Bruce Kulick Unholy Roller
November 1996
by Bob Gordon

Recently departed Kiss members Bruce Kulick and Eric Singer will appear at Metropolis next tuesday, November 26, as part of their Unholy Downunder clinic tour. BOB GORDON spoke to Kulick about life within and beyond Kiss.

While his former bandmates have been carving up the US like it was 1977 all over again, Bruce Kulick has been contemplating his musical future.

Mind you, he hasn't been sitting down while he's been doing it. As well as writing new material for a 1997 album (that is yet to be announced as a band or a solo project), he's performed dates with American songstress Lenita Erickson and a round of guitar clinic dates in Europe.

He had a ball, but...

"What's even more special about these Australian clinics is that Eric (Singer) and I get a chance to jam together," Kulick enthuses. "At the end we'll get a bass player to come up and play with us also. So certainly there'll be more band interaction, and we always play well together. It really is exciting.

"It feels much more like a performance which is what I get off on, even though I get a chance to interact with the crowd, answer questions and talk about my career as a musician and also as a member of Kiss. Whatever they really want to know about."
Though he played previously with the likes of Meatloaf and Michael Bolton, Kulick, of course, found his fame in the last 12 years playing the Beatles/Led Zeppelin fueled material of Kiss. Given his musical background, he was a natural fit from the very start.

"I was brought up really listening to the same stuff Gene (Simmons) and Paul (Stanley) were into," Kulick says. "Our influences are similar, Paul and I, ironically enough, we were at the same concerts in New York without knowing each other. We would talk about that many a time. It's no coincidence.

"I think that's important, you've got to work with people who have read the same books, so to speak. It rarely works when someone's coming from a totally different vein of music. It's just not going to click the same way."


Excited by the prospect of writing and recording new material at his own behest, Kulick doesn't necessarily see it as a chance to branch off in a new direction.

"I feel I'm a very versatile guitarist although within a certain style of rock music," he says. "Although I'll love composing music for a song like Forever, I loved playing nasty and completely obnoxious for Unholy, let's say. It's a little bit of both and certainly one advantage to not being in Kiss is that I can go where I want to go without thinking 'would Kiss do this?'"

"Though, if you think about it, Kiss did push the envelope in many different directions. Kiss has always had so much variety in its music through the years, but I think it puts me in a real healthy place to just be able to combine the styles that I really love and make some great music."


THE CARNIVAL IS OVER

Kulick's delight at being able to play and release new music is obvious, even down the line from Los Angeles.

It's understandable. He recorded a 'new' Kiss album from November, 1995, to February of this year, which has since been put on the record company shelf in the light of the band's much publicized reunion tour.

Happy now to look forward, his departure from the band - he and Singer were on a paid vacation of sorts until the reunion tour was extended and they tired of waiting it out from the sidelines - has understandably been one of mixed emotions.

"I miss touring with the guys," he says. "I spoke to Paul today. It's sad, I know he misses playing with me too, it's really a situation where it gets to a point where you've got to look at the big picture and the big picture is obviously 'well I'm not the guy who used to play the stuff from the '70s' and that's what they wanted to concentrate on.


"Even though I felt I played that stuff great, my biggest issue, I would say, was working on an album such as Carnival of Souls - which is what the fans seem to call the unreleased album - and that to be on a shelf! I worked really hard for a long time and I know the four of us were really proud of it. Now it's lost in this record company abyss, because of the reunion tour.

"I co-wrote nine things on that and I even sand a song (I Walk Alone). So it's really super frustrating although I understand the bottom line business situation of 'well the tour is not just gonna be for a year, it's gonna be longer'. Okay, well I don't wanna wait around on the bench. I gotta get out there and do music and perform for my fans."


While in a business sense a modern era Kiss album has no relevance in a nostalgia based reunion tour, this decade has been an era of recycled releases for Kiss.

