KISS: The Songs 1974-2012

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by GodShifter, Feb 7, 2017.

  1. dave9199

    dave9199 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Durham, NC
    You've paid your dues in life
    Now it's time to cash it in and
    Get what you've urned!
    (WOAH YEAH!)
     
  2. Curveboy

    Curveboy Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York City
    THRILLS IN THE NIGHT

    Back in 1984, this was my favorite song on the album. I usually don't go for "story" songs, but I liked this one. That said, this doesn't hold up so well for me. I do love Eric's cymbal work, and Mark really does a great job on the lead. It's still one of the more interesting songs in the Katalog.
     
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  3. Sandinista

    Sandinista Forum Resident

    There's still time.


    :evil:
     
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  4. GodShifter

    GodShifter Forum Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    Dallas, TX, USA
    Well, for what it's worth, I had "Thrills in the Night" in my head all day yesterday so there must be something to it. Usually, I listen to a song and it's gone by lunch time. Not this one (I'm not saying it's good, but it is catchy and that's the mark of a good single). Yet this one flopped ...
     
  5. GodShifter

    GodShifter Forum Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    Dallas, TX, USA


    WHILE THE CITY SLEEPS 1984 (Simmons, Weissman) (3:39)

    A song that was originally offered to the English hard rock band Heavy Pettin’ in 1983 (in fact, it was one of five demos that Simmons presented to them) “While the City Sleeps” is a song written by Gene Simmons and Mitch Weissman. The song features rhythm guitar by Weissman and a rare performance on Animalize of Gene on bass guitar. Paul, Eric, Mitch Weissman, and Jean Beauvoir are on background vocals.

    Weissman claims that the song is basically a re-write of Free’s “Wishing Well” and, as I suspected, he was responsible for about 90% of the music while the lyrics were a co-write between him and Simmons. Something I’ve noticed with Weissman’s songs are that the choruses are usually a little more intricate than something that either Gene or Paul would write. Weissman, of course, had been a part of Beatlemania back in the 70’s and had played many Beatles tunes over that period. He must have picked up some of Lennon and McCartney’s nuances of songwriting (and Harrison and Starr to a lesser extent) while playing those songs so many times. He just seems to have a good ear for incorporating melodic and more intricate lyric lines than Simmons or Stanley (as we recall he wrote the chorus for “Take All You Can Get” with Paul). Now, that’s not to say Weissman is a genius at song craft, but more to point out that there are sometimes subtle differences that can be picked up in terms of songwriting with KISS when working with co-writers.

    I suppose there is a hint of “Wishing Well” in terms of the main lick of “While the City Sleeps”, but it’s certainly not a blatant rip off. The crunchy, accents of the rhythm guitar riff works well with verses (I also like the kind of ‘bends’ on the end of the lines ala “War Machine” and, of course, Black Sabbath). The chorus riff is really good due to the bass that almost runs against the guitar line and maybe I’m crazy but I hear a bit of Rush in it as well.

    The only place where this song kind of fails is at the bridge (1:38) where St. John throws in some lead guitar flourishes as it kind of busts up the flow of the tune (it’s repeated at 2:52 with more soloing). I don’t like this aspect of the song much at all, but, overall, I find “While the City Sleeps” to a surprisingly good song for Animalize even if it is, perhaps, a little over reliant upon the chorus (a big Simmons writing fallback as we've seen). I’m going to go ahead and give Mitch Weissman the main credit for this one. I think he probably deserves it.
     
  6. Zoot Marimba

    Zoot Marimba And I’m The Critic Of The Group

    Location:
    Savannah, Georgia
    While The City Sleeps:
    The last of the four songs I like on Animalize and the one Gene tune I dig here. I'm not going to claim this is quintessential Gene, but it's a cool tune, I dig it and it's my third favorite on here, I like Gene's vocals, the backing vocals have some nice bite to them, music has a nice groove to it, really good for a Gene tune from this period.
     
    Last edited: Jul 17, 2017
  7. Curveboy

    Curveboy Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York City
    WHILE THE CITY SLEEPS

    Ah...the other GREAT Gene tune on Animalize!

    Now, I didn't always feel that way...but something clicked with me maybe 5 years ago where I really fell in love with it. I really like Gene's lyrics (or Mitch's...don't care!) and think some are rather clever ('through the eye of the needle gotta thread your life')
    What I still don't care for so much is something about the rhythm is off...it always sounded like the tape running at the slightest of wrong speeds. I've learned to overlook it as I like so much about the rest of the song, especially the strong lead from Mark. I also love the little siren noise he throws in right before the end.
     
  8. dadonred

    dadonred Life’s done you wrong so I wrote you all this song

    Location:
    Austin, TX
    WTCS
    My first-ever hearing. Opens like old Rush. Gene's vox doesn't seem to match this music - probably just my expectations (or unexpected to hear him).
    Bridge/pre-chorus is nice (harmony), chorus is boring - I know now why the city sleepzzzzz. :p

    Also, it's probably just my laptop, but very difficult to make out the words.

    Haha on the "rare performance" comment.

    I'm too lazy - which stunt-guitarist is on this tune?

