For many people, when they think of Glam Metal with a hint of the old time Rock and Roll, Kiss is the first band that pop into their minds. Their impact on pop culture has been quite a long and huge one.


Kissology Volume three is mostly a look at the time when the band were trying something different, they had decided to remove the make up and by the time of "Revenge Tragedy" had suffered with the passing of Eric Carr. However for chronological sake I’m starting the review with the 4th disc out of this special 5 Disc set.

This disc is the earliest recording of a Kiss live concert so there wasn’t the pyrotechnics and ballyhoo you come to expect now. Your first question is likely "why is this on Volume Three"? According to the producer’s note inside the booklet it didn’t feel right at the level the footage was when the Kissology project began to start Volume 1 with it despite the historical value. After months of cleaning up the audio and video the best they could the producers felt it would bring a meaning of full circle to the series.

Taken on December 22nd 1973 in Coventry in Queens, New York it shows Kiss at probably their most scaled down (at least until a recent show in Islington Academy in London!) but shows that Gene, Paul, Ace and Peter had the charisma even back then as the showcase highlights hits such as ‘Black Diamond’, ‘Deuce’ and ‘Strutter’ to a small venue! Paul Stanley states that:

Some people can (and will) see that as an egotistical statement but personally I think they may have also truly been thinking and feeling it. But there must have been that tiny bit of doubt thinking ‘will it hit the big time'? And despite Paul's statement now I feel even Kiss had to question themselves!

We now hop forward in the KISS time machine (which given how much merchandise there is who knows what could happen in the future) to the KISS ALIVE III recording at the Place of Auburn Hills in Detroit during the "Revenge" album cycle. KISS had decided to take a radical change by getting rid of the make up (one that would not prove as successful) in 1983 until the end of the "Revenge" tour. Bruce Kulick said that this tour was:

It was also the first tour for Eric Singer (who had played in Paul Stanley’s band during a solo tour 1989 along with Sabbath, Alice Cooper and Lita Ford) replacing Eric Carr who had sadly passed away from cancer. From a personal standpoint it IS weird to see Kiss minus the make up (as the only time I have seen them to date was Graspop 2008) but just because there’s no make up doesn’t mean the tunes weren’t good enough!

1995 brings another milestone to Kiss as they played MTV Unplugged and for the first time in years had Peter Criss and Ace Frehley perform tracks such as ‘Beth’, 'Rock and Roll all Nite', 'Nothin’ To Lose' and '2000 Man'. This led to a reunion tour in 1996 (revealed to the world at the Grammys of that year after an intro by Tupac!) The Tiger Stadium concert in June 1996 shows classic KISS at their best and led to one of the highest grossing tours ever, even then however (at least according to Gene) there was still friction which would spill over into the 1998 "Psycho Circus" tour.

Dodger Stadium showcased the "Psycho Circus" tour on October 11th 1998 and boasted to be the first 3D concert tour, a concept quite bizarre but for the Kiss army it works well and at least "Psycho Circus" songs are few and far between (it wasn’t the best Kiss album in the world, it was also revealed that while Ace and Peter were the image, most of their contributions were minimal!)

1999 brought a weird time for Kiss as while they did a short concert for the premiere of a Kiss themed movie called "Detroit Rock City" and also did a collaboration alongside World Championship Wrestling with the KISS demon (the less said about that the better!) By 2000 it became clear that for the time being Kiss would have to take a break and so with that in their mind's "The Last Kiss" tour was done and it was at least the last tour with Ace and Peter in the line up which the gig on the DVD showcases well.

This DVD package is worth it for Kiss fans and historians alike due to the amount of material found and being the most concise, even without a full documentary (the set is 9 and a half hours long already!) the band do contribute to mini commentaries that give some sort of insight into the band throughout this era. Volume Three has actually made me want to get the previous two volumes!

As a bonus I thought it would be fair to also show these two kiss moments from a show that seems to embrace them very well:

Firstly a clip where 'Ace' decides to interrupt 'Gene':

Secondly the movie I hope will get done in full: Kiss saves Santa!

BONUS!; Just to prove it does exist: the KISS Demon debut: