A lot of bands were putting out good albums around that time.

Aside from "Revenge," AC/DC also put out "Razor's Edge" (easily their best in ten years) and Judas Priest put out "Painkiller." (Best since Defenders of the Faith.)

I think the Attack of The Phantoms movie was terriffic. much better than the tv version ..... It Would have been cool if Peter Criss would have been asked to record his lines for the reissue of the movie..Just a thought

Well, I just finished watching the show on VH1, 'Kissology 2'. Paul and Gene gave commentary through some of what I figure are excerpts from the DVD set. I was just curious to see what those years would include. As a KISS fan from the 70s on, I'm curious..... I'd like to ask those of you that have the DVD set, on VH1 they had comments on change of members, including, Peter, Eric Carr, and Ace...on the show at least, they skipped right over the Mark St. John era. While he wasn't able to do much on tour for Animalize, he was KEY in recording the album. And after all, we were purchasing the album not the concert right? They skipped right over Mark and mentioned Bruce as the Vinnie (?) replacement. I've seen previous posts mention Eric Carr and while I realize he was more well known then Mark St. John (who also passed on, this year) can someone please tell me if he was at all mentioned in the DVD set?
Thanks....Brenda

He is.

Good news for the next volume, from an interview with one of the set's producers:

http://kissasylum.com/cgi-bin/fullSt...5-01Vaults.htm

GM: Any surprises in store for "KISSology Vol. III?"

AC: A lot of the stuff on Vol. III is footage I shot personally for MTV. The quality of the footage progresses, so now we’ve got multi-track audio and multi-cameras. We’re able to go back and remix and do true 5:1 mixes. Vol. III will have the "Unplugged" show in a remastered, remixed and more complete version than ever has been available. There’ll be footage from the reunion tour, and much more. As part of the MTV Video Awards, KISS performed "Rock And Roll All Nite" under the Brooklyn Bridge. We’ll include the rest of the songs they performed that night. There’s even some soundcheck rehearsal footage of the band performing without makeup.

I love the Kissology sets but would love even more releases.

Why not have a Live Kisstory release with a complete concert from every one of their album tours? That way you don't skip anything. Use only the best quality video & sound wise and go thru each album tour. Start with a Wicked Lester concert (if such a copy of it exists...according to their touring history there were only 3 concerts so it is unlikely those are on video...but Gene & Paul are notorious for having almost everything), early "Kiss" (club tours), "Hotter Than Hell", etc. on up to The Farewell Farewell Retiring Farewell (We Really Mean It This Time) tour.

I have all their albums. Now give me a concert for each one.

this is the one thing I dislike about the Kissology sets....

years ago, I was a bigger Kiss fan than I am now, and I acquired some bootleg video albums for some of their lesser successful albums (Dynasty through Creatures), each containing 2-3 hours of content alone. There was so much footage of these guys between 1978-1982 that they could've easily done a Kissology Vol. 2 alone just of 1978 to 1983 (ending with the Rio shows, while pt. 3 would cover the Unmasking through Unplugged, while pt. 4 would begin at the 96 Grammys). Even while album sales were downhill during this period for the band, there are countless archives of video from this period that would be great.

Here's some stuff that's missing:
Dynasty era:
Gene and Paul interview with their backs to the camera (it was either pre or post show, and they had their makeup off)
3-2-1 Contact feature about the roadies putting the show together
COMPLETE Tom Snyder Interview (how could Space Bear be omitted?)

