John's Disses

If I could rewind my life back to 1978, the year the first Ace Frehley solo album came out, and tell myself that not only would I someday know what Ace looks like without makeup (part of the allure of KISS in the ‘70s was that none of the fans knew what they looked like, it was a heavily guarded secret), but that I’d be able to see him rock out at a small club in Hollywood, less than 20 feet away, I’d probably have given myself a heart attack.

There is some sort of spell that Ace and his band-mates put on all of us children of the ‘70s. We were ruined forever by it. If the music had been bad, we’d just have fond memories of them, but the music was good! When Gene Simmons says “break out your wallets KISS fans”, we follow. From KISS cologne to the box we’re buried in, KISS fans can buy it all with KISS credit cards!

My first childhood memory of KISS is from Gemco in Riverside, CA. They had a small record department. I used to browse the records while my mom shopped. I remember seeing the Alive album and just staring at it in amazement wondering if they were men or women. Especially Gene, he had that weird pose. It stuck in my head forever. I didn’t buy the record, I didn’t have enough money and my parents wouldn’t have allowed me anywhere near it. But when I look at that cover I’m right back there in that store.

Soon after, we moved to a new house in Menifee Valley, just northwest of Temecula, CA, about 90 minutes southeast of Los Angeles. Now it’s heavily populated, but back then it was about as country as you could get. We lived a mile away from my school, at the top of this hill overlooking the valley. I used to ride my bike to school. It was awesome in the morning, all downhill, I’d get there in five minutes. After school was a different story. It was too steep to ride all the way back, and a long walk up the hill.

Two houses down from us lived a kid named Rick. I remember meeting him for the first time after school one afternoon. He didn’t go to my school, but was riding his bike that day and we rode/walked up the hill together. He asked me, “Do you like KISS?” Those words changed my life forever. I instantly remembered that Alive album I had seen at Gemco. I said “No, but I want to hear them!” He said “I have all their albums, you should come over”. I didn’t go over that day, but I went home and told my little brother, “there’s this kid Rick who lives down the hill who has KISS albums!”

Probably the next day or so I went over and was turned onto not only KISS, but tons of other hard rock bands of the day that I still love, like Aerosmith, Zeppelin, Bad Company, etc. But KISS stood out as the best of them all. The spell was cast. I remember the opening chords of “Love Gun” most. That guitar sound. I had to learn how to get that sound! And Ace’s solos were a huge part of it too. Even though I never actually sat down and learned them note-for-note, I can play along with Ace’s solos now (they are so melodic, and simple). That’s how brilliant they were.

My father learned about KISS from my mom. We were driving in the car and she told him that I was into this band that wore white makeup on their faces. He was disgusted. “Oh God!” he said. It must be how dads react to their kids getting into hip hop now. He used to tell me “you won’t like this music when you grow up.” But he was so wrong. I like it even more now than I did then.

I remember being Paul, and Rick was Ace, for Halloween that year. My mom did our makeup perfectly. I wish I had pictures of that.

When it was announced that the band was coming out with solo albums, it seemed almost too good to be true that we’d get an album of all Ace songs. We were so excited. I remember Rick and I calling the LA radio stations KLOS and KMET to request the song “Speedin’ Back to My Baby” because we thought maybe they would have the album before it came out. We probably got the song title from Creem magazine. I called KLOS first and asked “can you play Ace Frehley’s “Speedin Back to My Baby?” They said “we’ll try to get it on.” Rick thought that was so hilarious, he called KMET and after asking them, said “WILL YOU TRY TO GET IT ON?” We laughed our asses off; it was pretty funny at the time.

Of course they never played it. KISS was blacklisted on FM radio. The DJs had the freedom to play whatever they wanted but I guess KISS was so hated by the snobby hippy FM radio establishment (like the Ramones, Pistols, Dolls, Stooges, etc. were), that they got no airplay. Oh well, it didn’t stop them.

And Ace’s album didn’t disappoint. It was by far the best one, and its sales prove it. KISS had some great songs. Paul and Gene sang most of them, but that guitar sound was Ace. Those solos were the icing on the cake. Masterpieces, all. Never have they, nor will they ever, find a replacement guitarist who comes close. And Ace’s songs always were our favorites, whether he sang them or not (“Shock Me”, “Rocket Ride”, “Parasite”).

When KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park was originally broadcast on NBC, Rick and I stayed up to watch it at his house. He got sick the next day and his grandmother told him that it was because of the KISS movie we watched the night before. He decided that she was right, that KISS was satanic, and he gave me all his KISS albums. I still have them now.

So now, onto the show…

I don’t know any Ace fans so I only bought one ticket. I was warned to get there early because the Sunset Strip Music Festival was going on. I know of a secret parking space up in a residential neighborhood above the strip. It was open so I was happy about that. Ozzy Osbourne was playing the outdoor stage of the festival by the Rainbow Bar & Grill, and as I was walking down the hill I could hear him singing the song “I Don’t Know”. I couldn’t see the stage but stood on the corner of Sunset and Doheny and listened to “Suicide Solution”, “Bark at the Moon” and a bit of “War Pigs” before I decided to make my way around to the Viper Room. It was a long walk around and pretty cool hearing Tony Iommi’s massive riffs reverberating in the distance throughout Hollywood. I didn’t have a ticket to the festival, just Ace. Ozzy sounded as good as he ever did.

There was a long line already by the time I got to the Viper Room. The show was sold out. I stood in line for over an hour, and then once inside for another hour before comedian George Lopez introduced Ace. His first song was “Parasite” a track Ace wrote from KISS’s Hotter Than Hell album. Ace sang the song tonight but Paul and Gene shared lead vocals on the original.

