kiss

REVIEW: KISS – Crazy Nights (1987)

Part 25 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster! 

KISS – Crazy Nights (1987)

Gene Simmons, still off in la-la land ($immons Records, managing Liza Minelli), was about as far removed from the demon as you could get.  Looking quite womanly, and no longer singing in his “monster voice”, Gene had lost it by 1987.  Paul Stanley was writing songs on keyboards (not a good sign) although Bruce and Eric both made strong songwriting contributions.  The result is Crazy Nights, a record that Bon Jovi could have made, but Kiss?  It didn’t sound like Kiss to me.

Still, I will always have a soft spot in my heart for Crazy Nights because it came out when I was in highschool, and I played it nonstop then, even though I questioned Kiss’ direction. (Over)produced by Ron Nevison, Kiss were trying way too hard for radio and video hits. The rock was all but gone. At the same time, the songs are actually pretty well written for the most part. Better, on average, than some songs on Animalize. It’s the gloss and production that sinks Crazy Nights.

Originally titled Who Dares Wins, the album does indeed feature too many keyboards.  I remember being so disheartened by the video for “Reason to Live”, and seeing Bruce Kulick playing keys instead of guitar. Stanley himself didn’t play guitar in the videos either — he wore one, and danced around with it. This didn’t seem like rock and roll anymore.

Here’s my song breakdown.  I just wish there was more oomph to them.

Good to great songs:

“Hell Or High Water”
“Good Girl Gone Bad”
“Turn On The Night”
“No, No, No”

OK songs:

“Crazy, Crazy Nights”
“Reason To Live”
“I’ll Fight Hell To Hold You”
“My Way”

Bad songs:

“When Your Walls Come Down”
“Thief In The Night” (a song written earlier and recorded by Wendy O. Williams first)

So, not bad. Not enough Gene though. That was a problem on a lot of albums from Dynasty to Crazy Nights, there just wasn’t enough Gene. He had become a sideman, not a frontman. Gene’s singing here is smooth, no rasp and no guts.  Paul’s singing is very high and something shrill. It was the 1980’s.

Only one song (“Crazy Crazy Nights”) has been played live since this tour.

Pick it up if you love 80’s rock. Avoid if you don’t.

2/5 stars

There are also several outtakes from this album that were later released:  “Time Traveler” is a Paul Stanley keyboard song that found its way onto The Box Set.  “Boomerang”, a speedy thrash-like number, was re-recorded for the next studio album, Hot In The Shade. “Dial L For Love”, an Eric Carr demo, was released on his posthumous Unfinished Business CD.  Finally, one of the better Paul Stanley songs called “Sword and Stone”, was recorded by Bonfire and released on the soundtrack to the movie Shocker.

I have a couple bootlegs from this tour, seen below.  (Yes, they put Vinnie on the cover of one by mistake!)

Part 87: The Great Change

RECORD STORE TALES PART 87:  The Great Change

The Great Change happened around the turn of the millennium.

Prior to that, CD sales were fast and furious. DVD sales had begun to replace VHS sales. We still carried blank cassette tapes. Not too many people were downloading music. Most people weren’t even connected to the internet yet.  I still had friends who would come over to use it, and I only got it in mid  ’98.

Then I noticed a change. Cassette sales dwindled while requests for blank CD’s increased. Initially we resisted carrying blank CD’s. We thought by doing so, we would be unintentionally killing a CD sale. Eventually we began carrying blank discs, when they started dropping in price.  They, they took off.  We started hearing about Napster. And Metallica. Metallica fans began selling off their discs.

I remember one guying coming in with a great selection of Metallica discs. All the albums, plus the Live Sh*t box set.

“Wow, this is a great Metallica collection you have here,” I commented as I went through the discs.

“Thanks. I’m selling them because of that fucking asshole Lars. I ripped them all to my computer and now he can go fuck himself.”

                                                      

I’ll never forget that because at first I felt like, “Well, that doesn’t really do anything to Lars, you already paid for the discs and gave him your money,” but I guess it was the principle of the thing. People were really pissed off. And that represented a huge change.  People always bitched about CD prices.  $24 for a regularly priced disc, that’s a lot of money.  I used to get two albums for that money in 1986. There’d never been a satisfactory answer as to why a kid had to pay $24.99 for the new Judas Priest in 1998.  And believe me, it wasn’t the stores ripping off the kids.  The margin we made on new CDs could barely be called profit.

