Why was the rock band Kiss so successful?

I’ve always thought KISS set the template for over-the-top Rock bands going into the 1980s. Van Halen comes to mind. Van Halen didn’t do the makeup gimmick or anything approximating it, but they DID have over-the-top stage shows, and David Lee Roth in his prime was like a circus ringleader; an over-the-top personality. Van Halen didn’t copy KISS, but they damned sure took notes. Everybody did. And I’ve always thought those hair metal bands of the 1980s, with their teased hair, spandex, and makeup, were taking a page from KISS’ playbook. I mean, just look at Poison’s first album cover, and then compare it to the cover for Rock And Roll Over or even Dynasty. There are thematic similarities. Poison were playing characters. Look at Motley Crue’s image on Shout At The Devil. Image and marketing (and merchandising) were kicked up a notch in the 1980s, and that’s mostly because everyone took notes from the template KISS established.

I have to take exception to a lot of the poetic examinations in the comments about KISS’ relative merits, as well as the clinical diagnoses that seem to exist only to take shots at KISS’ songs and musicianship. From the perspective of someone who was a fan as a kid, lost interest in the band in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and saw the mechanics of the band for what they were as an adult, I get why KISS was successful. But I’ll never demean them as musicians. Yes, there were better and more technical musicians around in the 1970s. Especially when progressive bands like Rush and Yes were running around. But if you think they weren’t good musicians you’re kidding yourself. KISS were at least as good as ANY of the hair bands who ran around in the 1980s. And they were much better musicians than any number of Punk bands or even contemporaries like the Alice Cooper Band (the band, not the solo act) or Iggy and The Stooges, or The Ramones. Maybe they weren’t top tier musicians, but they were FAR from terrible. That’s a narrative pushed by performative kabuki complainers who are just trying to prove their bona fides as one of the cool kids by bashing KISS (or Nickelback, or Coldplay - same reasons, different bands).

Here’s the thing. KISS were successful because ALL of the above. A great gimmick / image, good music, relentless merchandising, and a guaranteed good time. It was all of this that made KISS so successful. It wasn’t one thing or another, it was ALL of it. You can’t remove any one thing from the equation or it just doesn’t work. And by the same token, you can’t simply criticize KISS as being a marketing gimmick, because they were more than that. You can’t dismiss them for being terrible musicians, because they weren’t. You can’t say they were just a brand or a product, because they put out some great albums that could have stood on their own without the makeup (at least those first six studio albums).

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And let’s not forget; KISS was basically a party band. People didn’t go to KISS shows to be enlightened or to marvel at technical artistry. KISS came into town like the circus and put on a spectacle. I saw a show in Charlotte, North Carolina in the late 1970s in which KISS’ flash pots scorched the rafters of the Charlotte Coliseum, and there was briefly talk about banning them from the arena. I never believed KISS did that intentionally. But you can bet it fit their brand as an over-the-top and somewhat dangerous Rock & Roll band. KISS’ image and stage package scared the hell out of some people back then. Us old-timers haven’t forgotten the whole “Kids In Satan’s Service” bullshit from religious folk. They’d never seen a band like KISS, and they sure couldn’t understand their success. Some of them are still complaining about it.

It’ll always be fun to go to the circus. And Gene Simmons damned well knew it.

It’s been a long, long time since I could consider myself a KISS fan. They lost me in the late 1980s and early 1990s. And even though they sparked a little nostalgic interest with their 2000 reunion, that didn’t last long. The thing that made KISS work so brilliantly as a Rock band in the 1970s was gone. But by then the iconic songs were already in place and the KISS brand could continue on with just the gimmick and the stage shows as a nostalgia act. At that point KISS kept rolling because fans from the 1970s were bringing their kids and grandkids to shows, because it was still fun to go to the circus.

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There are multiple reasons KISS were successful. First and foremost, the thing no one fails to mention is their obvious marketing gimmick; the makeup. They had a great and unique image. There were NOT the first artists to use such a gimmick. Arthur Brown wore makeup and was theatrical in the 1960s. Screamin’ Jay Hawkins was doing it in the 1950s (he didn’t wear makeup, but he had a very theatrical stage show and persona). What KISS did was take that theatrical approach and jack it up to comic book superhero levels. They each took on a character, and played that role on stage. I imagine this was probably Gene Simmons’ idea since he’s always been the marketing and merchandising guy who took promoting the brand to absurd levels.

I’ve went on about this much longer than I meant to. In closing, I just want to point out that most of the people who dismiss KISS as a band and come up with various excuses about why they suck despite their success, those people cherry pick the things they object to and simply ignore everything else. But where KISS is / was concerned, you can’t separate the image from the music from the marketing. The totality of all that is why KISS was so successful. And it’s the reason they were able to carry on decades after their heyday. It all still worked. But if you think they were just an image, explain their success in the 1980s when they didn’t wear the makeup. That alone disproves that theory. But KISS were able to continue on after the reunion tour without Ace Frehley and Peter Criss (putting other musicians in their makeup) because the gimmick still worked. And their massive stage shows were a spectacle that a lot of people wanted to experience. So the KISS machine just kept rolling.

When it comes to KISS, though, all of us have to concede that KISS was the first band to really kick the merchandising angle into an entirely new gear. KISS put their faces and brand on everything they could. T-shirts were a given. But KISS were on lunch boxes. Trading cards. There were KISS action figures, for pete’s sake. They had an image and a brand which lent itself to merchandising, and they took advantage of it. I played a KISS pinball machine all the time in an arcade in the early 1980s. It’s easy to dismiss the band as a gimmick because of this (and it’s largely the reason why most of their detractors do). But every other band took notice. Merchandising hadn’t really been seen as a revenue stream for artists in the same way before KISS. But everyone had merchandise after. Maybe not on the same absurd level as KISS, but artists did realize selling albums and tickets to live shows wasn’t the only way they could generate income. Sure, there’d been merchandising before. I mean, you can buy Beatles lunch boxes on eBay. But nothing like what KISS did.

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But the one thing which is usually overlooked is how good KISS’ music was. Yes, it was very popular back in the 1970s to hate on KISS. All the “cool” kids did it. I remember having an argument with a radio DJ as a kid when I called in requesting a KISS song and he was dismissive of the band. If you want to compare KISS to bands like Pink Floyd, Genesis (with Peter Gabriel), or Rush, or even Led Zeppelin, then sure, KISS didn’t have the same level of artistry that those bands did, and their music didn’t run as deep, emotionally, and weren’t as complex musically. But you can’t separate the image from the music, really. KISS were kabuki theater comic book heroes come to life, and their music flowed from their image. But you’re kidding yourself if you believe songs like “Rock and Roll All Nite”, “Detroit Rock City”, and “Love Gun” are not good songs. Those songs are iconic for a reason, and it’s not marketing. When it comes to marketing, that only works in the short term. You don’t remember songs 50 years after they were released if those aren’t good songs. And you can’t write good songs if you’re not good musicians. End of line.