History Trivia / Kiss

** In October 1993, Gene and Paul rated their work to that point for ''Goldmine Magazine''. When it came to ''Music/MusicFromTheElder'', Paul gave it a question mark and Gene said, "As a Kiss album I give it a zero. As a bad Music/{{Genesis}} album, I give it a two."

* CreatorBacklash: In some interviews in the early 90s, Gene pretty much disowned everything from ''Lick It Up'' through ''Hot in the Shade''. Stanley also stated that ''Lick It Up'' only sold more than ''Creatures of the Night'' because "people were now listening with their eyes rather than their ears" given the bad removed their make-up.

** Ace said that he threw a tape of the album against the wall because most of his solos had been edited out (this was later confirmed in a seperate interview by album producer Bob Ezrin).

*** Ace said that he threw a tape of the album against the wall because most of his solos had been edited out.
*** Interestingly, one song, "A World Without Heroes", was revived for the ''MTV Unplugged'' show. And once they attempted "I" only to discover they had forgotten the lyrics.

* BlackSheepHit / ChartDisplacement: Music/{{KISS}}' highest-charting single in the United States is "Beth", which is a tender ballad that uses a piano and a string quartet with Peter Criss on vocals. It's radically different than typical KISS songs with feature guitars and drums with either Paul or Gene on vocals. Their second highest, "Forever", is another PowerBallad (co-written by Music/MichaelBolton, of all people!).

* CreatorBacklash: In some interviews in the early 90s, Gene pretty much disowned everything from ''Lick It Up'' through ''Hot in the Shade''.
** In October 1993, Gene and Paul rated their work to that point for ''Goldmine Magazine''. When it came to ''Music from "The Elder"'', Paul gave it a question mark and Gene said, "As a Kiss album I give it a zero. As a bad Music/{{Genesis}} album, I give it a two."

*** Interestingly, one song, "A World Without Heroes", was revived for the ''MTV Unplugged'' show. And once they attempted "I" only to discover they haven't forgotten the lyrics.
*** They didn't have much good to say about their MadeForTVMovie ''KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park'' either.
*** As of 2015, for Simmons and Stanley at least this might be revoked. Their animated crossover with Franchise/ScoobyDoo clearly had some callbacks to Phantom of the Park.
*** Both ''Unmasked'' and ''Dynasty'' are generally not fondly remembered by the band due to the overly polished production compared to the last few albums and sounding too far removed from the band's signature sound.

*** Regarding Ace, nowadays [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcB2lV62jj0 he's stated]] that he actually likes both ''Music From The Elder'' and ''Phantom Of The Park''. His biggest problem with ''Elder'' is that he felt it was the wrong type of album for the band to release at the time (later proven right on several fronts because it performed like crap, and the band ultimately went with his idea to return to their hard rock sound anyway with ''Creatures Of The Night'' after he'd left the band). With ''Phantom'', he said he had a blast filming it, stating that the others thought they were [[TookTheBadFilmSeriously filming some masterpiece]], while he knew full well what kind of movie it was going to be.

** Bruce Kulick played guitar on "Lonely Is The Hunter" and "Murder In High Heels" on Animalize, before he became an official member during the tour following the album's release.

** Tommy Thayer sang backing vocals on ''Revenge'' and actually played most of the guitar parts on Psycho Circus, before he became Ace Frehley's replacement in 2002.

** Also, the songs on Dynasty and Unmasked were originally far less commercial sounding, but producer Vini Poncia (who had produced Peter Criss's 1978 solo album) insisted on polishing them up.

** At one point in the 90s, Gene was planning to have Creator/SabanEntertainment create a ''KISS'' cartoon; but Haim Saban himself decided to insult Gene in Hebrew. Gene flung it back at him, saying "[[BilingualBackfire You fool! I am one of you!]]" So any chance of a ''KISS'' toon on Creator/FoxKids were dashed.

** Tommy Thayer sang backing vocals on Revenge and actually played most of the guitar parts on Psycho Circus, before he became Ace Frehley's replacement in 2002.

* HostilityOnTheSet: The original lineup apparently couldn't (and, to this day, still can't) stand each other, with the two camps usually evenly divided between the more serious, business-minded Gene and Paul on one side, and the wilder, hard-partying Ace and Peter on the other; the myriad allegations everyone's made about each other over the decades -- of out-of-control egos, poor work ethic, racism, homophobia, anti-Semitism and general dickishness -- are all so at odds that [[Administrivia/RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgment it's impossible to create an objective portrait of the band in their own words]]. The two things they ''all'' seem to agree on is that nobody has any talent (sometimes stating that tracks had to secretly be re-dubbed by session musicians), and that their personal and professional dysfunction made every single 70's album an ordeal to create.

** After Ace Frehley left, before they brought in Vinnie Vincent, KISS seriously considered bringing in Eddie Van Halen. Gene had briefly managed Van Halen before they got their record deal and Eddie was very unhappy with the direction of the band at the time (particularly his frequent clashes with David Lee Roth and being forced to record so many covers). Ultimately both KISS and Eddie decided it would be best if Eddie stuck with Van Halen and KISS sought a new guitarist elsewhere.

*** Vinnie was also working on a project called "Guitars From Hell" in the late 80s/early 90s with Robert Fleschman after the break-up of "Invasion", some demos were recorded but the project fell apart after Vinnie went behind the record labels back and tried to get a better deal elsewhere, leading the label to cancel the project.