Over the next five years, I watched CD prices and sales drop, while we were forced to diversify in order to stay alive. We had already been carrying DVD’s. We started carrying McFarlane dolls.  They were cool, but a lot of them were really limited.  For example, for Kiss, we only got one Eric Carr, and two Aces.  People would want the whole set, but all you’d have left was Paul and Gene.

Then bobble-heads came (which I hate, I absolutely hate bobble-heads). Then Osbournes family toys. Trivia games. Simpsons toys. Clocks. Posters. Books. Hats. CD wallets with a Linkin Park logo on them.  Anything we could make a reasonable buck on, even if it was only marginally related to what we did, like the Simpsons toys. (We carried DVD’s, so Simpsons was marginally related.) Then we’d knock down whatever wasn’t selling to clearance prices, and try something else.

Angus

The only tangent that was really successful was Xbox and Playstation games. We had so many requests, and physically a game is identical to a CD or DVD, so games were a no brainer.  People asked for them all the time.  We had to educate ourselves from the ground up on game pricing and we jerry-rigged a way in our computer system to inventory them. However to me, the scent of decay was in the air. Because downloading had killed such a huge chunk of our music sales, the stores were nothing like the way I remembered.

Working in a store selling video games and bobble-heads wasn’t the dream job that started me on this path.  I was always there for one reason:  the music!

Well, yeah, and the staff discount.

DVD REVIEW: KISS – Exposed (1987)

Part 24 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster! 

KISS – Exposed (VHS 1987, DVD 2002)

While Kiss took some time off as Gene continued to pursue his movie career, Exposed was released in lieu of a studio album.  1986 was the first year to ever come and go without new Kiss music.  The band sought commercial success, and an outside producer as they worked hard to record hits.  This video nicely documented their career to that point.

A lot of long term KISS fans absolutely hate Exposed. It is not without flaws, but considering when it came out and what it aimed to do, it is actually one of the best home videos from the era.

Exposed is an early example of a mockumentary, or, as they say in the opening, “A rousing docu-drama. It will be disgusting to some, titilating to others.  But whether it disgusts you, or titilates you, it is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” That right there tells you everything you need to know. Interspersed with the docu-drama bits are video clips, and live clips of the band during the makeup years.

The biggest flaw with Exposed is that it’s pretty sexist. It’s all meant to be in good fun I guess, but many will be offended by Gene using women as wall decorations. It was the 80’s; every band influenced by Kiss was doing the same thing, and Kiss responded by taking it to the limit. It is what it is, and if you’re likely to be offended, don’t watch.  It’s still nothing compared to some rap videos I’ve seen.

The second biggest flaw is the lack of Eric Carr and Bruce Kulick participation. They each get two scenes: In Eric’s scene, he meets the interviewer and leaves without any audible lines. In Bruce’s scene, he chases a girl down the stairs and has the line, “Is this for the documentary? Edit her out!” In the final scene, Bruce and Eric are seen taking Paul’s monkey Sonny Crocket for a stroll. Everything else is the Gene and Paul Show.

The docu-drama takes place at “Paul’s mansion”, and this is where the jokes begin.  It’s kind of an 80’s Monkees, with the band all living together in the same house.  There’s a butler and women everywhere.  Gene of course has a throne.

Paul and Gene are funny in Exposed. The interview segments are 50% “straight”, talking seriously about the early years of Kiss, and 50% comedy segments. I enjoyed the comedy. Gene in partiular is a very funny guy. In the “straight” segments there is a comraderie rarely seen between Gene and Paul, such as Paul razzing Gene about early song lyrics he had written. (“My mother is beauuuuutiful…,” Paul croons to an old Gene lyric.)

The music videos include some rarities such as the banned “Who Wants To Be Lonely” clip (more girls). Basically you get every music video from 1982 through to 1985., with a couple exceptions.

