By: Brooke Johnpier
KISS was an American rock band that was formed in New York City in 1973 and had a 50-year run, retiring in 2023. The band is best known for their stage costumes, elaborate black-and-white makeup, and crazy shows. The band also took on a comic book-like persona with giving each of the members of the band a special name: The Starchild (Paul Stanley), The Demon (Gene Simmons), The Spaceman/Space Ace (Ace Frehley), and The Catman (Peter Criss).
On February 18, 1974, KISS’s debut self-titled album was released. The entire album was written by Stanley and Simmons with some help from Criss, and took around 2-3 weeks to complete, including the mixing process. The album contains two hits, “Strutter,” and “Deuce.” The album peaked at number 87 on the Billboard 200 chart.
Eight months later, KISS would release their second album, Hotter than Hell. This album contained three hits, including “Hotter than Hell,” “Parasite,” and “Goin’ Blind.” The latter is a song about a doomed romance between a 93-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl. This album didn’t do as well as their first one, though, only hitting 100 on the Billboard 200 chart.
KISS’s third album, Dressed to Kill, was released on March 19, 1975. Even though the album shows the members all wearing suits, none of them, except Criss, owned a suit. The album is a total of thirty minutes and contains one of their greatest hits of all time, “Rock and Roll All Nite.” Their best album by far, it peaked at number 32 on the Billboard 200 chart.
Their fourth album (and arguably one of the most iconic album covers of all time), Destroyer, was released on March 15, 1976. This album contains three of their greatest hits, including “Detroit Rock City,” “God of Thunder,” and “Shout It Out Loud.” The album was one spot shy of making the top 10 on the Billboard 200 chart. In 2003, the album also made Rolling Stone’s The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time lists, coming in at number 496.
Eight months later, their fifth album, Rock and Roll Over, was released. The drums on this album were recorded in a bathroom, and Frehley didn’t take part in any of the writing. There was only one major hit on the album: “Calling Dr. Love.” It had the same reception as its predecessor though, ranking number 11 on the Billboard 200 chart.
June 30, 1977, saw the release of their sixth album, Love Gun. This was the first album to hear vocals from Frehley, making it so that all four band members had a vocal part. During this album’s making, a poll was taken across the US, and it was deemed that KISS was the most popular rock band in the country at the time, beating out Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin, and The Eagles. This album contained two major hits (“Christine Sixteen,” and “Love Gun”), and one cover (“Then She Kissed Me”) of a Crystals song. This album made it into the top five of the Billboard 200 charts at number four.
Two years would pass before the world saw another KISS record. The seventh, Dynasty, only contained one major hit, “I Was Made for Lovin’ You,” which peaked by itself at number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, this album was also predominantly Stanley’s work. Dynasty landed in the top 10 on the Billboard 200 charts at number nine.
KISS produced a lot of albums after this which included some more of their major hits such as “Killer,” “War Machine,” “Lick It Up,” “All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose,” “Tears are Falling,” “Uh! All Night,” “Rise to It,” “Hide Your Heart,” and “God Gave Rock ‘n’ Roll to You II” (which is my personal all-time favorite KISS song). All those albums that included those songs didn’t have the original line-up of which the former albums did. For both the sake of space, and consistency, I’m not going to include those.
KISS is one of those rock bands that has a song for everyone. They have a certain sound that everyone can relate to and wants to listen to for at least a few minutes. And if you haven’t listened to KISS yet, do it. You’ll not only see what I’m talking about, but you’ll also find a new song you’ll like.
Want to share your thoughts? Do you have a band/artist you want to be written about? Email Brooke at johnpibl23@bonaventure.edu!
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