This week brings KISS Rocks Vegas to theaters for a one-night only event, delivering a stadium-style concert experience to audiences at the cineplex. And the sound mix in Dolby Atmos creates something no other concert films have achieved in their attempts to bring live music to theater audiences. I had the pleasure of seeing KISS Rocks Vegas at a special screening with the band themselves, and beforehand I spoke with singer-guitarist Paul Stanley and singer-bassist Gene Simmons. Before I get to the interviews, let me explain my history with KISS, my interest in audio for cinema, and why this movie was so special to me personally.
KISS Rocks Vegas
I've been listening to rock music my entire life, and I cannot even remember a time in my childhood when I wasn't a KISS fan. My eight older siblings -- particularly my sisters -- all listened to KISS and other rock bands, playing 45s and filling the house with the soundtrack of my youth. How many times did I don KISS makeup for Halloween? How many of their LPs and 45s did I hear over and over on the record player? How many times did I drive home at night, windows down and Detroit Rock City blaring from the radio? And how many times did I sit down at a piano and play the opening of Beth, the only tune I could even play? Later, in my teens, I would write song lyrics and sing in a band, with the KISS song Lick It Up as a crowd-pleasing part of the set. KISS wasn't just a band, they were an idea, and their songs were anthems declaring that idea belonged to everybody.
There's nothing in the music world like a KISS concert. I've seen it in person myself, and it's got to be experienced to be understood and believed. Previously, there wasn't a way to truly capture and deliver that experience outside of the live concert. But that's changed, and so today we have KISS Rocks Vegas, a concert movie that finally delivers a concert experience in a cinema setting. A one-night-only engagement, KISS Rocks Vegas benefits from the remarkable and unparalleled sound of Dolby Atmos. I screened the film at a special event with the band itself, at Dolby Laboratories in LA.
If you read me regularly, you know I'm obsessive about sound and image in theaters, and that I've been a huge fan of Atmos. I hadn't realized the potential for creating theatrical concert experiences that were truly immersive, that created a live concert experience, until listening to Jon Favreau describe how he used Atmos to create a sound mix for The Jungle Book that was a revival of Walt Disney's Fantasound back in the late 1930s and early 1940s. I'm lucky enough to have seen Iron Maiden live in concert a couple of weeks before seeing KISS Rocks Vegas, so I had a direct recent comparison regarding how well the concert movie adapted the live experience to the theater. I'm happy to say, the result is spectacular -- as a KISS fan and an Atmos fan, I was on cloud nine.
It's one thing to enjoy immersive sound in a fictional feature film situation, but you can really sink your teeth-- er, I mean ears into it when you have an actual personal comparison in real life and the movie recreates it. As visually thrilling and musically joyous as a live KISS concert, and as thunderously encompassing as hearing the band live, KISS Rocks Vegas is a greatest hits performance demonstrating a whole new potential for Atmos and for live music in cinema settings. I'm excited at what this could mean for the future of concert films.
I had the pleasure of seeing KISS Rocks Vegas with the band itself, and to speak with founding members Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons at length about the film, their careers, and what KISS means to their fans. So read on for my full interviews, dear readers!
[First up, I sat down with KISS singer and guitarist Paul Stanley...]
Growing up as a kid in the south with 9 siblings in a small house, we listened to a helluva lot of KISS. We had the 45s, the LPs, we listened to your music all the time—
PS: And you know what’s amazing? That it got you here. And got me here. Everything seems to merge.
Mark Hughes (center) with KISS members (left to right) Gene Simmons, Eric Singer, Paul Stanley, and... [+]
I was in a rock band as a teenager, and we played a cover of your song Lick It Up, and that — being in a band and writing songs — actually led me into writing, which led me into writing other things, so it did literally lead me here.
PS: I’m always fascinated and it’s very gratifying when you meet people from other fields who somehow see KISS as a catalyst for them to achieve a certain success in a field other than rock and roll. So when I meet a doctor or someone who says, “KISS got me through medical school,” or a policeman, or somebody who had a drug problem, it’s wonderful to not preach and yet become an inspiration.
There’s something very cinematic about KISS, and I remember the concert specials on HBO back in the day. And other artists had sets and things — Alice Cooper could get elaborate for example — but nobody approached what KISS did on stage. It was cinematic and it was the reason Marvel did a comic book of KISS and you did the movie KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park, and it went to a whole other level that transcended the idea of music.