The live stuff proved to be just a taster for what Kiss had in their vaults. At the time, bands didn’t release a lot of archive concerts on home video, instead concentrating on documenting current tours. Now they do release such archival concerts on DVD, and since then Kiss have released more complete footage on Kissology I-III. The film quality, despite complaints from the fans, is pretty decent, especially the old 1974 clip of Deuce. Some fans claim their bootleg home videos look and sound better than the official KISS releases; I haven’t seen that.

The video ends with a brief audio clip of Paul answering the question, “What do we call this?” He responds, “Why don’t we call it Volume I?”

Volume II would come later in the form of Kiss’ X-treme Close Up, a more “serious” video, stripped of the girls and the jokiness. I find Exposed to be a much more entertaining video.

Check it out if you are a fan, particularly for 80’s Kiss. Avoid if you are not.

4/5 stars

Incidentally, you can get Kiss Exposed as a third bonus disc in a deluxe edition of Kiss Gold.  Seen below, the regular edition of Kiss Gold.  We’ll be talking about that CD much later on.

DVD REVIEW: KISS – Animalize Live Uncensored (1985)

Part 22 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster!  I’m generally not going to be covering DVDs, but this one was crucial to me.  I heard a lot of these versions so often, that they were the “original” versions for me.  So I have a soft spot for Animalize Live Uncensored.

KISS – Animalize Live Uncensored (VHS, 1985)

 This video was recorded live at Cobo Hall, Detroit Michigan December 8th, 1984. It has never been released officially on DVD, although as you can see there are unofficial versions to be had.  (It’s clearly unofficial since it has a picture of Carnival of Souls era Kiss on the back!)  Annoying subtitles are the only real drawback to the DVD.

There’s not much crossover between this and the two Alive albums, as it leans heavily on newer material (Creatures, Lick It Up, Animalize).  The tempos are, in general, faster. The energy is high, and Paul is singing at the peak of his talents.  The solos by Bruce Kulick are flashy in that 80’s sort of way, which isn’t my thing. Basically this is 80’s KISS, like it or lump it. I like it somewhat, probably due to nostalgia. 

Visually, Gene and Paul are all over the stage, while Eric stands on his drums and demands to be seen and heard.  At the end, the band climb onto a flying platform. Very cool live show.

One special treat was Eric’s lead vocals on “Young and Wasted” and “Black Diamond”. I also quite enjoyed Eric’s drum solo. Gene’s bass solo is nothing much to speak of, just a chance for him to introduce “I Love It Loud”, but far more musical than solos past or present. Actually he only speaks twice on the whole DVD. Before “I Love It Loud” he says to the crowd, “Oh yeah? Ohhh yeeeah? Well alright, come on.” And then at another point Paul says, “How you doing Gene, alright?” to which Gene responds, “Welll ooooooohhhh yeeeeaaaah!” Quite comical really. Paul’s raps are some of his all time classics. “Paul, what you are doing with a pistol down your pants?” (“Love Gun”)  His story about Gene’s “little child” (“Fits Like A Glove”) is also classic. His guitar solo is nothing special, I guess Bruce Kulick was just too new to the band to warrant a big solo? The fact that Paul has one is somewhat a rarity in KISStory.

The video quality of the DVD is fairly low. Don’t quote me on this, but I think I heard that this concert is going to be reissued on the next installment of the KISStory DVDs. 

3/5 stars

There are several CD bootlegs (incomplete however) of this concert.  The only live audio from this concert to be officially released was “Heaven’s On Fire”.  Kiss contributed that track to Ronnie James Dio’s Hear N’ Aid LP (also being reissued!) which donated proceeds to feed people in Africa.

Editorial: Paul Stanley’s voice problems

I’ve been reluctant to post anything about this, but I’m an honest fan.  I’m no fanboy — when a band does something I don’t approve of, I say so.

Everybody knows I’m a huge Kiss fan.  I first started noticing Paul’s voice getting raspier on the 2004 DVD Rock the Nation Live!  Now, it’s…man it hurts to say this…it’s almost tuneless.  You can hear Gene and Eric Singer holding down the melody while Paul struggles to sing.

I read recently that Paul had vocal cord surgery in November 2011, and that he says he has simply done too many tours with not enough time off to rest his voice.  I think that is a real shame.  Paul, listen to me — I consider you to be one of the top five rock singer frontmen of all time.  Right up there with Freddie and Ronnie.  To hear the guy that I once saw in Phantom of the Opera croak like this, something’s clearly wrong.  Paul, if time off is all you need — take it!