Unmasked era:
album commercial (everyone has seen the 70's commercials for albums like Dynasty and Alive II, but this one is pretty rare)
more extensive footage of the hoopla surrounding their triumphant tour of Australia
Kids Are People Too appearence

Elder era:
Solid Gold performance
interview on America's Top 10
Flo And Eddie Show
appearence on a telephon for a Jerry's Kids type of thing

Creatures era:
MTV news mention of Ace leaving the band
Gene and Paul interview on a morning show discussing the controversy surrounding the COTN tour by religious fundies

it's been years and years since I've seen these things, but I know they're out there, I'm surprised more of this didn't appear on Kissology Vol. 2. They were on such a roll with the first Volume

I agree, more footage from this era would have been great. The amount of material from the Dynasty period was especially spare. Unless you got the Largo '79 bonus disc (I did), the only thing from that album's period was half of the Tomorrow interview. Pretty lame. I'm happy that the Unmasked period was well represented though.

just bought kissology 2 and was wondering how many studio albums does kiss have? and how many greatest hits albums do they have? I was thinking of trying to get all there studio albums.. right now i only have kiss, love gun and destroyer.. what are must haves? any of you have all of them?

http://wm07.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?...ifoxqe5ldse~T2

you NEED Alive! and Alive II.

thanks.. i think i'll pick up that box set that has alive 1,2,3, and another disk not sure of the name.. I thought they had more studio albums.. are any of those hard to find oop?

Nah nothing is hard to find. The boxset is a good way to go though, just for the 1st 2 Alives.

even though it isn't original lineup (Eric Carr was in the band by then, and Vinnie Vincent played guitars even though Ace is on the cover), Creatures Of The Night is a must-have album as well, Kiss never rocked harder, at least except for Revenge

"Must Have" KISS studio albums:

KISS
Hotter Than Hell
Dressed To Kill
Destroyer
Rock and Roll Over
Love Gun
Creatures of the Night
Lick It Up
Animalize
Asylum
Revenge
Carnival Of Souls

You could argue in favor of Dynasty, Unmasked, and The Elder for a number of reasons, but I'd say start with the other ones first.

I'd love to hear you make an argument for the Elder simply because not even Gene and Paul can...

I have everything Kiss has released (and a good bit they haven't ) and have been listening to them since I was a kid.

Must-haves to me would be from their first album up until Asylum. Now that is the extreme Kiss fan in me talking.

If you have to pare it down, I would say: Kiss, Hotter Than Hell, Dressed to Kill, Alive!, Rock And Roll Over, Love Gun, Destroyer, Alive II, Creatures of the Night, & Lick It Up. After Lick It Up, almost all the albums have several good songs and several weak ones with the albums as a whole a very unsteady listen at times. Yeah, some cry Revenge all the time but it is just a decent album made greater by the fact that the pretty poor Hot In The Shade was released before it (and the just as poor Crazy Nights before it).

It pains me to leave out the solo albums, Dynasty & Unmasked but if you delve deep enough into the ones above, you will eventually pick these up. I actually listen to the solo albums, Dynasty, Unmasked & The Elder more than the early stuff in recent years but that is mostly because I have burned up the early stuff so much that the later make-up years still sounds fresh(er).

A good way to start with them is Alive! and Alive II. If you like those, you will definitely want to get Kiss thru Destroyer either forwards or backwards. Just be warn that once you get used to the Alive albums pacing, going to the studio discs can be a little hard. They play much slower on the studio albums and the pace is so different that lots of the songs seem like completely different versions. I cut my teeth on Alive II and going from it to Love Gun and Destroyer was pretty strange at the time (especially God Of Thunder )

Another good way to see if they are your poison would be to check out the 5 disc Kiss boxset which can be found at reasonable prices. There are several demos on those but most of them are so similar to the originals that you will eventually be hunting down the original albums if you like the boxset enough. The 5 disc set gives a great over-view from the group and gives some deep album cuts as well as most of their hits.

thanks for the advise.. i will defently pick up the kiss box set with alive 1,2,3 at best buy tomorrow.. (hope its in stock) maybe pick up the elder and lick it up.. i have some rewards cash that i'm going to use

To be clear, the Kiss boxset I was discussing is this one: http://www.amazon.com/Kiss/dp/B00005...112159&sr=8-12

But I highly recommend passing on The Elder at first and getting Destroyer instead. If it must be two studio discs in addition to the Alive boxset, get Destroyer and Hotter Than Hell.

