DRAFT TYPOS
When Kiss tells us that (Music from) The Elder was a mistake, they are mistaken yet again.
It was completely intentional, in no way an accident.
And it was good. It blows away Unmasked to this day. The reason it didn't sell was because the previous album was so bad, nobody listened to the new record. I certainly didn't! And it looked stupid. And there was a new member. OK, it didn't jive with the times, either. It was two years post The Wall, and the guitars were pretty tame minus "Dark Light" but we all admit the record has aged well. Throw on Asylum. No. Hot in the Shade? HELL no! Revenge? Get the fuck out of here! You would rather put on the Elder because it's closer to real Kiss. They still wore makeup. Look at the cover.
Which brings us to another less obvious point. You think you already know what it is, for you are well versed in Kiss history, we are all sick of slogans like Kisstory and the Kiss Kruise.
And how do I know you think you know already, but don't? Because you are reading this!!!
You think I am annoyed that they aren't anywhere to be seen on the front or back cover.
YOU feel that way. We all do, right?
So we had become the new older brothers and began to get more sophisticated about music.
Kiss was for kids. They cut their hair, they were on Kids are People, Too. They came out with this cheap little explosion, played a tape of "Rock and Roll All Night" from Alive! (with Peter 'fuckin''
Criss) played absolutely no live music, introduced their new drummer who looked like Paul Stanley, and then they fielded questions from a bunch of eleven year olds, such as. What the fuck happened to Peter Criss? (And we still want to know, even though we basically DO already know better than THEY do, at this point. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons happened.) As a twelve year old, I was appalled. High schoolers wouldn't like this. People in their 20's would be in hysterics. I could tell. This was so elementary school, and I was in junior high.
This was the end. I never regretted abandoning the band, but there have been times I still regret having gotten "back into it".
So when (Music from) The Elder came out, it was a joke in the used bins, as we searched for Rolling Stones records, in 1981. The Stones completely wiped out Kiss for me that year. We would throw on Love Gun and break out into hysterics. Our buddy Chris, the hot shot guitarist of our neighborhood in those jr. high days walked in with his black beauty Les Paul and long rock and roll hair and said, "What are you guys still listening to Kiss for?" with a smile. He seemed glad. He got back into the band at the same time I did. Many of us left and returned in those years. The early 80s. High school.
You had to be there.
So nobody got it, but they had gone a second level beyond hiding their faces. It was so brilliant, it was stupid. "Lets hide our entire image from the record". We will be like cosmic forces in the universe, kind of like our stupid comic books will be in about fifteen years."
And it worked. Terribly.
But it was cool. I love the album. What was actually stupid was that they didn't put a photograph INSIDE of the packaging, in the gatefold, maybe at that Charlie Rose-like table.
Gene Simmons is really bozo. The adjective. But the album is Their Satanic Majesties Request.
"It isn't a great Kiss record." What a load of shit. That is suggesting that other Kiss albums are?
Kiss fans cannot truly and objectively critique a Kiss album because those of us who were actually there when the albums came out have been stuck thinking the same things for decades.
I got into the band years before, but didn't even hear the record until three years after it had come out, and only side one, on a tape a friend had made for me that spring.
I had gotten back into the band, and their concept record fascinated me. It doesn't anymore, but it brings me RIGHT back to my room in 1984 because the music is powerful, and well produced. The album has a great sound to it, it's tone. Later that summer, I bought the record and FINALLY heard side 2, or what I didn't know at the time was the sequence-revised-side 2.
I think the original first pressing sequence is better but it took awhile to get used to.
It peaks as the record is coming to a close, the second pressing is almost spent by the start of side 2. But I liked it.
The record is risky, interesting, and it sounds better than most Kiss albums after it besides the Vinnie years. It has ambiance. Instead of going flashy, they went mystical. Supernatural Kiss, sort of. If they hadn't done that at least once, their catalog would be even more disappointing.
We all would probably agree it is a far better value for 9 bucks or whatever than the Gene Simmons boxed set, but maybe it's just me.
The Elder is one of their best fucking albums. FIVE STARS (out of how many?)
When Kiss tells us that (Music from) The Elder was a mistake, they are mistaken yet again.
It was completely intentional, in no way an accident.