We, the Kiss Army, would gladly, patiently wait years between tours if it meant preserving your voice.  In the meantime you guys could continue to issue box sets and DVD’s with worthwhile unreleased material, and we’d buy it.

I fully expect the new album, Monster, to be good.  I have no doubt that in the studio, a controlled environment, Paul nails it.  But live, Paul, you need to give your voice a rest and take some time.  We’ll still be here when you come back.  For yourself, please think about it.

LeBrain

LeBrain as Paul

More KISS at mikeladano.com:

Complete KISS reviews + Complete ACE FREHLEY reviews + 

PETER CRISS – Criss EP review + GENE SIMMONS – Asshole review

Record Store Tales Part 3:  My First KISS + Part 8:  You Wanted the Best +
Part 77:  Psycho-Circus + Part 151:  24kt KISS…cheap at twice the price +
Part 152:  Carnival of Lost Souls + Part 173:  Gene Simmons’ Asylum Demos + 
Part 179: Phantom of the Opera + Part 241:  Halloween, KISS style!

REVIEW: KISS – Lick It Up (1983)

Part 20 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster!

KISS – Lick It Up (1983)

And off came the makeup.  Showing up for the cover photo session in their street clothes, the world now knew what Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Eric Carr, and Vinnie Vincent looked like.  I always found that concept kind of funny — like, did anyone care what Vinnie Vincent looked like?  It wasn’t until much later — around 1986 — that I first saw a photo of Ace Frehley without makeup.  I cared a lot more about that!

Musically?  What a rebirth! Like a snake shedding its skin (ooh, I bet Gene would have loved my analogy there) Kiss found new life on Lick It Up. This is a strong, strong album, almost as strong as Creatures Of The Night. Fresh blood, a fresh look, and new freedom to be taken seriously as musicians gave Kiss a serious kick in the pants. It might not be considered classic today by critics, but the song “Lick It Up” only left the setlist briefly during the 96-97 reunion tour.

Witness the strenths:

1. All songs written by the band, no outside writers, thanks to the strong talents of Vinnie Vincent.
2. All songs played by the band except one solo by Rick Derringer (“Exciter”).
3. A fresh sound thanks to Vinnie Vincent.

I’ve always said this: When restrained, Vinnie Vincent is one of my favourite guitar players. His tone on Lick It Up is just oustanding and so unique. When left to his own devices like on his solo albums, his playing sounds like razor blades in your ears. Here, he plays melodically, powerfully, and manipulates his tone with his hands like an artist. Hear his guitar whine and cry as only a master can make it do.  He could have been a guitar hero if he wasn’t a psycho!

Every song is good, not one bad tune in the pack.  Some of my favourites include:

  • “Exciter”, a great riffy opener with a catchy chorus.
  • “Not For The Innocent” which has a bit of Vinnie’s “Boyz Are Gonna Rock” riff at the end there.
  • “A Million To One” which probably would have made a great third single.
  • “All Hell’s Breaking Loose” — Eric Carr’s Zeppelin influences meet Paul’s…rapping?
  • “Dance All Over Your Face” which is a slow monster plod Gene song with a great chorus.
  • “And On The 8th Day”, the album closer, and another song that spun off of Vinnie’s original “Boyz Are Gonna Rock” demo.

Any one of those songs can stand up with the best rock songs in the Kiss canon.  And you’ll noticed I didn’t include “Lick It Up” itself.  That’s how strong this album is.  It’s also worth noting that two other songs from this album were frequently performed live.  Gene’s “Fits Like A Glove” was one of those speedy songs that Kiss were starting to do in the 80’s.  So was “Young and Wasted”, which Eric Carr sang live.

The Japanese had a neat idea when issuing this on LP. They put on obi sheet over the non-makeup cover, featuring Kiss in makeup — you had to buy the LP and remove it to see Kiss’ real faces! This was a great idea, and is the origin of the rumours that Japan had a makeup cover while the rest of the world did not.  Also, this obi featured Vinnie’s only cover photo in makeup.