The second song was “Deuce”, another old KISS classic from the first album, written and originally sung by Gene.  He didn’t sing much on tonight’s performance. The band seemed to all be singing on it together. After “Deuce” Ace quoted the song, “You know your man’s been workin hard!” Then addressed the crowd, “How’s everybody doin? Fuckin LA! Sunset strip!” Then he announced the next song, “Outer Space”, the first single on his new album, Anomaly, which comes out Tuesday. The song sounded much better live than I thought it would. It was the highlight of the new stuff that he played.

Next up was “Snowblind”: “Here’s a song from the ’78 album, I don’t do it anymore but it’s about cocaine.” They rocked this one perfectly and Ace played his solo note-for-note as it is on the album, which was one of the night’s highlights.

“Sister” was next, from Anomaly, followed by “Getaway”, another KISS/Ace song, originally sung by drummer Peter Criss on the Dressed to Kill album. Keeping with the singing drummer theme, Ace’s drummer sang the song. He is a good singer, although he sounds a bit schooled for rock n’ roll. Kinda generic for my taste. 

Then came a song Ace said that he “wrote while he was in Japan”: “Speedin’ Back to My Baby”. Every time I hear the song I think about that day Rick and I called the radio stations to request it. The song ended with him and his rhythm guitarist playing the main lead riff from the intro in unison. It sounded really good.

At this point in the show Ace said “I was looking on the internet and saw that KISS introduced their new costumes. Tommy Thayer’s costume has lightning bolts going up and down the sides of his legs, I wonder where he got that idea! How about you guys do something original? What are you trying to do, SHOCK ME?” Then the band launched into Ace’s classic KISS song “Shock Me.” This was the first song Ace ever sang with KISS. Legend has it that his first live performance of the song is on the Alive II album, which marked his first ever live vocal performance. His solo on this one was amazing, note-for-note (Buckcherry’s “Lit Up” riff is lifted almost directly from this song).

Toward the end of the song, the band left the stage so Ace could do his solo that he does after “Shock Me” on Alive II. It wasn’t as good as Alive II’s solo, but he did the smoking guitar thing at the end where he starts a slow Chuck Berry pentatonic riff and speeds it up and up and up until the band comes back in. At this point they launched into the instrumental riff from the end of “She” of Alive fame (originally on Dressed to Kill). It was a great way to end the song. Ace walked up to the mic after the song and said “still smokin’!”

At this point Ace started the intro riff to “Rocket Ride” which was my favorite song of the night. The only thing that sucked about it was that Ace walked over to his Marshall and turned his guitar up so loud it drowned out the rest of the band. He was much too loud for the remainder of the show. It kinda ruined it for me actually. I could hardly even hear the drums and vocals. The guitar tech should have turned him down.

Then the curtains abruptly closed with no “thank you, good night” or anything. How rock and roll is that? I thought maybe it was intermission because the show went by so fast. As the curtains re-opened, I thought I heard a snippet of a drum backing track for ”New York Groove” (Ace’s single from the first solo album), but they didn’t play the song. The first encore was my least favorite song of the night, an instrumental from Anomaly called “Space Bear.” The title refers to the famous KISS/Tom Snyder interview from the Tomorrow Show on Halloween, 1979 where Ace puts pieces of his costume on Tom’s stuffed teddy bear. When Tom asks Ace “What are you doing?”, Ace replies “I’m trying to make him a Space Bear!”

The surprise of the night for me, “Love Gun”, was next. Originally sung by Paul Stanley, tonight the drummer handled the vocals. It was great up until Ace changed the solo. “Love Gun” is my favorite Ace guitar solo of all time, so that bummed me out. It was still good because he did a lot of it verbatim, but the middle section was improvised. Ace’s recorded KISS solos are perfect works of art. When he changes them they pale in comparison. Ace gave Paul some props after the song by saying “Paul wrote some good songs didn’t he?”

Ace said at this point that it was getting late and everyone was tired. I was hoping he was just kidding, but it ended up being the last song. He introduced his “friend Slash” who came up to play rhythm guitar for “Cold Gin” (an Ace song that Gene sang on the first KISS album). I thought it was funny that Slash didn’t play a note of lead guitar that I could tell (go here to see the performance for yourself). They finished the song by going into the final solo and instrumental section of “Black Diamond” (with more smoking Ace guitar) which was a great way to end the show. Again, no “thank you, good night”, the curtains just closed.

All in all, Ace still has it. I would have liked to have heard him do his new version of “Fox On The Run”, (the Sweet cover and 2nd single from Anomaly),  “2000 Man” (a Stones cover that Ace sings on the KISS Dynasty album), “Rip It Out” from the 1978 solo album and maybe even “Rock Soldiers” would have been cool.

I saw KISS in 2000 during their Reunion Tour. I was far enough away that it felt like seeing KISS in 1977. I’m glad I got to see Ace do his thing so close-up tonight, but the quintessential Ace Frehley experience for me was that 2000 show. Just as KISS will never be KISS without Ace, Ace will never truly be Ace without KISS. It was as good as it could have been, the band rocked and Ace nailed his parts and vocals. But no band will ever have the magic that KISS had live. Never. Not even KISS.

If you sign up for my email list at www.johndissed.com, I’ll send you a URL and password for my Secret Covers page where I have 26 acoustic covers available for free download, including a version of KISS’s “C’mon and Love Me” from their Dressed to Kill album.