This week's music review includes KISS announcing their final show again, a Beards reunion and Angus Stone's soul-funk rebrand as Dope Lemon. IA music guru David Kowalski reports.
NO KISS GOODBYE
RECENTLY IN THE NEWS, KISS frontman and bassist Gene Simmons postponed 17 of the 26 dates of his solo tour of America in April and May 2025. The tour has made headlines for charging exorbitant prices for VIP packages, including one that costs more than US$12,000 (AU$18,900). Included in the package is the privilege of being a roadie, setting up the gig and having dinner with the man himself.
No reason has been given for the cancellations — however, it has been reported it was not due to health. The backlash from fans was swift and may have been the reason the dates were pushed back to 2026.
It looks a little too much like extortion, to my way of thinking — charging up to 18 grand for the privilege of doing the hard yakka to set up a gig. It’s no picnic, let me tell you. I see this as something of an affront to the many wonderful and resourceful road crew members over the years, who would never have been paid that amount of money for a day’s work.
The ink was barely dry on that story when it was reported that KISS would be doing a new show in Las Vegas later this year. The announcement comes less than 18 months after the band's final ever performance at Madison Square Garden in their hometown of New York in December 2023.
At the time, Simmons said:
"I'll say right here, right now, my hand on the Bible, it will be the final KISS-in-makeup appearance."
The new show to be performed at the KISS Army Convention in Las Vegas will therefore be a non-makeup show. Such clever verbiage, Mr Simmons.
KISS is a band that has made more comebacks than a homing pigeon. KISS makes John Farnham’s endless series of retirements and returns to the stage look amateurish. The gimmick had worn thin by the early 1980s — their ticket and album sales declined sharply. Their career fortunes had a slight upsurge for a while (in retrospect, it was something of a dead cat bounce) when they “unmasked” in 1983. They were on the verge of breaking up by 1995 when they decided to put the makeup back on and get the old band back together. Two world tours later, they decided to wrap up their careers.
As quoted in the 2023 End of the Road Tour programme, KISS guitarist Paul Stanley said:
“The 'Reunion' tour [1996-7] made us the number one band again. We played to about two million people in one year. Then we did the Psycho Circus tour [1998-9] and after that, we thought, "Been there, done it." We're the champs again, let's retire on top and we felt there is nothing worse than having someone go away and you don't get to say goodbye — so this tour really is for the fans and to celebrate the whole history of the band.”
I went to the Farewell tour in 2001 when they were planning on hanging up their platform boots. I waited in line for hours to get pre-sale tickets for the 2001 “final” shows in Australia at the time. I could’ve been knocked down with a feather when I found out they were coming back to Melbourne in 2003 to do the KISS Symphony concerts at what is now known as Marvel Stadium. They soldiered on sporadically until the End of the Road tour in 2023, where I was fortunate enough again to see them in Sydney in October of that year. Now they’re planning more gigs?
Granted, it’s not a full-blown tour, but I do feel a bit despondent about this. I really should’ve paid more attention to the history of the band. After all, they did this in 2002. They played the occasional one-off show for a corporate event or television before deciding life on the road was more fun than being at home — and then proceeded to crawl around the globe a few more times. Will history repeat itself?
With Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley being in their seventies now, it's unlikely. The rumours are that in 2027, there will be a KISS virtualavatar show, probably based in Las Vegas — similar to (but much more impressive than, according to Paul Stanley) the ABBA Voyage hologram show currently playing in London. We’ll see how that turns out.
THE BEARDS REUNITE
Speaking of bands reuniting, Australia’s premiere facial-hair-themed band The Beards is re-forming for an anniversary tour. In September 2024, they announced a one-off reunion show at Bluesfest in April and have now decided to make it a full-blown East Coast tour — taking in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and finishing off at home in Adelaide.
The band was (in)famous for extolling the virtues of facial follicles in songs like 'If Your Dad Hasn’t Got a Beard, You’ve Got Two Mums', 'It Only Takes a Fortnight to Grow a Decent Beard' and 'You Should Consider Having Sex with a Bearded Man'. They promise to use a special dynamic pricing scheme for the punters, charging a lower ticket price depending on whether the purchaser has a beard or not. How that will affect their female fans is something we are yet to find out. So far only one price is listed on their website. Tickets for all shows go on sale on 8 April 2025.
THE LATEST FROM DOPE LEMON
Angus Stone – of the sibling duo Angus and Julia Stone – has been busy recording a new album under the moniker of his project Dope Lemon. With his sister, he made four albums of quaint acoustic indie pop, and after a couple of solo albums of his own, has decided to go into a deep soul and funk direction instead. Over the last ten years, Dope Lemon has created four albums and a handful of EPs, including Hound’s Tooth — which gets quite the regular airing at my place.
Album number five, Golden Wolf, is due to be released in May 2025. A tour across Australia and New Zealand is locked in for July and August and the band will be touring the U.S. and Canada in May and June as well. 'Sugarcat' is the latest single. It features a heavily yacht-rock-inspired video clip and a slightly melancholic, darkly intriguing vibe that runs counter to the sunny visuals of the clip. Dreamy synths, inscrutable lyrics and funky basslines — this is a vibe to get wrapped up in. It’s very kaleidoscopic in its sound and scope. The album should be a banger.
Until next time…
LISTEN TO THIS WEEK'S SPECIALLY CURATED PLAYLIST BELOW:
David Kowalski is a writer, musician, educator, sound engineer and podcaster. His podcasts 'The Sound and the Fury Podcast' and 'Audio Cumulus' can be heard exclusively HERE. You can follow David on Twitter/X @sound_fury_pod.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
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