ALBUM OF THE WEEK # 219 KISS - HOTTER THAN HELL (40TH ANNIVERSARY -1974)

[RJhog (Admin)]

Artist: Kiss

Genre: Rock

Country Of Origin: United States

Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Member: Yes 

Album: Hotter Than Hell

Producer: Kenny Kerner/Richie Wise

Release Date: October 22, 1974

Running Time: 33:07

RJ's Top 5 Songs: 1. Goin' Blind...2. Got To Choose...3. Parasite...4. Comin' Home...5. All The Way

Disclaimer: All info that does not reside in my brain is gathered from wikipedia.com (mostly because Jon can't stand it). 

I'm going back to back with Kiss or Kiss related albums this week.  Lat week it was an Ace Frehley solo album.  This week it's the sophomore effort from Kiss.  If you've spent any time here at all, you'll know that Kiss is my favorite band.  And this week's album, Hotter Than Hell, easily rests within my top five or six Kiss albums.  Here are some tidbits regarding the album:

• Hotter Than Hell charted at a cool 100 on the Billboard chart.
• It is certified Gold (I would imagine that if Kiss came off the money to have it re-certified that it would probably hit Platinum, but that's just a guess).
• The only single released from the album was Let Me Go, Rock 'n' Roll, which was backed with Hotter Than Hell.
• This album was recorded in California as opposed to New York, where the debut was recorded.
• Ace Frehley wrote or co-wrote three of the tracks, but was still afraid to sing lead vocals.
• All photos of Ace on the album have his makeup airbrushed into the photo.  A serious car wreck was the reason.
• Goin' Blind was written by Gene Simmons and Stephen Coronel during the band's pre-Kiss days as Wicked Lester.

I love this album.  Everybody says the production sucks, and maybe it does, but it doesn't bother me in the least.  I like the darker songs, especially Goin' Blind.  It's possibly my favorite Gene song of all-time.  I also always loved Got To Choose and Comin' Home and was thrilled to hear them on MTV Unplugged (the uncut version from Kissology has the former).  Ace's soloing on Strange Ways and Let Me Go, Rock "n" Roll are fantastic.

One other thing, I always liked the opening track for side two, All The Way.  I think it kicks ass as a tune, and it has always seemed like a totally lost Kiss song to me.  So there you have it, a great album from my band.  If you don't have it, it's quite easy to find in remastered format.

Here's a commercial for the album from way back when:

Side One:

1. Got To Choose

2. Parasite

3. Goin' Blind

4. Hotter Than Hell 

5. Let Me Go, Rock 'n' Roll

  

Side Two:

6. All The Way

7. Watchin' You

8. Mainline

9. Comin' Home

10. Strange Ways

 

[Jon]

Jumped the gun on the anniversary album didn't you, McFly. 

[RJhog (Admin)]

I guess I misunderstood what you meant by "this" week.

[Jon]

Shame that my response stated "next".

[Scott]

What...  no mention of the photo session for the back cover?

[RJhog (Admin)]

This was a rush job.  I had nothing before I started this morning.

[Scott]

Lifted from a Youtube video poster who used the below as his description for the photo sessions....

------------------------------

The album was released in october of 1974 and featured a garish and colorful Japanese influenced artwork, and the back cover showed individual band shots taken by Norman Seeff at a wild party, and a composite of all four band members' makeup designs. Everyone present at the session (with the exception of Simmons) was drunk for the entire photography session. Stanley was so drunk he had to be locked in his car. Ace Frehley's image on the front cover is actually airbrushed, as a side of his face was injured in a car accident and was without makeup on half of his face at the time of the photo shoot.

Gene Simmons: Norman Seeff was a very bright but strange guy who believed that photo session should be this other thing. So he would create a climate and bring down everybody and anybody. Girls who would blow you, anything that would happen just to get a sense of something. That session was one of the few times that I've seen Paul drunk. He was blitzed. There was a photo of him with a girl who had nothing on, sort of painted like "Goldfinger" with silver stuff. I don't even think Paul was aware that there were forces of gravity. So he reached over and in one shot you sort of see him nuzzling with chickie and the next second he's over the bed. He'd fallen over. At the end of the photo session I had to carry him to the car and lock him in the back seat. It was Norman Seeff's idea to put the Japanese lettering on the album cover. The result of that was the Japanese instantly took to the band. We started reading cover stories about the band. Some people suspected we were Japanese. The Japanese thought we had taken the makeup from Japanese Kabuki theater.

Paul Stanley: I don't know if anybody can make out the back cover of the album but we were having this wild, wild party with tons of people in weird outfits. Ten minutes after that picture was taken I passed out. I cut my hand, I don't known how I did it. I was so drunk that they locked me in a car and I couldn't find my way out. A lot of the pictures taken for the back cover have never seen the light of day because some people didn't want to be incriminated by the pictures.

Peter Criss: It was a wild photo session for the back cover. I was sitting in the armchair there with this broad giving me head with this mask on. Paul was in bed with a bunch of broads and me in a robe over this big knight's table's chair. The photographer got us all drunk. That was the idea. He got us all loaded. Everyone was drunk except Gene but Gene had to be drunk on the whole room being drunk. Even the models and the people in the room were drunk. No one sober but Gene but he had to be intoxicated from just the intoxication of the whole vibe.

Ace Frehley: For the photo session we did for the "Hotter Than Hell" album, the doctor told me I could only put makeup on half of my face. So all the shots were profiles [laughs]. I got into a car accident. I got drunk one night and I kept driving around the Hollywood Hills. I kept going around the same block faster and faster until I lost control and hit a telephone pole. I think I was testing destiny. I got out the car and I had cut my head. I walked back down to the hotel and I knocked on my road manager's door and there's blood running all down my face. He said, "Oh God, what happened to you?" I go, "I wrecked a car." One of many, it was like the beginning of the saga.

[Jon]

That's funny. You actually think I'm going to read that. Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha   ha  ha  HAHAHAHAHA ha.

[Scott]

[Jon]

[Jon]

This was incredibly......boring. Every song just plodded on until the end and then the next song plodded. Part of it could do with the production I suppose, but the songs really aren't that good. There is nothing here that is even slightly memorable. I was going to count the "yeah's" but pretty much got bored after the first one popped up in song #1. Guess there was some cowbell use, but that didn't matter. As for "Strange Ways" which was highly recommended? Not good. Not even the solo. Sad thing is that I listened to this twice and still came away with the same feeling.