And it was good. It blows away Unmasked to this day. The reason it didn't sell was because the previous album was so bad, nobody listened to the new record. I certainly didn't! And it looked stupid. And there was a new member. OK, it didn't jive with the times, either. It was two years post The Wall, and the guitars were pretty tame minus "Dark Light" but we all admit the record has aged well. Throw on Asylum. No. Hot in the Shade? HELL no! Revenge? Get the fuck out of here! You would rather put on the Elder because it's closer to real Kiss. They still wore makeup. Look at the cover.
Which brings us to another less obvious point. You think you already know what it is, for you are well versed in Kiss history, we are all sick of slogans like Kisstory and the Kiss Kruise.
And how do I know you think you know already, but don't? Because you are reading this!!!
You think I am annoyed that they aren't anywhere to be seen on the front or back cover.
YOU feel that way. We all do, right?
"Space" ACE FREHLEY
1981
1981
1 of a Kind
NO IMITATIONS
Not exactly. They were trying to surprise us, right? They did, and we hadn't even heard the record yet, and thought we never would, either. We had discovered our older brothers' albums, or at least our friends' older brothers' albums. And we instinctively knew that The Beatles were better than Kiss, and so on.So we had become the new older brothers and began to get more sophisticated about music.
Kiss was for kids. They cut their hair, they were on Kids are People, Too. They came out with this cheap little explosion, played a tape of "Rock and Roll All Night" from Alive! (with Peter 'fuckin''
Criss) played absolutely no live music, introduced their new drummer who looked like Paul Stanley, and then they fielded questions from a bunch of eleven year olds, such as. What the fuck happened to Peter Criss? (And we still want to know, even though we basically DO already know better than THEY do, at this point. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons happened.) As a twelve year old, I was appalled. High schoolers wouldn't like this. People in their 20's would be in hysterics. I could tell. This was so elementary school, and I was in junior high.
This was the end. I never regretted abandoning the band, but there have been times I still regret having gotten "back into it".
So when (Music from) The Elder came out, it was a joke in the used bins, as we searched for Rolling Stones records, in 1981. The Stones completely wiped out Kiss for me that year. We would throw on Love Gun and break out into hysterics. Our buddy Chris, the hot shot guitarist of our neighborhood in those jr. high days walked in with his black beauty Les Paul and long rock and roll hair and said, "What are you guys still listening to Kiss for?" with a smile. He seemed glad. He got back into the band at the same time I did. Many of us left and returned in those years. The early 80s. High school.
You had to be there.
So nobody got it, but they had gone a second level beyond hiding their faces. It was so brilliant, it was stupid. "Lets hide our entire image from the record". We will be like cosmic forces in the universe, kind of like our stupid comic books will be in about fifteen years."
And it worked. Terribly.
But it was cool. I love the album. What was actually stupid was that they didn't put a photograph INSIDE of the packaging, in the gatefold, maybe at that Charlie Rose-like table.
Gene Simmons is really bozo. The adjective. But the album is Their Satanic Majesties Request.
"It isn't a great Kiss record." What a load of shit. That is suggesting that other Kiss albums are?
Kiss fans cannot truly and objectively critique a Kiss album because those of us who were actually there when the albums came out have been stuck thinking the same things for decades.
I got into the band years before, but didn't even hear the record until three years after it had come out, and only side one, on a tape a friend had made for me that spring.
I had gotten back into the band, and their concept record fascinated me. It doesn't anymore, but it brings me RIGHT back to my room in 1984 because the music is powerful, and well produced. The album has a great sound to it, it's tone. Later that summer, I bought the record and FINALLY heard side 2, or what I didn't know at the time was the sequence-revised-side 2.
I think the original first pressing sequence is better but it took awhile to get used to.
It peaks as the record is coming to a close, the second pressing is almost spent by the start of side 2. But I liked it.
The record is risky, interesting, and it sounds better than most Kiss albums after it besides the Vinnie years. It has ambiance. Instead of going flashy, they went mystical. Supernatural Kiss, sort of. If they hadn't done that at least once, their catalog would be even more disappointing.
We all would probably agree it is a far better value for 9 bucks or whatever than the Gene Simmons boxed set, but maybe it's just me.
The Elder is one of their best fucking albums. FIVE STARS (out of how many?)