Vinnie Vincent proved to be too unstable a personality to stay in the band much longer.  Gene and Paul have always said Vinnie was a gifted writer,  and he’d come back as a writer 1992’s Revenge. Keep reading LeBrain’s Blog for the story there!

Lick It Up to me is a classic, and it deserves no less than:

5/5 stars

Intermission: The State of the Rock / S*** LeBrain’s Dad Says

Good day all,

As you may have read in a previous story, I recently had a significant birthday.  One of the nice things I received was a brand-new camera.  (Thanks mom & dad!)  Up until now, I’ve been taking pictures of all the albums and collectibles with my Nokia c3 cell phone.  (If this were a techie blog I couldn’t give that phone a glowing review, but as you can see it helped me get through the first few months of this.)

So this means, after I’m done posting all the old photos in upcoming entries, I can finally bring you better quality photos and videos.  I know a lot of you love checking out the rare discs and collectibles.   I never liked the photo quality on my blog, so I’m stoked to have a camera.

Here’s a bunch of photos with the old Nokia that I never got around to using.

I know some of you are following the Kiss reviews.  We’re done the makeup years!  Coming up, I will be covering the rest of the studio & live albums, and as many box sets and compilations as I have access to.

And, some of you follow the Record Store Tales.  Coming up, you’ll read more classic quotes, hear about a lot more annoying customers, get the feel for what it’s like behind the counter, and discover more fantastic musical finds.

For now I’ll leave you with a fresh S*** LeBrain’s Dad Says, from today.

Today was the day we decided to hold the official birthday party.  As mentioned my parents bought me the new camera.  As I opened it, my dad said:

“Wow, that looks like a nice camera there.  Who’d you get that from?”

REVIEW: KISS – Creatures of the Night (1982, 1985, 1997 editions)

Part 19 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster!

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KISS – Creatures of the Night (1982, 1985, 1997)

Creatures Of The Night is one heavy, over the top & loud Kiss album. Very very loud. Hot on the heels of The Elder and Killers, Creatures was a defiant “we’re back!” from a band who was written off by the end of 1981.

It is important to note that there are several versions of Creatures floating around. At one point in 1985, shortly after Asylum, it was reissued with new (non-makeup) cover art with Bruce Kulick  instead of Ace Frehley. Interestingly, neither played on Creatures. The reissue with the non-makeup cover has the songs in a different order, and they were remixed to bring down the loudness of the drums. I guess someone in the mid 80’s decided the album was just too loud, and the remix was done. Thankfully, the original loud drum mix was remastered in 1997, finally available on CD.

Interestingly, the 1985 remixed version featured a picture of Gene’s ass in leather pants on the back cover!  See below for a gander at Gene’s buttocks.

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And yeah, the drums are loud alright! They sound awesome, like John Bonham shooting cannons off the back of the stage. They are the cleanest, most powerful, natural and clear drum sounds this side of Led Zeppelin, and Kiss had a lot to be proud of. Just listen to “I Love It Loud”. Wow.

Creatures really is a stellar album featuring songwriting by Bryan Adams, Mikal Japp and a guy named Vincent Cusano, better known by his stage name Vinnie Vincent. Guitars were by Paul Stanley, Bob Kulick, Vinnie Vincent, Rick Derringer, Steve Ferris, and who-knows-how-many-others. Kiss claim to have lost track due to the process of auditioning and recording at the same time. Eric Carr, who had no songwriting credits this time, played bass on Paul’s “I Still Love You”.

“Creatures Of The Night” is an amazing fast paced opening, starting off with a barrage of Carr’s toms. I think The Elder was a dissapointing way to introduce the new drummer. Creatures overcompensates, and I am sure Carr was very happy. The main riff and guitar lick in “Creatures” is driving and catchy, and the chorus will stay in your head for days. This is Kiss’ statement of purpose.

Gene takes the tempo down a bit with “Saint & Sinner”, a rebellious one about standing your ground: “Get me off this carousel, you can do as you please, you can go to hell.   Put my back against the wall, well, I’m not gonna fall on my knees, no, not at all.”  At this point Gene was trying to sing in his low “monster” voice more, and this is such a great song. Shame it has not been resurrected live.

