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Links LUPEC |
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Okay. First let me just say that Poison was great, but I was not as overwhelmed with joy as I was the first time I saw them in 2001. Although they DID play my favorite tune this time--"I Won't Forget You", and CC was as entertaining as ever in his pink furry pimphat. They were great, but they were clearly the opener and the vibe was very different. And then. I expected to really really enjoy the KISS concert on July 4th. I even thought maybe it would change my life a little bit. But what I did NOT expect was to fall madly in love with Paul Stanley. I guess I really had no idea what a KISS concert would be like, and somehow I thought that Gene Simmons totally ran the show. How wrong I was! Paul Stanley is 54 years old and just a teensy bit pudgy around the middle, but the man can still work it out. He cajoled and teased and ran around in 12 inch silver platforms and claimed that he really wanted to lick every one of us. He BELTED. Man, did he belt. He's still got some pipes on him, and although he is often slightly off key in his belting, it only adds to the charm. The stage show was off the chain, with explosions and fire and swirly firework things and lots of video screens playing multiple images and risers and things going up in the air and all that. Eric Singer who I loved dearly when he played for Alice Cooper last year was on drums, and hittin it hard. I have undying love for Peter Criss, but apparently he doesn't really hit it anymore so they got Eric back. A good move, I think. The lead guitar guy (Tommy Thayer, it says here) was very excellent on the wailing guitar. He got to play some killer solos and was very loud and flashy. Gene Simmons was Gene Simmons--didn't surprise me at all, really. He blew fire and spit blood and stomped around on his big dragon shoes and flailed his leather wings about and at one point he acended into the air. That was cool. He also sang "Christine Sixteen", the first of two surprises just for me. But Paul---WOW. The second surprise just for me, that I know was REALLY just for me because every KISS fan in the world despises this song---was when he flew out across the audience on a silver swing to a platform in the middle of the crowd to sing--"I Was Made for Lovin You." No kidding. To quote Roseannerosannadanna, I thought I was gonna die. As you can see if you look at that link, the song came out in 1979 when I was in the begining of 7th grade. I had a friend when I lived on the west side of Elyria and she had mirrored wallpaper in her room, and we used to put that song on and pretend(both of us) to be Paul Stanley. I had kinda forgotten about that until I saw him there on the platform beltin it out. So yes, I am officially in love with Paul Stanley, another addition to my "exception to the rule" club of men with a lot of chest hair who I find hot(the president of the club is Paul Michael Glaser...maybe it's a Paul thing?) He really got to me when he crawled across the stage on his hands and knees begging us to sing along. I fell slightly out of love with him when he launched into a very jingo-istic USA speech, prompting the crowd of drunk and stoned metal heads to chant USA, USA and pump their fists in the air, but I figured it was July 4th and he was totally playing to the crowd. And I gave up expecting my music heroes to share my political feelings a long time ago. I think it might have been a dream show for a really hard core KISS fan--they played a lot of DEEP CUTS that I didn't really know and I saw a lot of dudes totally losing their shit about it. That was fun. There was also this little blonde haired girl in front of us on the lawn, maybe 6 or 7 years old, with her parents and older sister. She had Gene Simmons make up on and a "Flaming Youth" t-shirt. This little girl was whipping her long blonde hair around and throwing up the double devil horns like crazy. It was very entertaining. At one point Paul instructed the audience to "hoist your children in the air!" so he could see the future of the KISS army. The cameras panned a sea of little kids in KISS makeup who were lovin every minute of it. Nice to see that metal will not die. The show closed with "Rock and Roll All Night", of course, and just as they started to play it and the confetti ballons burst over the audience and the fireworks started over the pavillion, the rain came down. Hard. My honeygirl and I stood under our tarp and rocked out and declared it the best 4th of July EVER. And truly it was. I got a KISS ARMY wifebeater. I'll wear it with pride. |
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