    I'd give it an 18" out of 10 ft tall flame bomb.
     
  9. Zoot Marimba

    Zoot Marimba And I’m The Critic Of The Group

    Location:
    Savannah, Georgia
    Mark
     
  10. ejluther

    ejluther Forum Resident

    Location:
    Newtown, CT
    That last little bit of WTCS really echoes the end of "War Machine" to my ears...
     
  11. GodShifter

    GodShifter Forum Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    Dallas, TX, USA
    No, I definitely hear that as well.
     
  12. Cheevyjames

    Cheevyjames Forum Resident

    Location:
    Graham, NC
    While the City Sleeps

    Good riff on the intro and the little "chugga-chugga" in the verses is a nice touch. Gene's voice sounds good in this one. The chorus repeats just enough without getting on my nerves. Love the start/stop right before the solo and I wasn't too annoyed with Mark's contributions to the song. Overall While the City Sleeps is a good song and a welcome change from a lot of this album. This one is going in my playlist.

    I felt the same thing while listening to the video. Did another listen on Spotify and I could hear the vocals a lot better. I think that video was just a cruddy upload (also, too much digital noise in the cymbals)
     
  13. ejluther

    ejluther Forum Resident

    Location:
    Newtown, CT
    Just a general thought about that - think of all the factors that go into "listening" to something; file quality, soundcard quality, speaker quality, etc. I find I can't really seriously listen to anything through my iPad - it just doesn't sound as good as I know it should/could. I could use earbuds/headphones with it for what I imagine would be better quality but I've just never done that. I've got good computer desktop speakers but I still listen to the vast majority of music I'm serious about through my "real" stereo from the best possible source I have access to...I suppose that's why I like these forums so much, what with all the like-minded folks and all! How do you all listen to these KISS songs, for example?
     
  14. Tippy

    Tippy Well-Known Member

    While The City Sleeps

    Better than I remembered, but still ultimately forgettable.

    Regarding how I listen to the song of the day, I have all my KISS albums ripped to FLAC on laptop's hard drive. Usually just with headphones, and I do mean headphones, not buds.
     
  15. Curveboy

    Curveboy Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York City
    Considering you can put Apple Lossless files on your iPad, it should be fine...heck, even AAC ripped at 320VBR would sound good.
     
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  16. PJayBe

    PJayBe Forum Resident

    It was on the Animalize tour that KISS stayed at the hotel in Brighton where I worked for a week before the European tour started in order to rehearse. Both Gene and Paul were very friendly and I asked about geting an autographed picture. Paul pointed out the band's manager and said thet I should ask him,. and he'd sort it. The day after the gig I found an envelope at reception with a picture of the line up including Mark St. John, and needless to say not an autograph in site.........
     
  17. Sandinista

    Sandinista Forum Resident

    While The City Sleeps Gene finds his bass and records a song with KISS.

    I really want to like this more than I do. So I'll damn it with faint praise. Gene sounds reasonably engaged here with a bit more shading to his vocals that elsewhere on Animalize. So that's good. His vocals are a bit recessed, it sounds like which is not my top choice - but then, the 80s KISS is a little busier than 70s KISS so the simple Kramer-esque probably wouldn't fly right anyway.

    The hooks aren't as strong - but I do like the riffage.

    The chorus bugs me a bit - to my ears, a bit of a letdown... that interval in SLEE-eps is kinda not that interesting to keep repeating as often as they do - that type of interval seems more of an aside than the main hook for the chorus.
     
  18. Terrapin Station

    Terrapin Station Master Guns

    Location:
    NYC Man/Joy-Z City
    "While the City Sleeps"

    I like this tune. I enjoy listening to it when I listen to Animalize. But I'm trying to "increase the magnification of the microscope" for this thread, and sometimes that leads to constructive criticism, which is mostly what I'll be doing below.

    As with "Lonely Is the Hunter", even I, Gene-lover that I am, have to admit that for the most part Gene seems to be half-assing things here. Now, there are some Gene-isms that I love here--some bends, both in the riff and vocally, a very bluesy vocal overall, a smidgen of unusual harmony (in this case some slight chromaticism and one case of making the tonic provide tension (that's when he goes to the E in the prechorus)), some fun rhythmic stuff . . . but still, for Gene, this is half-assing it.

    First off, this tune is basically one riff. And that riff is basically the old I - bVII - I thing, again in E--which both Gene and Paul have been milking like crazy for awhile--contrasted with a bVI to bVII progression (there's the bVII chord again) and a little chromatic walk-up/down--from E up to G and back down to E. That's the intro.

    Well, the verse is pretty much the same thing, only with some rhythmic variation, and with just a walk-down from G to E--no walk up.

    Gene figured he can't just do the same thing for the entire tune, so the prechorus introduces a new progression--or rather, it's mostly a V chord, with the IV chord as a leading tone and a suspended cadence at one point. Or in other words, the prechorus progression is just about the most unimaginative change you could think of.

    And that's it for the most part.

