The manager of KISS has confirmed the group are in talks to launch a TV talent show to find replacements for frontman Paul Stanley and guitarist Gene Simmons – when the duo eventually retire.
It has long been rumored that founding members Stanley and Simmons hope to keep the band running when they decide to quit – but both men have been evasive when asked about whether any new members have been signed up and if the takeover will happen after their current world tour.
The rock veterans are the only original members left in the band, which was marred by the departure of Ace Frehely and Peter Criss and the death of Eric Carr in 1991 – the group now includes replacements Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer.
However their longtime manager Doc McGhee insists that there are indeed plans to replace all four band members and keep KISS alive for a new generation – they are close to signing a deal to find their replacements through an American Idol-style TV show.
McGhee says in a new TV documentary about the band, “I believe that KISS can go on forever. I believe that there is a way – and we are talking to people and we’re pretty close to getting it done – about finding the four new members of KISS.”
As our own Eddie Trunk reports in his Trunk Report, despite the fact that this article is dated 2008, Eddie writes, “the plan and closer than ever to happening…maybe two years away from launching.”
source: starpulse.com
192 Responses
This is B.S. Kiss was never a manufactured band like these so called American Idol kareoke “artist”. They should go about this a different way….find four unknowns, who noone knows what they look like without makeup and try to recapture part of that 70’s mystique
Dream on – how could anyone recapture a time that is gone forever? You cannot re-animate a certain time when people did certain things, were influenced by certain music, politics, social developments, art movements and everything interacting with each other etc., it is just in our dreams (and a major reason why we go to the concerts of the bands we loved when we were young and still eagerly discovering the world) that we want to relive this because we want be feel young again, which is OK. So the mystique a band, or art, or actor or whatever has at the beginning will inevitably be lost when they become a household name and accepted and integrated by the mainstream public. Just a normal development.
That McGhee gangster is the worst thing that could happen to a rock band and in this case, to Kiss. This is a joke, and so they see themselves as. The stamp of a true artist comes from their personality. A real singers and musician leaves a bit of their personality in their art. From Robert Johnson to Elvis to Michael Jackson to Barbra Streisand, they were and are who they are not only because of their talents, but their personalities. By doing this, Kiss is saying their individual traits and what made them what the are now, don’t count, anybody that walks off the street can do it. Goodbye for ever now, Kiss, thanks for the years you were honest.
To be in a world without KISS will be a sad day for all fans. A World without Heroes! But a replacement band would keep the band alive..I could see a Las Vegas review-type residency,however. Anything to keep the band going. Why not?! I agree with with Terey,find unknowns to recapture the mystique!!!
If this were to be a Las Vegas only residency, I could see this being something more than a “ha ha ha.. WTF” Like those shows with impersonators. But to any serious KISS fan, this is just pathetic.
Kiss Week in Vegas ’15. MGM Grand Arena with the surprise shows with you know who. Doc & the dynamic duo had the Jersey Boys, er Kiss Boys thing schedualed years ago. Brilliant on the ’14 tour, Singer & Thayer on fire and Paul singing great.