Rock Hall Snub KISS but Will Induct Iggy

Gene Simmons was once asked about the lack of respect KISS had receive from Rolling Stone magazine and he responded with something along the lines of Rolling Stone still hasn’t gotten ‘it’ to this day. But that’s ok. Being accepted by aging hippies isn’t at the top of his priority list. That’s a good thing because Rolling Stone just did it again.

KISS Webcast This Week

(PR) KISS on Facebook via a Ustream streaming link live from their show at the Staples Center in Los Angeles at 9 pm PST on Wednesday, November 25. This is the first-ever live web concert for one of rock’s most iconic bands as KISS celebrates the release of their new, three-song Guitar Hero track pack featuring Modern Day Delilah, I Was Made for Loving You and Lick It Up.

Users can watch and interact by visiting the official KISS Facebook page at facebook.com/KISS or on Ustream at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/kiss-live to connect with other KISS fans for a personal chat and live video experience in real-time during the show.

38 bands the USSR banned

A secret Cold War document has been revealed, listing bands the Soviet Union refused to allow to be heard in youth discos – and while the usual suspects are high in the ratings there’s a few surprising entries too.

The Sex Pistols, Iron Maiden, Kiss, Judas Priest and AC/DC all appear, as might be expected. But alongside them are some

Banned in the USSR

surprising entries, including “punk violence” acts Madness and Blondie, and “neofascist” performers Julio Iglesias and 10cc.

The People’s Cube has translated the paper into English, detailing the reasons why 38 acts were not to be heard in the USSR during the mid-1980s. The site editor explains: “We never saw it before because it was for internal use only, but we felt the invisible presence of such lists throughout life in the Motherland.”

It’s a stark illustration of the strict limits imposed on freedom in the Soviet Union of the 1980s, even though the era of change which would see the collapse of the USSR and and the end of the Cold War was only a year away.

The Soviet Komsomol, the Communist Party for young people, released the banning order in 1985, stating: “The following is a list of foreign music groups and artists whose repertoires contain ideologically harmful compositions.

“This information is recommended for the purpose of intensifying control over the activities of discotheques. This information must also be provided to all vocal-instrument ensembles [that’s bands] in the region.”

The list, approved by Head of the General Department of the Obkom of Komsomol, explains why each band is not to be publicised.

“Group Name and Type of Propaganda”

1. Sex Pistols – punk, violence

2. B-52s – punk, violence

3. Madness – punk, violence

4. Clash – punk, violence

5. Stranglers – punk, violence

6. Kiss – neofascism, punk, violence

7. Krokus – violence, cult of strong personality

8. Styx – violence, vandalism

9. Iron Maiden – violence, religious obscurantism

10. Judas Priest – anticommunism, racism

11. AC/DC – neofascism, violence

12. Sparks – neofascism, racism

13. Black Sabbath – violence, religious obscurantism

14. Alice Cooper – violence, vandalism

15. Nazareth – violence, religious mysticism

16. Scorpions – violence

17. Genghis Khan – anticommunism, nationalism

18. UFO – violenct

19. Pink Floyd – distortion of Soviet foreign policy (“Soviet agression in Afghanistan”)

20. Talking Heads – myth of the Soviet military threat

21. Perron – eroticism

22. Bohannon – eroticism

23. Originals – sex

24. Donna Summer – eroticism

25. Tina Turner – sex

26. Junior English – sex

27. Canned Heat – homosexuality

28. Munich Machine – eroticism

29. Ramones – punk

30. Van Halen – anti-Soviet propaganda

31. Julio Iglesias – neofascism

32. Yazoo – punk, violence

33. Depeche Mode – punk, violence

34. Village People – violence

35. 10cc – neofascism

36. Stooges – violence

37. Boys – punk, violence

38. Blondie – punk, violence

Kiss make up with Oshawa

Kiss made amends with Canadian fans last night when they gave a small Canadian venue a full-power live show.