PS: Well, you know, I think that a lot of other bands— not that there were many, but the few that there were that perhaps would be compared to us — really, their music was more the soundtrack to the stage show. With us, the band drove the car. We were the engine, we are the engine, and I think it’s much more powerful to lead the charge than to be part of a dramatic presentation.
So I’ve always thought of us as — funny enough — a no-frills rock and roll band, like the bands I grew up seeing at the Fillmore East. That, taken to a different level, adding accoutrement to that, but at the core of it we’ve always been just a no-frills rock and roll band. I remember seeing Humble Pie, I remember seeing Derek and the Dominos. I saw Hendrix, I saw Zeppelin playing for a few thousand people. And it was the synergy onstage and the commitment to the music that brought that combustibility and excitement.
All we did was surround that with more, with pyrotechnics. The theatricality, I think, came from within us, as opposed to having dancing toothbrushes or anything like that. It was really about us.
That kind of leads into what I was thinking with this new film. There’ve been concert films before, obviously, but I don’t think cinema has ever taken full advantage of the cinema experience to bring live music to a mass audience larger and beyond going to the live shows. But the Dolby Atmos provides that—
PS: That immersion.
—yes, that immersion in the music. And KISS seems to be the perfect band to do that.
PS: Yeah, very much. I think the goal when we did KISS Alive was not to record a live show, but to immerse you in the experience of a live show. At that point, for the few live albums that there were, you didn’t know they were live until you heard some applause at the end of a song. What we wanted to create was that you were in the thick of it. So, whether it meant enhancing things, we wanted you to be able to have what you remembered — and that’s sometimes different than what actually existed. I think that using the Atmos system and doing the show in the venue we did, it would be very different doing it in a stadium.
I keep drawing the analogy to a ship in a bottle. You can’t put the ship in in one piece, you can do it one piece at a time, and then you can’t take it out. That’s virtually what we did, because we didn’t have to deal with the practicality of traveling with the show. So we could create a show that for all intents and purposes was a stadium show in a very small venue, a venue smaller than anything we normally play. And I think that makes for that much more impact. The band becomes even larger than life, because the room can barely contain us.
And it’s always interesting to me that we’re never eclipsed by our show, because nothing can eclipse us. Whether you want to say we’re cinematic, dynamic — we’ve been around so long, we’ve almost become superheroes. We’ve become timeless, we’ve become ageless, although I can tell you that’s not the case.
So there is a responsibility, because of the pride. I think throughout the years, even with the naysayers, some people missed the point that we have a tremendous amount of pride in what we do, and a tremendous amount of responsibility and commitment to the fans who make us what we are. With time, our only competition is our past. And living up to that is challenging. But to go onstage and play for people who’ve never seen us, and to see them after the show, it’s gratifying beyond anything most people get to experience. We’ve made a career of being the underdog.
I have an 8 year old nephew who had never seen KISS before, and a few nights ago I was showing him images of KISS and some clips from concert footage online. And afterward, he was mesmerized and wanted to see them over and over. That speaks to the timelessness you talked about, and it’s like you’re your own genre of music, your own subgenre of rock and roll. There’s no other band in your genre but KISS.
PS: I agree with you. You know, I think we created our own niche, and if it was as simple as putting on makeup you’d be talking about many more bands than we’re talking about. It’s a singularity. It’s always been about the heart and the passion for what we do, that’s what drives this. At this point, all it takes is money to put on a KISS show, but no other band can be KISS. Our DNA is in everything you see, but it can never be us.
The idea that people want to emulate KISS is fabulous. What we’ve always sung about, and what we’ve always believed in, is a timeless simplicity that was lost on some people. About self-empowerment, about self-determination, about autonomy, about working hard to fulfill your dreams — that was considered trite, but it’s as true today as it was when we started.
It’s interesting to see that we’re so multigenerational at this point. You see parents bringing their children, and it’s amazing they want their children to share something that was pivotal in their lives. And you see parents of those parents, you see three and four generations. I’ve said onstage at one point, “Raise your children up, hold them up in the air,” and I said, “We were there for your parents, and we’ll be there for you.” And that’s what it’s really about. It’s timeless, and the longer we last the more invincible we are and the more we’re perceived as superheroes.
