collaboration with Epic Rights, KISS’s exclusive global licensing agent.

The band’s leading lights Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley jointly stated: “KISS is very excited to be partnering with Sproing to bring the KISS Army and game enthusiasts such an entertaining mobile game. The game play rocks, we know you’ll love it!”

‘KISS Rock City’ is a fun-filled adventure that takes players through the struggle of building a legendary rock band just like KISS. Players need to work their way up from playing the local bar circuit to the international spotlight, play along with the band’s original hits and reach fame and fortune through skill, business deals and the help of their mentors. No rock-star cliché is too small as players need to deal with the quirks of their band members, rivals, their manager and other weird characters. The developers believe players will be laughing all the way.

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Kiss concert on Halloween night becomes local legend in Peru

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Carson Gerber | Kokomo Tribune

PERU – Halloween night, 1974.

Kiss in Peru 5.jpg

Dan Mongosa had just returned home from trick-or-treating around Peru when the sounds of a rock concert drifted from the Peru circus building to his backyard two blocks away.

“I thought, ‘That’s odd. What the hell is that?’” Mongosa said.

The then 10-year-old jumped on his bike and pedaled down to the building at 154 N. Broadway – the home to the Peru Amateur Circus – and snuck around to a back alley. The doors stood open, so Mongosa slipped inside.

On stage stood four guys with “dark, black, frizzy hair.” The music was deafening. One of the songs had something to do with firefighters.

After the third song, a roadie spotted Mongosa watching the show from the back of the building and told him to get lost. But before he left, Mongosa had to know: Who were these guys?

The roadie told him. The band’s name was Kiss.

“I said, ‘Kiss? What kind of name is that?’” Mongosa said. “It sounds like a girl’s lipstick.’”

That’s right. Kiss, the iconic American rock band known for their face paint and over-the-top live concerts that included fire breathing and blood-spitting, played a concert in Peru. On Halloween night. Inside the Peru circus building.

 

What followed became the stuff of local legend. The crowd stormed the gates before the show, forcing organizers to push back the start time. Police and firefighters ended up on scene after someone called to report people were drinking and smoking marijuana inside the building.

“It’s almost turned into an urban legend,” Mongosa said. “It’s like, ‘Did that really happen? It’s just one of those weird moments in life that you come across.

Today, it’d be tough to find someone who has never heard of Kiss, which was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2014, or at least heard one of their mega-hits like “Rock and Roll All Nite” or “Lick It Up.”

But in 1974, the rockers from New York City were virtually unknown. The band had just put on its first show in January 1973 for an audience of three in Queens, New York.

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During Fire Stunt at Kiss Tribute Show, Bassist Caught on Fire Just Like Gene Simmons

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Christian McPhate | Observer

Kiss Destroyer, Texas’ premiere Kiss tribute band, has been performing across North Texas for more than a decade. When vocalist Robby Wayne (Paul Stanley), guitarist Bob Thomas (Ace Frehley), bassist Steve Cleere (Gene Simmons) and drummer Dave Bower (Peter Criss), took the stage at Lola’s Trailer Park in Fort Worth Saturday night, they planned to ignite it with rock ‘n’ roll in the name of a good cause, raising money for Hurricane Harvey victims.

They just weren’t expecting the fire to literally ignite their bassist during Saturday’s Blizzfest when, during the song “Firehouse,” Cleere blew a mouthful of Rum 151 at a torch he held in his right hand. As he lifted the torch in the air, he went a little higher than the 45 degree angle he normally aims for and blew. Then a gust of wind hit as a cloud of fire ignited in front of him.

The flames exploded on Cleere’s right shoulder when he dropped the torch to hit the next note on his bass. It spread like wildfire over his chest and toward his black-and-white painted face and and black wig.

“I have caught my hand on fire a number of times,” he says. “But it was the first time that it got on my chest and hair.”

After he put the flames out, Cleere told the crowd, “That’s my first time ever to catch on fire in 14 years.”

Cleere wasn’t injured.

“He wasn’t burned,” Thomas says, “but we could smell burning hair for a couple of songs.”

Thomas says their fan base has been waiting for something like this to happen. It’s happened to Simmons on several occasions over the years. The first time occurred on Dec. 31, 1973, when he debuted his fire-breathing antics. A roadie with a wet towel saved him.

Cleere has been blowing fire onstage since the tribute band first formed in the early 2000s. According to Cleere, when the band got together its members, who are now in their 40s, were lifelong Kiss fans who simply wanted to recreate some of the Kiss magic onstage. He figured playing what he calls “Champagne gigs” would be a way to earn more money.

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