14/3/03 One More Kiss Before We Say Goodbye

I'm not sure if this is anything to be proud of, but I have been a fan of Kiss for as long as I can remember. I marched in the Kiss Army before I reached my teens. I sang "Sure Know Something" with air guitar on my bed well before I knew anything about what Paul was insinuating in his lyrics. My 28th birthday party was Kiss-themed and I went costumed as Gene (with an alarming codpiece attached). I had a better idea of what the lyrics were about then.

At the tender age of 35, nothing much has changed. I recently bought the Gene Simmons biography, Kiss And Make Up, and read it in one sitting while playing through their albums from the first self-titled LP through to their most recent CD of new material in 1998, Psycho Circus.

The great thing about Psycho Circus was that the original line-up had returned to explosively limp into a post-grunge nineties keen on reunion tours for rock dinosaurs. What was even better about Kiss was that we couldn't see how old they had become. And, if Gene's track record with women was anything to go by, they still had plenty of stamina left in performance.

My unanswered childhood dream of seeing them "Alive" came true in 2001, perhaps over twenty years too late. Apparently it was their Farewell Tour. I went fully made-up as my hero, Peter Criss. But he didn't show up. So I missed my chance to hear my favourite Kiss member sing his No 7 US hit "Beth".

But, to the chagrin of many rock critics and to the delight of the tongue-poking child within, this Farewell Tour was not in fact the end. Last Friday evening, at the Telstra Dome in Melbourne, I had another final chance to see them - albeit one member down again. (Ace Frehley obviously took the title of the preceding tour more seriously than the other members.) And they had matured musically - KISS were performing with actual violins and other orchestral instrumentations.

The evening was everything I wanted and more. Surrounded by swarms of my own people, many made-up as one of the four kings of the night time world, we were treated to a KISS smorgasbord: seven-inch leather heels, a surfeit of pyrotechnics and blood capsules, flying band-members and virtually all of the Destroyer album, to name but a few delectations. And Peter Criss, my catty hero? Yes, he sang "Beth" and later in the evening lifted-off into the rafters with his drumkit . My soul was similarly elevated. I hardly noticed the bad mixing.

But there was more. Although (hopefully) bewildered by the lyrics, the Australian Childrens Choir sang along to "Great Expectations" with cheeky smirks which suggested they¹d need a severe grounding when they got home. And by the end of the night, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra - amped-up, ears bleeding and with their make-up slowly dripping onto their music stands - were waving their instruments in one hand and making devil-signs with the other throughout the whole drum solo of "Rock and Roll All Nite" . It seemed that just about everyone was acting twelve again.

If it's better to burn-out than to fade away, Kiss are the exception to the rule. They come from a world where farewell means "until next time". They've been fading, gracelessly and politically incorrectly, for many years now. They have survived disco, grunge and nasty reviews. I see on their official webpage ("the site that clicks ass") that you can even buy a Kiss coffin these days. And hence, the party can indeed rock and roll all nite... and go on and on into the great hereafter.

This may be every priest, parent and rock critic's nightmare. But it was also this boy's dream. As we headed to the exits, I heard a little guy (made up as Gene) say to his father (made-up as Peter), "Dad, that was just awesome."

Couldn't have put it better myself.