The glam heroes were slated last month after they ran an online competition to win a tour visit on their Alive 35 trek. The city of Oshawa polled more votes than anywhere else, but was left off the first release of tour dates, to massive criticism. The band said they never intended to snub the city, and had just

Kiss All talk AND all action

not announced a date they’d booked, but then rescheduled the show to earlier in the tour. Last night they delivered the goods, playing a full-power two-hour set, even though Oshawa’s General Motors Centre has a capacity of 7000 – significantly smaller than other venues on the tour.

Frontman Paul Stanley asked the crowd: “Did you really believe we weren’t going to come to see you?

“We’ve been to Moncton, we’ve been to Sudbury, we’ve been to Saskatoon – we’ve never been to ‘Shwa. Tonight we change that. We love the big cities but it’s cities like you who make it all happen.”

Councillor Robert Lutczyk, who led the voting campaign and then criticised the band after the perceived snub, said: “The spirit was unbelievable – it wasn’t so much about Kiss, it was about Oshawa winning a contest. So everybody came out.”

Meanwhile, motormouth bassist Gene Simmons has been at it again, slamming anyone who doesn’t agree with his way of doing things. In a wide-ranging interview with Billboard he rants his way through a series of topics. Here are some of his best quotes:

On the planet: “Earth – that’s not a cool name for the planet. ‘Planet Kiss’ – now you’ve got something. If every inch of ground is Kiss ground, the air you breathe is Kiss are and the food you eat is Kiss food, we’ve got something. Brand everything – and you should pay us every step along the way.”

On rock music: “McCartney cannot write a single shred of music, nor can Jagger or Hendrix, and so on. We all do what we do by the seat of our pants – except some of ours are made of leather and are tighter.”

On Kissmania: “That’s not even a description of it. We owned your children. They looked like us, painted their faces like us, walked like us, knew our songs. Eventually they had children and named them after our songs.”

On illegal downloading: “I don’t believe in anything for free. If you try to break into my house I’ll shoot your head off. But fans were allowed to break into stuff that people created and take it without paying for it, and that is nobody’s fault but the record industry. I’ll let you know when I want to give my stuff away for free – I don’t want you to determine that.”

On doing it for love or money: “Anybody who wants to do it for free should give me any dollar they don’t want. We gave birth to Kiss and do I want to get paid for it? You bet I do.”

On being professional:“It’s self-respect – just do it for yourself. Shit out the Axl Rose disease in your system.”

On what other bands get wrong: “They don’t listen to Gene Simmons.”

Ace won’t badmouth Kiss bandmates

Former Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley won’t join the slagging match restarted by Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley last week, even though he thinks the band’s 1990s reunion was as bad as they’re saying it was.

Reunion era: Frehley, Criss, Stanley and Simmons

Simmons and Stanley last week explained that while the original lineup put the makeup back on in 1996 to great acclaim at first, the experience turned nasty after a time. Drummer Peter Criss left again in 2001 and Frehley’s contract expired the following year.

Although they stopped short of naming Frehley and Criss, the remaining pair were explicit in apportioning blame. Stanley called them “delusional about their songwriting and musical abilities” while Simmons said: “When you defile Kiss you should be thrown out.” Read the full story.

But Frehley, talking to Stop Smiling magazine, is happy to talk about Simmons and Stanley. And while he agrees with their analysis of the reunion, he doesn’t blame them, and he still regards them as friends.

He says: “It started off great – it wasn’t that different from tours in the past. I remember a couple of times doing shows, feeling I’d really gone back in time.

“But as the tour progressed things got weird. People started saying the same old things, pushing people’s buttons, and it wasn’t fun any more. It was like the 80s all over again.

“Originally it was put together in the spirit of all doing it together. Next thing I know, I’m feeling like a hired gun and I don’t have any say in anything. That’s not fun. The four of us invented Kiss but it wasn’t like the old days – pretty much everyone went their own way.”