I like the comparison to superheroes, because as a child one of the things that crystalized in my mind was, it’s possible KISS could be anyone under that makeup. You became these iconic symbols, it made it possible for anyone to put the makeup on and imagine they were KISS, like donning a superhero costume to play a superhero.
PS: In the same way, I’ve always believed that perhaps you can’t look like KISS but you can feel like KISS. In other words, you can look at a picture of us and go, “I feel like that guy.” So even if you can’t make yourself up, you see there’s a place for individuality to take a stand, that you can wear who you are on your sleeve and be proud of it. And in the face of adversity, of people saying what’s possible and impossible, you can break those rules.
I’m a firm believer that the ones who tell you what’s impossible have failed. I’d rather be the voice out there saying, “The only thing standing between you and success is hard work.”
[Next up, I sat down with KISS singer and bassist Gene Simmons, so read on!]
As I mentioned to Paul Stanley, I was showing my 8 year old nephew pictures and video of KISS. He was mesmerized and he knew I was coming to the show [KISS Rocks Vegas], and at one point he asked if he could come.
GS: For me, the best thing is that magic, that light that goes on and the sense of wonder. It's like the magician who pulls a rabbit out of his hat and mesmerizes the kids. The grownups get it, like, "Oh yeah that was well done, the craft and all of that," but when a kid sees it, that's my favorite.
Tommy Thayer (left) with Mark Hughes.
The light did go on for him, and he watched a clip where you spit the fire and made me rewind it again and again. So he could be at home wearing KISS makeup right now. Which brings me to a question I've wanted to ask for years: when you decided to don the makeup, were you conscious of the fact it made it suddenly possible KISS could be anybody, that idea of anonymity that creates an everyman, so to speak?
GS: No, we never thought about that.
I think people really zeroed in on that idea, that maybe they could be you.
GS: Yeah, we could be anybody.
Of course, not just anybody could literally be KISS. But it allows that fantasy when we put that makeup on, we look in the mirror and it's like wearing a superhero costume so you can imagine it's really you up there.
GS: Well, I have to tell you, 42 years ago when we started the band, we had a peculiar notion. The notion was: The world doesn't need another rock band. We were so used to going to see rock bands because we liked the songs -- The Electric Prunes, [sings] "I had to much to dream last night," [imitates self] "Yeah, that was cool, let's go see them!" -- and they're on stage and they look like a lot of bands today, which is like garbage collectors. They just didn't have pizzazz.
We always thought of the stage as holy ground, like electric church. It's literally raised above us, and it should always be a place for special people, which is why the English bands always appealed to us. Like Hendrix -- who of course was American -- with his jackets and lighting his guitar on fire.
Yes, you've always got to have the songs, but there's got to be something called charisma, the ability to-- well, you said it, the visuals got your nephew right away, even before the songs, there's that sort of connection. And Elvis, and Little Richard playing piano with his feet, and all that stuff. It's show business, it's not just songs. You don't want to go to a concert and close your eyes. It's audio-visual.
So, we wanted to put together the band we never saw on stage. Sort of like the Beatles on steroids. We all wanted to look... It's funny, we never verbalized it, but we had a sense -- everybody equally, Peter, Paul, Ace, and myself, there's no mastermind or grand design . It just happened. We happened to be at the right place, New York City during the glitter era when a lot of guys were dressing up like their girlfriends, and it was free, you know? They only come out at night, during the day everybody looks like Clark Kent but at night it's Jekyll and Hyde.
New York was a very special place and it had its scene, and it gave birth to the Magic Tramps, the Harlots of 42nd street and the Brats and all kinds of stuff. They never went anywhere. The New York Dolls made a little bit of noise, but it was that sort of androgynous thing. We took a stab at it, we were Wicked Lester first and physically I'm too big physically to be convincing as your girlfriend.
So the end of it was, we found ourselves in a rat-infested loft. One day, I have no idea why but we said, "Let's go downstairs" -- there was a Woolworths, one of those chains where you can buy stuff -- and we bought a $15 mirror, one of those that stands up. We bought a few of those, and as you'd lean them against the wall they'd warp, it looked like a freak house. And we went next door to this gag shop and bought clown makeup, and somehow we said, "In order to be different from the other bands, we have to wear makeup." I have no idea why we did that.