Even though gene Simmons has told X-Press Magazine on two occasions that 'this band is about today', it's six years into the decade and there's only been one new original release from the band (1992's Revenge) - as against four live/greatest hits compilation efforts and a tribute album. Simmons has also been critical of the five albums between 1982's Creatures Of The Night and Revenge, yet there has been little new material to show them up. A frustrating scenario?

"Oh always," Kulicks says. "I've got to admit that Paul was frustrated when Gene would say that, because Paul was very proud of say, Crazy Nights (1987), that was a huge hit. Maybe for Gene it wasn't his cup of tea, but that's not what the band is about - it's always more what's best for the band isn't necessarily best for the individuals. Which certainly proves true for myself too (laughs).

"But yeah, I've gotta say that the stuff from the 80's, many fans missed that - and I was involved with that stuff - and it's something that is an issue for some of the fans. But I always saw the band moving forward and obviously a reunion tour doesn't move it forward for me. It may move a lot of people into an arena, but it's not doing anything for me."


Talk of a Kiss reunion tour (which hits Pert on February 9, at the Burswood Dome) has been rife for years, but it always seemed nothing more than the wishful thinking from diehard fans. Not so, apparently - Kulick was advised as early as 1985 that it was a possibility.

"I have to give Gene and Paul credit that they never said to me 'never'," Kulick states. "You had to say it sometimes to the fans because it was getting to like 'well stop asking, don't you like what we're doing?' You know what I mean. But they never would say to me 'Bruce you don't have anything to worry about', cause they knew that at some point they may do it. I respect them for that."


Stanley and Simmons have become fiercely protective of the Kiss empire. An article in Forbes magazine claims they were ripped off twice in the 1980s by errant managers, incidents that probably explain their hardball business line of the Alive/Worldwide tour.

"I think they're really proud and they are protective," Kulick says. "They don't like people making money off of them and that's, for example, why you don't see 'Kiss' in an advertisement for Eric and I doing clinics. Kiss fans know who we are and if they don't then they should figure it out from an article. If they've got to figure that out, then they're probably not really interested in going anyway (laughs). You know what I mean?"


SPEAKING FREHLEY

Obviously a vastly accomplished rock guitarist, Kulick's playing would stand and fall on it's individualism. Even so, was it hard to play Ace Frehley era songs with his own flavor while still retaining the essence of the song?

"First of all Ace played a lot of classic stuff," Kulick points out. "His solos were very lyrical and there was a definite melody and feeling he was getting across. He may not be the most technical player, but that doesn't matter. What he was able to play had so much content to it, that's why I don't want to ruin any of that.

"I was never afraid to study another guitar player if there's a riff I like. So that's what I did, then maybe there might be a phrase or two that I feel more comfortable playing a little differently, but I always felt that I did the old material justice and I know Ace felt that too."

In interviews band members always talk of Kiss as 'family', and while Ace Frehley and Peter Criss left under a cloud, there was never dirty laundry aired in public until latter years. It seems that Vinnie Vincent (1983-84) was something of a different story, but the departure of Kulick and Singer seems quite graceful. Does the family notion ring true?

"For myself, truthfully, there's no bridges burned and we all do get along," Kulick says. "I always though it was low class when I did hear stuff from a Peter or an Ace about not wanting to sign an old picture of the four of them. I'm so happy about the 12 years I had in the band and I'm not going to run around complaining 'oh they put the makeup on and they ruined my life'.

"No, that's stupid. There doesn't have to be any dirty laundry if you're grown up and you understand your role in the situation."
While Kulick finds it hard to pinpoint highlights in his 12 years with Kiss, he says that as a native New Yorker playing Madison Square Garden was a special thrill, as was the undying loyalty of that member of the species known as the hard-core Kiss fan. And while he's busy looking forward, he'll always be happy to talk about Kiss to anyone who wants to.

"Why not? I'm so proud of that. Look at how many millions of people have seen me perform and heard my guitar playing from being in the band. I don't mind that at all."

"Obviously they'll get a chance to judge what I put out new when I get it out there," he concludes. "But from the fan mail I've been getting in the past six months, it's all about supporting my future too. I have a lot to look forward to."