** At one point in the 90s, Gene was planning to have Creator/SabanEntertainment create a ''KISS'' cartoon; but Haim Saban himself decided to insult Gene in Hebrew, for whatever reason. Gene flung it back at him, saying "[[BilingualBackfire You fool! I am one of you!]]" So any chance of a ''KISS'' toon on Creator/FoxKids were dashed.

* CashCowFranchise: It's often said that "Most rock bands want to be Music/TheBeatles, but KISS wanted to be Coca-Cola." They have all kinds of licensed merchandise, including action figures, comic books, ''condoms'', and, last but not least, the infamous '''Kiss Kaskets''' (in one of which [[Music/{{Pantera}} Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul]] was buried). From 2013 to 2016, Gene and Paul owned their own Arena Football League team in Los Angeles. The team was named the LA Kiss and used the band's logo. In addition, purchasing a season ticket included access to a KISS concert.

** Also, the songs on Dynasty and Unmasked were originally far less commercial sounding, but producer Vini Poncia(who had produced Peter Criss's 1978 solo album) insisted on polishing them up.

* BlackSheepHit \ ChartDisplacement: Music/{{KISS}}' highest-charting single in the United States is "Beth", which is a tender ballad that uses a piano and a string quartet with Peter Criss on vocals. It's radically different than typical KISS songs with feature guitars and drums with either Paul or Gene on vocals. Their second highest, "Forever", is another PowerBallad (co-written by Music/MichaelBolton, of all people!).

* OldShame: Their album when the band was still called "Wicked Lester".
* ThePeteBest: Ron Leejack, lead guitarist when the band was still called "Wicked Lester"

* ReferencedBy:
** They get one of the best-known in rock when Music/CheapTrick mentions them in ''Surrender''. During live shows, Cheap Trick would toss [=KISS=] albums to their audiences.
** They also get mentioned in Music/{{Weezer}}'s "In the Garage".
** In the liner notes to Music/{{Jellyfish}}'s debut, ''Bellybutton'', Steve [=MacDonald=] (of Redd Kross] is credited as having "played bass, breathed fire and spit(ted) blood".
** ''Kiss My Ass'', from 1994, is an entire album of KISS songs covered by other artists. Little tip for J-Rock fans: Music/{{Yoshiki|Hayashi}} performs "Black Diamond" in it. Little tip for country fans: Music/GarthBrooks does the lead vocals on a straight version of "Hard Luck Woman", with Kiss themselves as his backing band.
** ''Kiss My Ankh'' is a 2008 album consisting entirely of covers of songs written or co-written by Vinnie Vincent
** Nicolas Nadeau performed to "I Was Made for Lovin' You" as an [[https://streamable.com/qw27c exhibition number]] during the 2019 Canadian Figure Skating Championships.
** Newspaper columnist D. L. Stewart recounts, via his book ''Fathers Are People Too'', how one of his sons was a fan of the band, and explained them (including showing him a trading card of Gene Simmons) after Stewart complained about the volume on the record he was playing. Songs namedropped in the scene in question include "Cold Gin", "Rock Bottom" and "Ladies' Room". Stewart apparently had a low opinion of the music, comparing it to alley cats yowling.

* BlackSheepHit \ ChartDisplacement: KISS' highest-charting single in the United States is "Beth", which is a tender ballad that uses a piano and a string quartet with Peter Criss on vocals. It's radically different than typical KISS songs with feature guitars and drums with either Paul or Gene on vocals. Their second highest, "Forever", is another PowerBallad (co-written by Music/MichaelBolton, of all people!).

* CashCowFranchise: It's often said that "Most rock bands want to be Music/TheBeatles, but KISS wanted to be Coca-Cola." They have all kinds of licensed merchandise, including action figures, comic books, ''condoms'', and, last but not least, the infamous '''Kiss Kaskets''' (in one of which [[Music/{{Pantera}} Dimebag Darrell]] was buried). From 2013 to 2016, Gene and Paul owned their own Arena Football League team in Los Angeles. The team was named the LA Kiss and used the band's logo. In addition, purchasing a season ticket included access to a KISS concert.

* BlackSheepHit \ ChartDisplacement: KISS' highest-charting single in the United States is "Beth", which is a tender ballad that uses a piano and a string quartet with Peter Criss on vocals. It's radically different than typical KISS songs with feature guitars and drums with either Paul or Gene on vocals. Their second highest, "Forever", is another PowerBallad (co-written by Michael Bolton, of all people!).

* BlackSheepHit: KISS' highest-charting single in the United States is "Beth", which is a tender ballad that uses a piano and a string quartet with Peter Criss on vocals. It's radically different than typical KISS songs with feature guitars and drums with either Paul or Gene on vocals.

*** Interestingly, one song, "A World Without Heroes", was revived for the ''MTV Unplugged'' show..

* CashCowFranchise: It's often said that "Most rock bands want to be Music/TheBeatles, but KISS wanted to be Coca-Cola." They have all kinds of licensed merchandise, including action figures, comic books, ''condoms'', and, last but not least, the infamous '''Kiss Kaskets''' (in one of which [[Music/{{Pantera}} Dimebag Darrell]] was buried). From 2013 to 2016, Gene and Paul owned their own arena football team in Los Angeles. The team was be named the LA Kiss and used the band's logo. In addition, purchasing a season ticket included access to a KISS concert.

** At one point in the 90s, Gene was planning to have Creator/SabanEntertainment create a ''KISS'' cartoon; but Haim Saban himself decided to insult Gene in Hebrew, for whatever reason. Gene flung it back at him, saying "[[BilingualBonus You fool! I am one of you!]]" So any chance of a ''KISS'' toon on Creator/FoxKids were dashed.