ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, October 3, 1996 TAG: 9610030012
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MADELYN ROSENBERG STAFF WRITER
A lot can happen in 17 years - the time it's been since the original members of Kiss have toured together.
You can get married and have a daughter.
You can spend your days drunk or stoned.
You can quit all that.
You can get divorced, regroup, find yourself a new band, start over.
And, if you play your cards exactly right, you can pick up where you left off. You can get a second chance at the glamour and glory that goes with stadium rock 'n' roll.
That's pretty much the way it's been for drummer Peter Criss, who left his makeup and platform shoes behind in 1980 when he left Kiss, a band as synonymous with the '70s as disco and bell bottoms.
Criss is 48 - all the members of the band are in their late 40s. Old enough to know better about a lot of things. But not too old to give up on the grinding rock that put them on lunch boxes and stereo turntables around the world.
"God gave me a break," Criss said in a recent interview to promote the Kiss Alive/Worldwide tour, scheduled to stop tonight at the Roanoke Civic Center. "Seventeen years of insane stuff is gone. I'd like to forget some of it. I have more respect for myself and my kid and my peers. I want to hold on to this as long as I can."
Kiss has held on better than most.
After hooking up in 1972, Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Ace Frehley and Criss - four boys from New York - produced albums that went gold and then platinum. They never got much critical acclaim, but they did get an army of devoted fans.
When the '80s came, Criss left. Lead guitarist Ace Frehley followed soon after. Rumors of drug use followed both of them.
But Simmons and Stanley rocked on with two replacements. They took off the makeup that was their trademark and continued to play to crowded arenas.
They talked to Oprah. They put out more albums. They appeared on ``The Tonight Show.''
Last year, the original four got together to play a few songs for ``MTV Unplugged.''
And now - now the makeup is back on. Now the drummer and the guitarist are back with Kiss' star-eyed singer and long-tongued mastermind.
A lot of things are like they used to be.
Smoke still pours out of Frehley's guitar (``and rockets, too,'' Criss said). There's the mandatory dripping blood (Simmons will regurgitate 358 pints during this tour).
But some things have changed, in the way only time can change them.
These guys have families now.
And on the phone waiting for a sold-out show in Denver, Criss talks about more than "the Greatest Show on Earth." He talks about ... parenting.
"I was fortunate enough and wealthy enough to do nothing but raise her," Criss said, referring to his first 10 years out of the public eye, years he spent raising his daughter Jenilee, now 15, in Connecticut. (Honest, he said Connecticut.)
"I really got into family life," he said. "I really wanted to do the John Lennon thing. I admired him for taking the time out to do that."
Those first years of a child's life are the most important, Criss said, sounding more like Dr. Spock than a raspy-voiced drummer should sound. After all, this is Peter Criss, this is Kiss, a band parents have tried to shelter their children from for two decades.
"Those are the years you really have to be there for them," Criss continued. "After that, look out."
After that, he said, they turn into teen-agers.
But so far, Criss seems to be enjoying Jenilee's teen years, too.
"Some people say kids are draining," he said. "My kid gives me energy. It's up to us as parents to keep up.
"My kid's a good kid. She learned through me and through friends of mine, drugs are a nowhere road, a nightmare. I know she knows that. So I trust her. That's a big word, trust, but I'm not afraid of letting her go to Smashing Pumpkins or Nirvana if they were still around - you want to see what drugs can do? They'll show you."
It's hard to tell teen-agers not to do something, Criss continued, like he was the first parent to discover rebel youth. "When you say don't do, they do. But I think I've been a pretty good parent. I think [Jenilee] has a mind of her own."
He talks to her every day on the phone, he said. "You've got to talk. You've got to keep those doors open. You can't close them. You can't give up on a kid."
They all have kids now, these men America knows as "Monsters of Rock."
Ace Frehley's daughter is 16, a year older than Jenilee. Paul Stanley has a little boy. Gene Simmons has a son and daughter.
"So we all relate," Criss said.
So, part of this reunion tour is about relating. But part of it is about rock, too (and money, of course). Kiss has worked hard for this moment - Simmons wouldn't have it any other way. He told the group that the fans would expect a lot of them, and that Kiss would deliver.
Before the tour, they all worked with personal trainers, lifting weights, doing push-ups and sit-ups, riding exercise bicycles. Before the tour, Criss was having problems with his lower back. "Now it's a rock," he said.
They spent hours listening to the music and relearning vocals and arrangements - especially Criss, who also worked on his drumming for three hours a day in a tiny room before practicing with the band.
"I think we became an event," Criss said. "There were a lot of stories fabricated about us, making us out as bigger than we were. It's a lot to live up to. ... We don't want to ruin anybody's dreams. I can see people telling their kids, `These people were great, wait till you see it.' That's important. We wouldn't want to blow up that dream."
For some people, Criss said, the reunion tour "might be nostalgia. 'I remember when I was 18 and saw Kiss for the first time.' But for us it's much deeper than that. This is a good thing. I don't look at it like the Beach Boys getting back together, or the Eagles."
The tour, he said, is about continuing on. It's about time - and maybe about fighting time (which is where Kiss certainly has an advantage: Don Henley never went on tour with a supply of 54 pounds of theatrical makeup).
Criss remembers trying on that makeup again for the first time, up at Simmons' place after practice.
"It took me two hours," Criss said. "I can do it in 20 minutes now. I got the boots, I thought I was going to fall - they were so high. After a while, it started feeling normal, like a second skin."
Today's makeup is better than the old stuff, Criss said. It's better for your face. "We're told it's healthy for you, this whole process of moving your face around, taking the makeup off ... it gives you more elasticity."
The group gets along better now, too, Criss said. "We sit down every two weeks, have group meetings if something's on our chest. We're brutally honest with each other."
And they're careful. When they have a day off, they stay in the hotel instead of prowling the town.
Backstage, they eat pasta and chicken and lots of vegetables.
"I take a ton of vitamins," Criss said. "What happened to me? It's a clean life I'm living, but you gotta."
You gotta if you're going to be in top form for 22 concerts in October alone. You gotta if you're going to be ready to spit blood or levitate or breathe fire.
"Gene flies, for Christ's sake," Criss said. "You have to be out of your mind to do that. But there goes Gene. He'd die for the crowd."
For his army.
And as long as that army wants Kiss, "we'll stay a band, wherever that may take us," Criss said.
After this tour, it's taking them to Japan again, and Europe and Australia, like the old days. Next year is pretty well booked up.
"We've got it back," Criss said. "We've got it back and I don't think we'll ever lose it."
LENGTH: Long : 145 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. They got their MTV: This year the original foursomeby CNBappeared in makeup for the "MTV Video Music Awards" show. Their
initial TV reunion - out of costume - was last year, when Kiss got
together to play a few songs for ``MTV Unplugged.'' color.