Review Summary: Greatest band in the world? Not yet, but with their debut album, the group gets itself on the right track...
“You wanted the best, you got the best! The greatest band in the wo…”
Hold it! Hold it just a minute! Who is this “greatest band in the world” of which you speak? Certainly not those bozos in clown make-up back there? Two poor Jewish boys, one poor Italian boy, and one poor American boy? And wearing make-up? They’ll never get anywhere!
If you were a common American citizen in the early 1970s, that’s probably what you would have said upon sight of KISS. The band’s concept was so outrageous, not even their management put much faith into them. The band would, however, exceed and transcend expectations, becoming one of the most recognizable names in rock history, and spawning na ungodly amount of merchandise, which streteched from the usual t-shirts and patches to toilet-paper (!), videogames and beyond.
Yet in 1974, the “greatest-band-in-the-world-to-be” was still pretty much an unknown quantity. Having formed the year before, the foursome were driven byt the megalomaniac ambitions of co-founders, leaders and best friends Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons. The duo had a plan, and it involved creating a band like none other, which would take the world by storm. However, their ambitions quickly smacked against the hard brick wall of reality, and they realised that every band must start small.
The realisation came, of course, with the release of their eponymous debut album. Ignored by a majority of the public, despite the marketing boost provided by a kissing contest (!!), the album nevertheless started to garner the band a cult following among the very same misfits that supported Alice Cooper or the New York Dolls, and who would later get behind the Sex Pistols and the Ramones. Now, over thirty years later, we can see that KISS’s debut album was a solid, if not all that groundbreaking, rock’n’roll offering.
The group’s sound was best described by the Allmusic Guide, which labelled it a cross between the New York Dolls and the Rolling Stones. I had already heard the New York Dolls in the album, but the Rolling Stones comparison provided the final element I needed to fully convey
Kiss’s sound. In fact, a track like
Nothing To Lose smacks of mid-period Stones, from the piano-infused boogie to Gene Simmons’ boisterous vocal attitude. Other tracks, such as
Let Me Know and the cover to
Kissin’ Time, bring the mishmash of heavy guitars and doo-wop elements that the New York Dolls made famous on
Too Much Too Soon. Occasionally, we can even hear the group predate the hard rock movement, which they created alongside such names as Alice Cooper or Cream; the intro riff to
Cold Gin, for example, is a dead giveaway.
Overall, the first half of the album is quite strong. Even Ace Frehley’s
Cold Gin, initially a less attractive song, eventually grows on you, despite the lead guitarist’s tendency to make space for himself in the track’s structure, which leads to numerous moments of unrequested wankery. The second half, however, is a little limper, with the odd throwaway song (
100.000 Years) and a general tendency to repeat rhythms and patterns from one track to the next.
In fact, that is one of the major problems of
Kiss, the album: while none of the tracks can actually be labelled “bad”, most of them sound like variations of each other, and end up sounding rather nondescript. Still, there are undisputable moments of genius here, such as the spiritual choir vocals on
Kissin’ Time and the acoustic intro and long, progressively unwinding outro of closer
Black Diamond. There are also at least three songs which stand clearly above the rest.
The first of these standouts is opener
Strutter. Boasting the heaviest guitar of the album, alongside
Cold Gin, this Stanley/Simmons collaboration also brings its strongest chorus. The best song overall, however, is the delightful
Let Me Know, a short, sweet slab of piano-fueled retro-rock’n’roll that’s equal parts 50’s all-american country-boy innocence and 70’s ghetto sleaze. The final standout comes in the form of
Black Diamond, a more complex, elaborate track with another good chorus.
Of the remaining songs, all are decent. Instrumental
Love Theme From KISS is, like all instrumentals, curious; the cover,
Kissin’ Time, is competent and knowingly goofy; and tracks like
Cold Gin, Deuce and
Nothing To Lose provide decent backup. As noted, the only (slightly) limper moment is
100.000 years, which nevertheless features some good guitar work from Frehley and Stanley.
All in all, then, this album finally makes me see why KISS are considered a good band. As musicians, they’re limited, but they have good ideas and know how to spruce up their songs; they manage to include very little filler and, while not the saviors of rock’n’roll some make them out to be, provide an extremely pleasant listening experience. All this album would need was a little more variety and an ever-so-slight increase in “punch”, and we would have an easy 4.5 on our hands. As it is, it’s still a classic, and at least merits an attentive listen.
Recommended Tracks
Strutter
Let Me Know
Black Diamond
