Gene Simmons - Gene Simmons

1978

     I dreaded the thought of going back and listening to this. When I finally did, I had to force myself. I've been revisiting Dynasty lately after listening to the earlier Kiss discography. Dynasty is the best album they had put out up to that point in their careers. So, being suaded by that I started in and realized that Radioactive was not really any worse that the songs he had done with Kiss recently. 

      Radioactive has a cool intro bit as well.
      Burning Up With Fever sounds pretty slick and generic and polished and aimed at the general population. It still sounds like Kiss, other than the Motown type back up singing during the chorus. Oh! Is this the one where Donna Summer sings?! I think it is! 

     The third song is shooting hard for placement in the Starskey and Hutch falling out of love scene. Catchy seventy's style shooting for the top 40. Killer light, light weight pop. 

     Forth song.I don't know what I missed, I kinda tuned out, but the fifth song True Confessions steps off in to pure crap. It's like Meatloaf or something. This is the farthest thing in the world that you want to hear as a Kiss fan. This is Gene swinging for the fences in search of some mega hits that reach the lowest common denominator in the biggest pop sense. 

   Livin in Sin is really really bad if you are a 14 year old Kiss fan...un listenable in the most disappointing of ways. and it just gets worse...

    Next song has an Elder vibe going on. Mysterious. Is it cheese? Wait, it's getting dramatic!  In a Golden Slumbers kind of way. Then full on Hey Jude.

   Man of a Thousand Faces. This is where it goes fully bizarro if your a Kiss fan. This is not what you signed up for and this does not match the album cover, in a Sgt. Peppers outro kind of way.

      Mr. Make Believe full on attempt at some type of Beatles thing, very much Beatles thing. Again, this is nothing you want to hear as a 14 year old Kiss fan. This is Gene selling out in the biggest way he knows how. This is some fancy production. I see what he was going for here. 

    Then a remake of See You In Your Dreams that sounds almost identical to the original. By the end though that the production is much more lush.

    Then When You Wish apon A Star. Which is pretty insane.

Paul's ends' up sounding very much like Kiss, which would lead you to believe Kiss wasn't holding him back from anything he wanted to do. The other guys either felt restrained, or maybe in the case of Gene used at as an exercise to really shoot for the top 40 in the most pop way he could think of.