Review Summary: The best KISS album
Of all the bands who are regarded as "Classic", I will never understand why KISS is considered such. To be frank, they were the 70's version of Nickleback; a shitty, generic, Rock band with obnoxiously catchy singles and a basic understanding of "listenable music". With this in mind, one must always remember that even the worst of bands can produce a good album once in a while. KISS had that in
Dressed to Kill.
Despite being only thirty whole minutes long,
Dressed to Kill has a myriad of good tunes.
Room Service features some of Ace Frehley's best guitar playing, riffing his way through excellent solos as Paul Stanley lights up with some excellent, hard hitting, vocals. One of the most notable changes from their first two albums was that Paul Stanley did the majority vocals in this album, as Gene Simmons was majority for their first two. This can be attributed to the fact that Paul's vocals were better received and of the financial failure of their sophomore album, which Simmon's was lead vocalist of.
Getaway is a very fun track, with booming drums from Peter Criss as Ace Frehley goes completely bonkers, doing all of the guitar work on the track with such excellent virtuosity.
Rock Bottom remains one of my personal favorite tracks, with its somber tone reminiscent of
Led Zeppelin IV's ethereal production quality. The sound quality of this record is top notch, especially when the hard guitar half breaks through the strings, completely doing a 180 on the entire track's atmosphere.
Of course I would be remiss if I didn't mention KISS' magnum opus. I'm talking, of course, about
Rock And Roll All Nite. A bursting guitar-heavy track combining the talents of all four members of KISS evenly, creating a track that describes KISS to a tee. To be fair as well, Simmon's is the perfect vocalist for this track, as his hissing and talkative vocal performance add to the raw and unbalanced nature of the tune, as tamberine's begin meshing with guitars, chorus, and percussion to create pure madness.
Dressed to Kill is not perfect, it has flaws like every other KISS album. Cheesy lyrics, squeaky clean production, basic formula for every song, and repetition ad nauseum are easy to point out. The change is what
Dressed to Kill offers that other KISS albums don't. That lies in its creative guitar playing from Ace Frehley, one of the best Rock singles of the 1970's, and Paul Stanley being majority singer for the record. In this instance, KISS reached their apex, and would never reach this height ever again.
