Author: Urban Bolta
Location: Villa Manin / Codroipo / Italy
Concert date: 17.06.2013
Attendance: 6,000
Ticket price: €75
It took only three years for American rock giants Kiss to get a new studio album out the door. If we waited a good decade for the previous one, »Sonic Boom« (2009), Kiss obviously found their studio groove with it and soon released a new, jubilee twentieth album of their long career. It’s called simply »Monster«, and its release at the end of last year came as a perfect fit for a new summer tour of Europe, where the American giants returned after exactly two years.
This latest wander around the Old Continent covers just 12 dates, most of them of course far off in the heart of Scandinavia and the German-speaking countries, but their Slovenian fans could still get their fill too. They could catch the band a few days ago in front of the stage at Austria’s Nova Rock festival, or in Italy’s Codroipo, where the friendly Rockline and Paranoid crews headed as well. Near Codroipo you’ll find Villa Manini, a famous Venetian residence where even Napoleon Bonaparte himself lived for a while. The huge atrium of this multipurpose villa is still writing its glorious history today, having hosted plenty of music giants in recent years — just to mention a few, R.E.M., Iron Maiden, Whitesnake, Foo Fighters, Radiohead, Motörhead… So last Monday, Kiss joined the long list of performers at this Venetian historic temple.
The sun was blazing like crazy as the first fans were already crammed up against the stage, waiting to meet their musical idols up close. But before the main attraction of the night, around eight in the evening, RIVAL SONS stepped onto the megalomaniac stage — a young Californian rock outfit that draws its inspiration from seventies blues and hard rock, so it’s no wonder they’re getting strong media backing from Classic Rock magazine, in whose pages I first came across the band myself. Rival Sons stood up bravely to the unforgiving conditions (the thermometer still read over 30 degrees Celsius) and with a confident performance proved that smaller bands can handle the demanding job of warming up the crowd at big shows. Their style recycles the rich treasure chest of Led Zeppelin ideas, but with vocal moves from Jay Buchanan that remind you more of Paul Rodgers (Bad Company) than Robert Plant. Hard rock with a dash of blues and retro-sounding guitar licks that even Glenn Hughes himself wouldn’t be ashamed of! With a run of four-minute original tracks, mostly from the current album »Head Down« (2012), Rival Sons introduced themselves with flying colors, a name that fans of the classic rock school will probably be saying plenty more times in the future.
Because of the over-the-top spectacle at KISS shows, we had to wait patiently until nine in the evening for the stage to be fully set, when a huge curtain with the band’s logo dropped and the band opened the show with Psycho Circus. And they really did bring a proper circus to the stage – the opening track already came with pyrotechnics, and there was certainly no shortage of them throughout the show. Despite such a carefully directed and rehearsed show, it was funny to watch bassist Gene Simmons getting startled by the loud bangs a few times — during one song he even dropped out of the rhythm for a moment.
Kiss are music giants who conquered the world market with a formula of carefully thought-out marketing moves, and their thoroughly corporate approach was nearly revolutionary in the mid-seventies, when they started their climb. Kiss still follow the tactics that raised them among the biggest. Frontman Paul Stanley’s banter thus remains a product of cheesy American logic, since he doesn’t say words from his heart, but words the crowd wants to hear. How else could I explain the opening speech after Shout It Out Loud, which went something like this: »Even though we’ve never played in your city, I feel like I’ve always been part of this family«. Somewhere in the middle of the show, Stanley got a loud response from the crowd by betting on the rivalry between nearby Udine and Milan — using the exact same trick as two years ago, when I saw them in Malmö, Sweden, except that time he threw the crowd a bone by mentioning the hated Stockholm. Stanley and Simmons have their manipulation game down to a science, so it wasn’t hard for them to rope the crowd into the slogans the fans stayed stuck in long after the show was over.
Even though Kiss, wearing their famous black-and-white face paint, are on a promo tour for the new album »Monster«, only two of its songs made it into the set: Hell or Hallelujah and Outta This World, the latter featuring solo spots from guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer. Kiss are stuck in the era of their commercial peak even harder than most classic rock giants, so the setlist leaned deep into the seventies. Naturally there was no lack of eighties hits either, like Lick It Up and I Love It Loud, while the better-informed fans of the band were drooling over War Machine and Heaven’s on Fire. The sound was good, especially compared to the Iron Maiden show at the same location two years ago, when gusts of wind carried the sound away.
When we’re talking about Kiss shows, we’re of course talking about a proper concert spectacle! Kiss adapted the look of the stage for the European tour, which Paul Stanley promised before it started would be something completely new, never seen before. Despite those self-glorifying words, even from the standpoint of a more modest budget alone it was hard to believe they’d managed to top the 2008 shows, when they celebrated their 35th anniversary on an extensive European run, just for a short current tour.
Still, we had plenty to see! The first big highlight came with God of Thunder and Simmons’ bass solo. A technically average bassist, he put his charisma front and center, grabbed the showman’s spot right from the start, and finished the number just under the stage roof, where he flew up hooked on cables like Batman. Next came Love Gun, which Paul Stanley played from the mixing desk, right in the middle of a sea of fans. It was an incredibly ecstatic moment, and it was interesting to watch the crowd, who simply couldn’t decide whether to follow Stanley at the mixing desk or the other three on the visually perfect stage. The trip along the wire to the mixer could have ended tragically too, since some Italian idiot climbed onto his friend’s shoulders and almost managed to take Stanley down on his way back. The magic of the second half of the show was only boosted by the sea of confetti during the party hit Rock and Roll All Nite, which already signaled the encore with Detroit Rock City and I Was Made for Lovin’ You. During the latter, Gene Simmons made a gigantic blunder, wanting to double the chorus right after the first one and realizing his mistake only after a few long seconds. Live comedy, but one that unintentionally proved Kiss play and sing live. With age, their vocals have started to wear, so there has long been speculation about how much help they get from the mixing desk. The epic Black Diamond is always welcome in their setlist, but after a bunch of hits in the closing stretch, its atmospheric nature made it somehow not the best choice for saying goodbye to Villa Manin.
What to say in the end? Kiss stay true to their prestigious style, serving up a visual feast for concertgoers on top of the music. Their obsession with their own stage image often hurts the musical performance itself, but even their harshest mockers can’t deny that they do their job damn well. Still. Proof of that was the show in Codroipo too, where despite a relatively poor turnout (the reason probably lies in the inflated ticket prices) they staged yet another performance by the famous greasepaint brand. Long live Kiss! »Forever«!
Setlist
1. Psycho Circus
2. Shout It Out Loud
3. Let Me Go, Rock ‘N’ Roll
4. I Love It Loud
5. Hell or Hallelujah
6. War Machine
7. Heaven’s on Fire
8. Calling Dr. Love
9. Deuce
10. Say Yeah
11. Shock Me
12. Outta This World
13. God of Thunder
14. Lick It Up
15. Love Gun
16. Rock and Roll All Nite
———-
17. Detroit Rock City
18. I Was Made for Lovin’ You
19.Black Diamond
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