God Gave Rock n' Roll to You

Monday night I went to a KISS concert. With my brother. Because I am all kinds of cool like that.

Gene and Paul and two other guys who weren't Ace & Peter were there. In full make-up and platform boots.

It was fantastically awesome, and I found myself amused at the fact that while I found it completely unforgivable that Motley Crue seemed incapable of removing themselves from the 80's with their commentary, looks and moves, I found it positively charming that KISS seems to doing the same thing they've been doing since the 70's.

With KISS it's...classic. With Motley Crue, it's...dated. There's some subtle nuance there that I can't explain, and really I should probably be focusing on the fact that I have now admitted that I was (am?) in fact an 80's hair band junkie.

Let's review for a moment shall we?
Concerts the Princess has attended:

Bon Jovi x eleventy squillion (I've never missed a show in Winnipeg - they were my first concert when I was 14 in 1989, and I will in fact be seeing them in July when they return)
Skid Row
Warrant
Poison
Guns N' Roses
Motely Crue
Poison & Vince Neil concert
and now...KISS

In my defense, I've also gone to some lovely events that don't revolve around men wearing lipstick and mousse:

Jesse Cook x 3
The Cranberries
Goo Goo Dolls
Great Big Sea x 4 or 5
Vance Gilbert
Amanda Marshall
Boston (or do they fit into the category above?)
Russell Crowe and Thirty Odd Foot of Grunts
etc...

Ok, this post seemed to segue in an odd direction. Back to the point: the KISS concert last night.

By the time we were done work yesterday, neither my brother nor I really felt like going. My Dad bought the ticket for my brother as an early Christmas present. (He offered to buy mine too, but I am still assessing my options, I think I'd prefer a pony or a new tiara...)

Anyhow, after much discussion over dinner, my brother's conscience allowed him to decide that we would try to sell the tickets outside the arena and we would simply give the money back to our Dad on the way home. And here we enter the lesson in non-scalping portion of the post:

HOW TO SELL CONCERT TICKETS ON THE NIGHT OF:
1. Show up early. (Not say, 20 minutes before the opening act)
2. Even though you're proud of being all "legal" and intending to sell at face value, get over yourself.
3. Because people will offer you $20.00 for a $140.00 ticket.
4. Ignore the hecklers, because there will be LOTS.
5. Resign yourself to the fact that unless you want to take a massive loss, you are in fact going to the concert yourself.

A little note about KISS. I wanted to go because a) they're a zillion years old, and it'll probably be my only chance to see them in platform boots and full make-up. b) I've recently caught a few episodes of the Family Jewels and it is in fact hilarious. c) It seemed like a good bonding event with my brother. I used to hear KISS coming up through my floor from his basement room for years.

But as a child? KISS terrified me. I mean look at this album cover? Cartoony right? Even kind of funny. Now picture yourself looking at it as a four year old girl. I thought they were demons. I actually thought that Gene Simmons (not that I knew his name at the time, cause even at 4, I probably wouldn't have been scared of a guy named "Gene") was in fact the Devil.




But I will say about the show: It was awesome. They know how to entertain. They really seem to care about actually showing everyone a good time. It's not just a bunch of singing heads. I even bought a t-shirt. Because again? I'm cool.

xo