“Keep Me Comin'” is a pretty self-explanatory Paul title. The riff is very Zeppelinesque, and Zep was a seemingly huge influence on this era of Kiss. It has some serious groove to it and Paul sings his ass off.

“Rock And Roll Hell” was a song that was played live a couple of times on the 1982 tour. I would describe this Gene song as a slow burner. It seems to be about a kid who “might even steal a guitar” to get out of his rock and roll hell, and make the big time. Very cool groove and lyric.

“Danger” is probably the weakest song on the album. It’s another fast Paul track with a somewhat weak chorus.  It would be followed in the exact same album slot (last song side 1) by similar Paul songs on later albums:  “Gimme More” on Lick It Up, and “I’m Alive” on Asylum.  All three songs are below standard and interchangeable.

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Side 2 begins with “I Love It Loud”. Everybody knows “I Love It Loud”. Your grandma knows “I Love It Loud”.  At the time as a kid, I thought this was the greatest Kiss song ever. That drum beat, that chanting, and Gene’s awesome lyrics about taking no crap — yeah! That’s what every grade 8 student felt like! Unfortunately the novelty wears off after a couple of days and today I feel it’s one of Kiss’ most boring songs. After all, there’s not much to it. Shame it still finds its way into setlists in 2012, while other songs have fallen by the wayside.

The sole ballad “I Still Love You” is next. When Kiss used to play it live (the last time was the 1995 Unplugged concert), it became Paul’s vocal centrepiece.  It’s a slow with not enough dynamics, but Paul again sings his ass off.  As mentioned, Eric Carr on bass.

“Killer” (probably written at the same time as Killers?) is a really cool Gene Simmons song that has lots of interesting riffs and twists. I can’t believe how cool this song still is today. It’s fast, it has interesting backing vocals, and is insanely catchy.

The album ends with Gene’s plodding epic, “War Machine” which still gets played live to this day, despite being retired briefly during the reunion tours. Gene wrote the song with Bryan Adams which would be a surprise to Adams fans. Who knew he could get so heavy? The lyrics are pure, vintage Gene: “Strike down the one who leads me, I’m gonna take his place, I’m gonna vindicate the human race.”

Creatures wound up being the first Kiss studio album to have only two lead singers:  Gene and Paul. Sadly this would remain the case until Eric Carr got his first album vocal much later in 1988. I am glad that the Kiss of today have decided to let all four members sing, as that was one of the factors that got me into the band in the first place.

This would also prove to be Kiss’ final album in makeup.  They had grounded themselves musically once again, while their biggest change was yet to happen….

5/5 stars

Gene’s bum bum

REVIEW: KISS – Killers (1981 German and Japanese editions)

Part 18 of my series of Kiss reviews, leading up to the release of Monster!

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KISS – Killers (1981)

Killers is a greatest hits CD with four “new” tracks, released in ’81 everywhere except North America. After The Elder bombed, the European record company requested demanded a greatest hits album with new songs, specifically rock songs, no exception. Paul Stanley sings lead on all four new songs, and Paul, Bob Kulick & Robbin Crosby play guitar in Ace’s absense.  Yes, Ace was on the album cover but nowhere on the album.  He was effectively though not yet officially out of the band.

The new songs:

“I’m A Legend Tonight”: A great song with Eric Carr finally showing off what he can do on the drums. Although Paul himself tends to disown the songs on Killers, this is great. The riff is very memorable and the song is catchy (even if the chorus reminds me somewhat of “I’m So Excited” by the Pointer Sisters).

“Down On Your Knees”: Co-written by Bryan Adams (his first but not last collaboration with Kiss), this is a nondescript rocker. Catchy enough as an album track, but not outstanding. The cymbals are mixed a little high.

“Nowhere To Run”: The was one of the first songs written for The Elder sessions, and you can kind of tell by the falsetto that Paul employs in the bridge. It was dumped when they decided to go all concept album on The Elder, but here on Killers it is the standout track. The riff is stellar, the acoustic intro is cool, and Paul’s singing is perfect.

“Partners In Crime”. The weakest song. It’s a slow plod with nothing really going for it.