I think Elder has some good songs on it. Definately not an album for a Kiss newbie to try on, but there's some fantastic stuff on there, I believe World Without Heroes is nothing short of a masterpiece. It's just not a typical Kiss album but it's good for what it is

and if you have to have a solo album, PLEASE make it Ace's for the love of God.

am I the only person not too wild about the pre-Destroyer STUDIO material? the first album has some gems on it, but Hotter Than Hell and Dressed To Kill have never been faves of mine. I'd recommend Creatures Of The Night or Rock N' Roll Over over those two albums any day of the week. Revenge is great too but it's a totally different era, although if you like Alive III, that stems from the Revenge tour from 1992.

Crazy Nights and Hot In The Shade are the nadir IMO, I know albums like Dynasty and Unmasked get shafted a lot for being pop, but at least there's classic material on there. CN and HITS are Kiss desperately trying to mimic Bon Jovi and Cinderella in hopes of reclaiming some of the fame they had in the 70's. Shade did give Kiss a top 10 smash with "Forever" (their first top 10 hit since Beth), but the rest of the album was forgettable. I actually don't mind Animalize and Asylum because they still rocked then even if they were getting more and more MTV by the album. Revenge is beloved because it totally puts Kiss back at square one, a kickass hard rocking band, it did in the early 90's for Kiss what Creatures and Lick It Up did for them in 82/83 musically.

Studiowise, Revenge is the last album you need of theirs. Carnival Of Souls was horrific and Psycho Circus, while fun, was still likely the weakest effort from the original lineup. With live cd's, after Alive box set, you should check Unplugged out. That is the show that really set in stone the reunion tour and is a great performance and perhaps Kiss' last true hoorah as a modern band before they decided to jump on the oldies gravy train

I find the solo albums really interesting, if uneven.

The four solo albums are, in a lot of ways, a turning point for the band. They were commercially unsuccessful and revealed a lot of the weaknesses within the band at the time.

Gene's album was all show and little substance. Tons of guest stars and covers. It's essentially nothing but showmanship.

Paul's sounded the most like a KISS album, but his limitation of only being a "frontman" were apparent. (Look at a lot of guys from the 70s... Ozzy, Nugent, Alice Cooper... they're only as good as the band they were recording with at the time.)

Ace's album confirmed that he was the musical backbone of the band. His album was the best in that it had the most hooks and best songs.

Peter's made it apparent that he was in the wrong fucking band.

And you will notice that Peter left not long afterward, and when Ace became disenfanchised and his role in the band was minimized, they began flirting with disco and released "Unmasked" and "The Elder."

Paul's is good too. basically a more pop version of a KISS album, which is pretty much what Dynasty turned out to be. Gene and Peter's solo albums are unlistenable.

Ace's solo album is one of the greatest albums of all time! By any band!

Hotter Than Hell has Got To Choose, Parasite, Goin' Blind, Hotter Than Hell, Watchin' You & Strange Ways. All classics in my opinion. The secondary songs are still great - All The Way & Comin' Home. The only songs I feel are truly weak are Let Me Go, Rock n Roll (which many consider a classic) and Mainline.

Dressed To Kill has one of the worst Kiss songs ever which is Two Timer. Just a terrible song in every way. Room Service is really weak (but another many consider a classic). I personally love Ladies In Waiting, Rock Bottom, C'mon And Love Me (the weakest of the one I love but Gene's background vocals on it are great), She and of course Rock And Roll All Nite. So 5 classics, 4 weaks songs and 1 truly awful song. Yet if you are a Kiss fan it is still a must have.

Of course the first self-titled album is a must have with the only weak song being Kissin' Time which is just bizarre and out of character. Sure it's just a remake of an old song but it is a really strange listen.







Funny, those are the two solo albums I listen to the most of the four with Gene's being first and Peter's second. I love all four of the solo albums but Gene has always been my favorite songwriter in the group which is probably why I like his the best.



Awesome quote!