    Now, I don't want to give the impression that a tune is bad or lackluster just because it's simple. I don't agree with that at all. And a tune isn't bad or lackluster just because it uses well-worn music-theoretical tropes either. After all, I love the Rolling Stones, and a lot of their tunes analyze more or less to vamps, often with IV - I progressions and so on.--they often take almost a James Brown approach to songwriting (and I love lots of James Brown, too) Heck, I even love "Surfin' Bird"--that would be pretty high on a favorite tunes list for me, and it's mostly just bashing away on one chord, with the only variation--a varation that has the power of coming across an oasis in a desert--is a brief change to a V then a IV chord, and that's it. (And I'm also a Ramones and an AC/DC fan, and on and on . . . so definitely "simple" or "using well-worn/cliched ideas" doesn't imply something negative to me.)

    It's more about the craftiness of how everything works together (including the arrangement), or we could say more abstractly how much care or "feeling" or "passion" etc. someone seems to put into the tune at hand. And with "While the City Sleeps", what's conveyed seems to be Gene doing something that's "good enough" ("That's enough to work as a riff . . . and if I change it just this little bit, just do this little variation, that's enough to count as a different part . . . and if I simply go to a IV-V here, that's enough to make it not sound like the same thing over and over for the entire length of the tune . . . ")--it's the scrambling to do the homework at the last minute idea. Gene is talented enough that his last-minute scramble is still enjoyable to me if I don't approach it from a constructive criticism angle, but he's capable of something more than that.

    This even extends to the vocals. He's doing his heavily blues-influenced thing, with lots of bendy notes, etc., but he's doing it in--for him--a pretty pedestrian way that kind of just goes along with the riff and that's a pretty stock pentatonic approach. And the chorus comes across almost as if it would simply be the first thing you think of singing when you want the words to be "While the City Sleeps".

    By the way, re mining the same musical ideas over and over, notice how the main riff here could work as an alternate "Thrills in the night (with the E-D-E e) . . . Turn out the light (E-D-E e) . . . I love eating beaver (C D the beginning of the E)" (and then you get the "While the City Sleeps" (with the walkdown) after that last line)
     
    Last edited: Jul 17, 2017
  19. MagneticNorthpaw

    MagneticNorthpaw Senior Member

    Location:
    Chicago, IL USA
    WHILE THE CITY SLEEPS
    Gene's songs (demos) on Animalize generally get some rightful flak, but, to be honest, I prefer the last two songs over "Under The Gun" and "Heaven's On Fire." The slashing chords on the pre-chorus and choruses and bent notes in the verse please my ear - and the siren effect MSJ plays over the last chorus fits the theme of the song. The lyrics, naturally, are a laughable hodge-podge of listed sayings/cliches in support of a Stanleyesque "get all you can take" sentiment with another film noir title used to tie it all together. It's essentially a subpar sequel to "Naked City," but one you will watch if you happen to land on it while channel-surfing. It's the aural equivalent of junk TV.

    So Gene only plays bass on TWO of his four songs? Has there been consensus on which two, as I've heard it's "BBB" and either "Lonely" or this. I'm pretty sure "Murder In High-Heels" is Jean Beauvoir (or, received wisdom is that it is him).

    EDIT: Forget to mention - there's no need to ever use the phrase "open sores" in any context in any song. :wtf:
     
  20. GodShifter

    GodShifter Forum Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    Dallas, TX, USA
    I think it's three (supposeded) bass performances by Gene on Animalize. "Burn Bitch Burn", "Lonely is the Hunter" and "While the City Sleeps". Weissman is credited as playing bass on "Murder" but admits he messed up on the recording and Beauvoir had to re-record it.
     
  21. GodShifter

    GodShifter Forum Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    Dallas, TX, USA
    So a "prechorus" is essentially the same as a "bridge"? I'm embarrassed to say after all this time people keep using the term and I'm not 100% clear on what it is (and, yes, I Googled it). Still confused.
     
  22. dadonred

    dadonred Life’s done you wrong so I wrote you all this song

    Location:
    Austin, TX
    Did it feel sorted or sordid?
     
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  23. dadonred

    dadonred Life’s done you wrong so I wrote you all this song

    Location:
    Austin, TX
    Substitute "open source" and it still works.
     
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  24. dadonred

    dadonred Life’s done you wrong so I wrote you all this song

    Location:
    Austin, TX
    I may have misused it. To me, they're not the same. The bridge is typically not repeated I think whereas pre-chorus is a turnaround from a verse before it goes to the chorus (and rare, I guess).
    But I will sometimes use them interchangeably, especially when there isn't a bridge. Bridges are usually for a turning point in a song, an attention getter where you ram home a key point (unlike Gene who just uses the chorus to ram home whatever).
     
  25. npgchris

    npgchris Forum Resident


    It's funny you mention Aerosmith and Queen, because I remember those two, and definitely wanted them. But I must not have ever owned them, because I think I'd remember it more clearly. I think it was just that I wanted them, but never got them.

    I believe they also made belt buckles of all 4 guys in KISS, based on the Love Gun cover artwork? That rings a bell, but I don't think I ever actually saw them for sale in a store anywhere. But I think those were offered on the merch sheets that used to come in their albums. Did they do ones based on the Solo Album artwork? I can't remember.
     
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