Kiss - novelty act or great hard rock band?

I grew up during the Kiss taking over the hard rock world with Kiss Alive! then when Alive II hit it was massive, they were everywhere! The albums leading up to Alive II were huge, and almost all the kids that I grew up with that listened to hard rock were into Kiss. For sure the makeup played a huge part, think of Ziggy Stardust, all that flamboyant stuff was popular back in the mid 70's. And yea their live shows were a main reason they were so big and the studio albums sold so well.

They must have been a novelty act because they were not a great rock band, imo.

Hey, they did all that they possibly could with the three chords they had.

Pretty hard to argue their accomplishments, I would say this defines a great band but there are other definitions of great I am sure.

Great hard rock act? I wouldn't say so. Most of their albums are uneven, some great songs and a lot of filler, bad lyrics. I have also disliked the drama around this band... 

KISS proves precisely why progressive rock was and never will be as popular as anything KISS ever did: people prefer basic chords and easy sing-a-along rock music. They nailed that, hence their success.

SteveG wrote: Three? Sounds more like two.

Cristi wrote: Frenetic Zetetic wrote: KISS proves precisely why progressive rock was and never will be as popular as anything KISS ever did: people prefer basic chords and easy sing-a-along rock music. They nailed that, hence their success. nothing wrong with easy sing-a- long music, but it still need to be done competently, a hook, a good vocal performance, a nice guitar lead and so on...

Of course there is room in this world for the most complex prog and the most straightforward, simple, sing-a-long rock. I love both for what they are. I don’t see that we have to prefer one over the other - it depends on what mood your in. Kiss are a great band and King Crimson are a great band. Trying to compare them is futile. It’s like saying that Stephen King is not a great writer because he’s more popular and not as artistically satisfying as Dostoevsky.

I don’t understand this argument about chords (mentioned elsewhere in this thread). Eg.the more chords the better the song, the fewer chords the worse the song. Surely it is the effect of the overall song that is important, not its constituent parts.

I know this is a prog rock forum but I think it’s OK to really enjoy and appreciate all music genres, even the ones that seem most divergent from prog.

SteveG wrote: To be serious, I find it hard to place them in a category with Led Zeppelin or early Sabbath. Or even Deep Purple or the newer British bands like Iron Maiden. But they had a few anthems like Rock And Roll All Night, so they accomplished something.

I think the members of Kiss would agree with you here (perhaps with the exception of the obsessively self-promoting Gene Simmons). Paul Stanley has said on record that he was embarrassed when Kiss once rated higher in a poll than Led Zeppelin. He said very clearly that Kiss were never even in the same league. In fact no one would put Kiss on the same level as Zeppelin, Sabbath or Purple - these are the architects of hard rock. Kiss never claimed this status but that doesn’t mean that they are crap. For example, Stanley Turrentine was not an innovator like John Coltrane but he was a great jazz saxophonist and made some of the most engaging and listenable straight ahead jazz albums of the mid to late 1960s. Because Turrentine was not a pioneer of the genre, does that mean his music can be casually dismissed? Kiss were not revolutionary but they were very good at what they did and deserve the critical recognition for this.

^ Stanley Turrentine is rolling in his grave. And so is John Coltrane. But they're counterpoint rolling. Because even dead they have syncopation.