(Oh, I forgot to mention, and obviously not everyone got it from the title, this article is about the rock group, “KISS” (The Hottest Band In The World) and in particular the release their new album “Sonic Boom” after twelve years without a studio record.)

Band Logo

The group is lead by Paul Stanley (57 – rhythm guitars and lead vocals), and Gene Simmons (60 – bass and lead vocals). They are the two founding members to stick with the band during their whole career (at least so far, in their case anything could happen).  In the last twelve years, they haven’t done much work in the studio, however they performed live and released  almost a “shameless” amount of compilation albums. Actually its no surprise, in fact, they’ always were hip businessmen. This is not the first but the second official reunion of the group, but as for KISS its actually a bit more complicated topic. In the meanwhile the members started different projects, like fine arts (Stanley) and various “controversial” show business activities, and appearances (Simmons).

Why keep on rocking? The answer is simple. They can’t stop. And actually in my view, they really should not.

Stanley and Simmons got together with drummer Kiss’ drummer, Eric Singer (since 1991) and lead guitarist Tommy Thayer (he started to work wit them in the “Psycho Circus” era, around 1997-1998), and they released the new album on October, 2009.  I won give a detailed track-by-track analysis, my simple opinion is just that they did good. REAL GOOD. I really hate to hear lots of oldie bands’ comeback materials, they are mostly unnatural, weak, and lack impulse. I could align a couple of bands, but I don’t want to. Fortunately KISS managed to solve this differently.

Current Line-up, from left to right: Gene Simmons, Eric Singer, Tommy Thayer, Paul Stanley

Each track on the album is resembling a period from the bands history. There are a couple of songs written in the glam, and hard-rock style they had in the 80s-90s, but surprisingly there are some others which would perfectly fit on albums like “Kiss (1972)”, “Destroyer” (1976), or “Love Gun”. We can hear the classic “Yeah!”-s and “Allrights!”-s, and Simmons seems to be gaining back his “lovelace” attitude. The sharing of the lead-vocal roles is really like the usual between Simmons and Stanley (personally I prefer Stanley’s vox), and even Thayer and Singer got their own songs in which they could handle the microphone part. I really enjoyed them singing as well, of course no one beats the skills of Stanley, (including Simmons) but this seems to be a part of KISS’ traditions, to let everyone sing at least once.

"Sonic Boom" Coverart

If I had to say something I didn’t like about it, is would be the “conservative KISS policy” that forces Thayer play exactly like Ace Frehley (lead guitarist 1972-1982, 1996-2002) used to. If such policy doesn’t exist, than I don’t know whats the matter with Thayer, who seems to be, not particularly creative, but definitely a crafted musician.

But what the hell? What matters is, that one of my favorite bands form the genre can still entertain and was able to create something of high value, after a long series of poor efforts in order to  maintain their brand.

Maybe they should wait an other twelve years with their instruments, costumes and war paints hidden away somewhere before fixing up their fourth reunion. Or fifth? I’m not sure.

Official Website: http://www.kissonline.com/

John Mayer

The american guitarist, singer, songwriter announced his upcoming (fourth) studio album, “Battle Studies” to be released on the 17th of November 2009.

I’m extremely looking forward to hear the new record, especially, since I gather Mayer is like good wine… he matures as time elapses. The main reason why I got into what he does, was the third full-lenght album of his, “Continuum” (2006). Although both the debut and the follow up John Mayer albums, “Room for Squares” (2001), and “Heavier Things” (2003) were really successful, especially the first one.

The main difference in terms of the first two albums and Continuum for me was the basic approach of songwriting and composing. On Continuum Mayer introduces a new sound, a lot more “bluesy” one than ever before.  After I came to know the album better, I listened to the other two as well. I found them really entertaining, with loads of singles and “single-like” tracks, but the whole concept was too “pop-rock” for me. I still put them on, once in a while, for one simple cause, the unique guitar style and obvious virtuosity he’s been gifted with.

Mixing this “JM guitar” factor with the blues – rock and roll taste is the best I could ask for. On his third album, Mayer worked together with Pino Palladino (bass) and Steve Jordan (drums) for the first time on a studio album, and later they formed the “John Mayer Trio”. From then on, the Trio became a separate act to play the “more serious-elegant part” within John Mayer live performances. To sum up my thoughts, I would like to say, that regarding his recent works, no one should be afraid of dissapointment, from the group of fans who like what he does for the same reasons I do. 

Here’s the first official music video featuring the song “Who Says”, one of the tracks from the new album. (Lot of people said, that it resembles “Stop This Train” from Continuum, or more like a sequel of it. I agree with them perfectly, by the way Stop This Train is my favorite John Mayer song.)

Go Johnny! (Official Website: http://www.johnmayer.com)

This is my very first post ever, and who knows, it may be the last as well. I know that was a  bit more  pessimistic thought for a start, than what was expected, however, I suppose this could work out for me, with a little focus.

The idea of getting into this thing was came right after I read a book about this whole blogsphere. The book is probably known by a wide audience “up here”, but this is not the only reason I won’t advertise it.

The topic is not clear yet, but my “self-designed” logo (which I’m very proud of) gives a rough idea about the aimed areas. Actually I’m planning to post whatever comes to mind for a while, sooner or later it should finalize itself.

The truth is, I’m not at all sure of anything right now, thats why I said, “who knows”. Honestly does anyone know?