Frehley’s been clean of alcohol and other drugs for three years now, but part of the agreement in 1996 was that he wasn’t allowed to drink on the road. He explains: “It was a business – a machine. It made me remember why I quit the group in the first place.

“Things started getting more about merchandising and marketing than music. I got involved in rock’n’roll because I love it, it was fun, I was getting to see the whole world and it was great.

“Then you start reading the fine print you realise people are deceiving you about this and that. Your lawyer tells you it’s over a lot more money than you thought. There are ulterior motives.”

But he doesn’t blame Simmons and Stanley, who are about to release a new Kiss album, Sonic Boom. Frehley says: “It was people who were handling us. We had to sue our record company. We had to sue our business managers. It was all because of mismanagement – people trying to take what they shouldn’t be taking.”

Speaking of his former colleagues he says: “You know, we’re old friends. I talk to them occasionally. We’ve been through too much together. People paint this picture like there’s good and bad – but everybody’s just trying to make a living.

“They take pot-shots at me once in a while but I guess that goes along with the territory.”

In the full interview Frehley discusses his addiction problems, his new solo album Anomaly and his early experiences with his out-of-control rocket-launching guitar.

KISS Slam Original Members

Rock Radio reports: Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of Kiss say their 1996 reunion with Ace Frehley and Peter Criss was a disaster mired with delusion. In an attack thinly veiled by not using their ex-bandmates’ names, frontman Stanley and bassist Simmons have criticized the band’s original guitarist and drummer in the era the band put their makeup back on and recorded the Psycho Circus album.

The reunion ended with Criss leaving in 2001 and Frehley’s contract being allowed to expire the following year. The band continued with Eric Singer on drums and Tommy Thayer on guitar despite original plans to split up. Now Stanley tells the Detroit Free Press: “What I learned towards the end of the farewell was, I didn’t want to say farewell to Kiss – I wanted to say farewell to some of the members.” [A refresher, Paul is talking about when they scammed fans with their bogus farewell tour.]

“It was magical at the beginning. But ultimately the only magic I wanted was to make certain people disappear. It had the potential to be much more than a reunion tour but it quickly became clear it couldn’t progress…. I think we had people who were delusional about their songwriting and musical abilities.”

KISS, Genesis, Stooges, RHCP Lead Rock Hall Nominations

PR) The nominations for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame were announced Wednesday. The twelve nominees are: ABBA, Darlene Love, Donna Summer, Genesis, Jimmy Cliff, KISS, Laura Nyro, LL Cool J, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Chantels, The Hollies and The Stooges.

Ballots will be sent to more than 500 voters, who will select artists to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the 25th Annual Induction Ceremony on March 15, 2010 at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City.

Five of the twelve nominees will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. To be eligible for nomination into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, an act must have released its first single or album at least 25 years prior to the year of nomination. This year’s nominees had to release their first single no later than 1984.

The inductees will be announced in January 2010, and all inductees are ultimately represented in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, Ohio.

[KISS qualified a decade ago but the Rock Hall turned a blind eye to them, so it is curious to read their description of the group: Few bands short of The Beatles inspired more kids to pick up the guitar than KISS. With their signature make-up, explosive stage show and anthems like “Rock and Roll All Night” and “Detroit Rock City,” they are the very personification of rock stars. Original members Ace Frehley, Peter Criss, Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons came together in New York in 1972. While their first two records didn’t generate many sales, they quickly gained a national following for their bombastic, pyro-filled stage show. Their 1975 live disc Alive! captured that energy and reached number nine on the charts, quickly making them one of the most popular bands of the 1970’s – scoring countless hit singles, sold-out tours and appearing everywhere from comic books to lunch boxes to their very own TV movie. They continue to perform sold out concerts around the world.

Who wants to bet LL Cool J gets in and KISS doesn’t? And what about Rush?]

KISS Video