There we are in a loft with no windows, rat-infested, egg cartons that we put up on the wall. We'd get them at the grocery store, they'd throw them out and some of the shells were still kind of half-broken in there, so at night dinosaur crustaceans would come in and it was a meal to all of these huge cockroaches. We were rehearsing so much I moved my bed in there, because I had a job during the daytime, and it was scary. I had a girl with me one night, and it was pitch black, and I heard a blood-curdling scream. She got up and I turned on the light, and this huge monstrous prehistoric cockroach ran off. This is true, so help me God! She ran out, I had to go back in, and I slept with the light on this time.
Put a saddle on it and ride it around.
GS: Very good, ba-dum-bum-tss!
So, in retrospect, we happened to be in the right place at the right time with the right thing. Because without any one of those things-- it's like Earth, there doesn't seem to be another Earth-like planet with exactly the right amount of water and things like that. The songs somehow fit the band, the songs somehow came from Paul and myself, we were both avoid anglophiles so the songs had that kind of feeling, more English than American. And the makeup that we put on was pretty darn close to what we continue to wear today.
There was no grand design, no marketer. We didn't even know what marketing was. And 42 years later, here we are, America's number one gold record award-winning group of all time in all categories. Which is astonishing considering the fact we don't use backing tracks, we don't really write singles -- I think we had two hit singles, one was kind of a ballad and one was a dance thing, I Was Made For Lovin' You, and that's it! There's no rhyme or reason to why KISS is where it is now.
So here we are again with this KISS Rocks Vegas that's going to be playing around the world just for one day.
That's a perfect merger, the band and the format.
GS: We think so.
As you mentioned, at the concert there's the stage and it's kind of like being in a church...
GS: Yeah...
...and the cinema is a church in its own separate way. And the only bands I can think of historically that cross over from the church of music into something cinematic that I could imagine putting in with Dolby Atmos and the theatricality of putting it in cinemas around the world, are KISS and U2.
GS: It's a tip of the hat to any band that wants to go up on that stage and give their fans more, and not use backing tracks and have the integrity and pride of doing themselves live. I can't tell you how I disown and disavow anything to do with any band -- disco, rap, pop, or anything that uses backing tracks or disco boys dancing onstage -- it doesn't mean the songs aren't good or that they can't dance, you just want a bit of honesty. So there are just a handful of us left, but we happen to be the bands that play stadiums. Paul McCartney is live, The Rolling Stones and AC/DC and just a few others play live, and we think that's important.
Besides music, you're also an actor. And for the last several years I've been waiting for the announcement that DC or Marvel had reached out to you to play someone. Like right now, they're filming Justice League and I thought of Darkseid--
GS: From the New Gods, created by Jack Kirby, along with Orion and Highfather.
I mean, Gene Simmons as Darkseid -- who else even has the voice to achieve that?
GS: Well you're very kind about that. But going along with that, we're talking with Warner about our own series. And I have a film company called Erebus, which is a joint venture with WWE -- in fact, we just finished our first film called Temple with Wesley Snipes and Anne Heche. The truth is, there's so much that besides being lucky we're blessed, because almost anything we touch seems to succeed beyond our wildest dreams. I just came back today, I flew in from Dallas where we just opened a huge Rock & Brews, the second Texas one.
There's a new Thor movie coming out, they're making Ragnarok, and I keep thinking, "How is Gene Simmons not in a Thor movie?" And seriously, the song God of Thunder needs to show up in Thor, it's gotta happen.
GS: You're very kind. I've had run-ins up and down with the James Bond series they wanted me to be one of the villains. But it takes so long to make a movie, you've got to be available from three to six months depending on the shoot. Unless you're doing a lower budget thing where you're in and out in three weeks, you're going to be stuck doing nothing but that, so you've got to have the patience and the time. And that's -- luckily or unluckily, depending on how you look at it -- I don't have the time. You know, hopefully if they gave me a shot, I'd do a decent job.
But there's nothing like getting up on stage. Nothing. That's why every Kevin Bacon and all the rest of them want to put together a band and tour. Everybody, you want that thing, it's immediate. When I was in movies or on television doing CSI, Castle and all the rest of them, it's fun but boy you just don't get that immediate rush. You know, there's that thing, there's nothing like it, it's even difficult to describe... and when you're making a movie is maybe at the Academy Awards, and even then it's subdued.
Thanks to Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of KISS for taking time to speak with me, and for a lifetime of great rock and roll!
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