

I think they're well-crafted and professional, but One Direction and NSYNC and all the boy bands don’t change the world. But am I going to form a garage band to do those songs? No. Eternal music and bands," Simmons went on.Īgain, remaining wholly ignorant of the last three decades of successful rock music and operating under the false presumption that rock music had a finite end in the late '80s, he explained, "But from 1988 until today, who is the new Beatles? BTS? There's no denying BTS are world famous. You had the heavy bands Metallica and Iron Maiden, all that stuff in those 30 years. Disco stuff, Madonna, Prince, Bowie, all that great stuff. The Hollies are hardly ever talked about, they're a great band. You have the surf thing and the Beach Boys, the British invasion – hundreds of bands. From 1958 until 1988, 30 years, right? You got Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones and on and on. I played this game before and it bears noting, rock continues to be dead. Even the return-to-their-roots sound of late career albums were perfectly in line with trends for bands who were in similar stages of their careers.įor such savvy businessmen, why haven't KISS been able to weaponize the modern music climate for maximum benefit? Sure, blame it on the fans, that's the easy way out. That's how we got a hit disco song in 1979, after all.

It's a tad befuddling because KISS, musically, always made sure to keep up with the times. Sure, pirating music cratered album sales, but what is often left out of this discussion is that CD prices had soared to absurdly greedy totals of nearly $20 per album in the early 2000s.Ĭomplaining about illegal music downloading in 2022 is excruciatingly outdated and, if anything, signals that Simmons has simply failed to adapt to changes in the industry or just stubbornly refuses to. Music is available at subscription rates in countless places, though it is worth acknowledging the royalty rates artists are paid for streams are quite piddly. He immediately followed it up by again targeting fans for killing rock, however.Īlso, music fans shifted away from illegal music downloading quite a long time ago and that has mostly transitioned toward on-demand services, such as YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, Tidal, Deezer, Amazon Prime Music, Bandcamp. Fans are even shelling out exorbitant amounts of cash for one concert ticket now as Live Nation comes under increasing scrutiny for unsavory business practices that have essentially held fans financially hostage, forced to pay upwards of $1,000 for a single concert ticket or left with the option of staying home.ĭISCLAIMER: Later in the interview, Simmons did acknowledge the importance of buying a concert ticket in order to help artists and their road crew members survive and feed their families. The fans are the reason rock is still thriving as numerous stadium tours have launched in recent years, something that felt unimaginable since Simmons first proclaimed that rock was dead eight years ago. who? A bunch of rock and metal bands, that's who.Īnd if they're not buying music the way they used to (20-plus years ago - is anything the same as it was 20 years ago?), then the only realistic way for an artist to generate serious revenue would be through live performance. in June, where over 100,000 FANS are expected to show up to watch.
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Simmons gave this interview in advance of a headlining appearance at the Download Festival in the U.K. And so rock is dead," the KISS bassist and co-vocalist expressed. How do you expect somebody who loves the guitar to come into this creative process? You’ve got to invent yourself. Fans killed the thing they loved by downloading and file sharing for free.
