Today may seem like any other day, but it is the 40th anniversary of the Kiss Solo Albums; on the 18th of September 1978, their record label released four solo albums by the four members of the band.
The albums were each very different from each other, featured none of the band members in any other than their own and all wore matching black, back-lit portrait album covers to suggest you had to own them all. This concept of an active band having all it's members make and release solo albums with no contribution from the others and released at the same time has never happened before or since..
So today I will do a blog post for each one and I will start off with my personal favourite, Peter Criss's RnB, 50s rock n roll and schmaltzy ballad heavy collection. I have chosen by far the most subtle thing he ever sang, the gentle, whimsical folk tune Kiss the Girl Goodbye. Written with Stan Penridge, his old writing buddy who wrote Kiss' biggest hit Beth, this starts off under a sea of finger picked guitars. Apparently this is the first Kiss related tune to feature a diminished chord, their musicianship was limited to meat and potatoes hard rock power chords. Here Criss employs a ghostly falsetto that weaves in and out before the rousing chorus where sings so beautifully the line "We've been apart so many times before, one more time won't change things, I'll even love you more"; he sings it with such a wearied ache in his voice and ghostly sheen to make this a haunting track along with the circular melodies of the acoustic guitars playing their jangle chords and flamenco lines like a festive carousel. Frankly it has a mature, sophisticated soft rock vibe that would be expected by a John Denver or England Dan and John Ford Colley, it' deeper than the simple 4/4 rock n roll material Criss was known for; he was known for incredibly simple drum patterns for just as simple hard rock riffs in Kiss not 12 strings and flamenco noodling.
No comments:
Post a Comment