The rest of the album is filled with the greatest hits, but it is crucial to note that aside from one track on an Australian-only version (“Talk To Me”), all songs are sung by Paul and Gene. I do not believe any of the hits are remixed, but some feature edits/fades not present on the original albums (“Detroit Rock City”). I loved that “Sure Know Something” was included as it’s one of Paul’s under appreciated classics.

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The Japanese, which I have, included “Shandi” from Unmasked and “Escape From The Island” from The Elder. An instrumental, “Escape From The Island” was one of the few rockers on The Elder, which Ace wrote. Therefore, the Japanese version is a much more complete version and the version I recommend.

Killers is actually a great CD for new and old fans alike, which is a rare thing in the KISS catalog. There are cheaper compilations out there, but this one has a nice variety of tunes including oddballs like “Sure Know Something”. Of course there’s the four new songs too, two of which are really special.

4/5 stars

Part 82: Impact
Your gracious host

Your gracious host

The first time a record store person had any impact on me was actually well after high school.  Until then, I never spent much time interacting with them.  I always knew how to find what I wanted, and I never special-ordered anything because the stuff I wanted, they couldn’t get anyway.  I had to order my rare albums from magazines.

In 1990, Peter and I got heavily into Faith No More.  Peter got Introduce Yourself before I did, but I found We Care A Lot first.  I found it at Sam The Record Man, generally considered the best store in town at the time.  Angel Dust had just came out on CD, but I hadn’t got it yet.  We Care A Lot was a rarity; therefore a priority in my spending budget.

It was there, on cassette.  $14.99.  Not cheap.

Al King was behind the counter.  Al King was the undisputed music guru in town.  Undisputed.  I strived to be what he represented.  Heck he even had a feature spot on a weekly local TV program — The Metal Mike Show — which I watched many times.

“Do you have the new Faith No More yet?” Al asked me as he took the security tag off my purchase.

“No, not yet.  I saw this and I had to get it because I’ve never seen it before,” I answered.

“The new one is…pretty different.  Have you heard Mr. Bungle?” he inquired.

Al was engaging me.  He had just seen Bungle live.  He liked Bungle, but the new Faith No More was still growing on him.  He explained to me that you could really hear the Bungle influece on it.  The next time I came in, he told me he had just seen Faith No More.  He told me everything about the show.

Years later, things cycle around, and I found myself in Al’s shoes.  Kids were coming up to me and asking my opinion on things.  I tried my best to be honest and treat them with respect.  I had my bad days — we all do — but I certainly didn’t want to recommend music that I didn’t think was any good.

When I saw a young guy or girl come in buying Kiss, that was an instant obvious coversation starter.  Tall One and Short One, who I talked about several chapters ago, started getting into bands like Kiss and Oasis, so I tried to steer them into the albums I was into.

I made a lot of friends that way.  Shane Schedler, who I’ve talked about twice before was one guy who trusted my opinion implicity.  There was another guy, Italian Tony, who always wanted to know what I was into.  I sold him Slash Puppet that way, I knew he would be into that band.  And then there’s my buddy Statham.  Some found me on Facebook, some I just run into randomly.

Of course I had just as many failures.  Sometimes you expect someone to be into a new Maiden album just because they liked the old Maiden, for example.  Then they don’t trust you anymore.

I don’t think I appreciated my position back then.  I don’t think I saw myself as Al King.  I think I saw myself as still trying but not quite succeeding at being that guy.  It’s only now that I talk to people and get it.  Somebody will say to me, “You told me to buy this album, and I did, and it’s in my top ten of all time now.”  That’s a cool feeling.  I wish I appreciated it back then.

The truth is, it was a job just like any other.  You were a business and businesses were supposed to make money.  Stores have to be cleaned, books balance, shelves stocked.  Sometimes it felt like conversation was keeping you from your job.  And spend too much time with a single customer, and you got dirty looks from people with the authority to give you dirty looks.

I appreciate now though, that conversation was the job.  Conversations that I don’t even remember have turned out to have huge impacts on people’s musical lives.  Al King was a trusted musical guru to me.  It’s weird to think that I might be that to other people.   But if that truly is the case, I have to say thanks, because that’s all I ever really wanted anyway.

Well…that and a staff discount.

Yeah. Slash Puppet, baby.