1996 Vintage Guitar Magazine

Bruce Kulick - No Kiss-Off

By Willie G. Moseley

This is one of those "dead-line dilemma" articles. Just a few days before this issue of VG was to go to press, media reports said guitarist Bruce Kulick and drummer Eric Singer had left Kiss, and a phone call to ESP's Matt Masciandaro confirmed such. Because Kulick's interview was recorded prior to his departure, it was decided to run the interview as it was recorded. At the very least, the opportunity for an update from Kulick is now in the offing.

The bottom line is that Kulick had been in the lead guitarist slot with Kiss longer than anyone else when our conversation was recorded at a large guitar show. Since he usually brandished modern-looking guitars on-stage (with one notable exception), it might come as a surprise to some readers to discover that Kulick is a vintage guitar enthusiast and collector. His pride in his accomplishments after years of hard work was evident when we began our on-the-record chat:

VG: I've asked other New York players about what kind of influences came from being brought up in such a large, diverse metropolis.

BK: I was born in Brooklyn; moved to Queens when I was 10. There's no doubt the Beatles were the first big thing that got my attention. But my older brother, Bob, loved music, and thanks to him, I heard about the Yardbirds with Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page. He used to take me to a lot of concerts; I saw one show, for example, where the Young Rascals headlined, and the opening acts were Cream and the Who. I was about 13 or 14.

I heard a lot of stuff I wouldn't have heard if it hadn't been for my brother. Originally, we were listening to folk music, then the Beatles, then all of a sudden he was hip to every British band in existence, and hanging out in the Village all the time! He's got some great stories; he told me about a lefty black guitar player who'd played with his teeth; that was Jimmy James and the Blue Flames, of course. I learned how to play "Hey Joe" from my brother, who'd heard Hendrix playing it in the clubs. I was exposed to a lot of stuff, and about the only American guitarist that made an impact on me was Leslie West. I thought Mountain was great, but they were some guys from New York "doing Cream" ...and doing it very well, but I also had the Vagrant's singles.

So I began frequenting the Fillmore; I'd listen to anybody from Miles Davis to the Allman Brothers to Humble Pie with Peter Frampton. I was there on New Year's Eve when Jimi Hendrix recorded Band of Gypsies.

The British Invasion really affected me; I didn't have any real affection for the Beach Boys or other American stuff. I loved Clapton in Cream, and Jack Bruce, too. In fact, my first good instrument was an EB-3; my brother was playing guitar so I figured I'd play bass.

VG: Was that EB-3 your first instrument?

BK: No, the first guitar I picked up was the hand-me-down, nylon string acoustic that a lot of players wish they still had, for sentimental reasons. I wore holes in it playing the two chords to the Dave Clark Five's "Glad All Over" (laughs). I played a bit in high school; I borrowed my brother's Epiphone Riviera. The cover band I was in did dances, and we even did the Circle Line, which was a boat that would cruise around Manhattan. By then I had the EB-3, and I got a Plush amp, which was tuck-and-roll like a Kustom, but Kustoms were more expensive. I think playing bass strengthened my guitar playing, and I felt like I got better than the lead guitar player. To this day, I still play bass on occasion, even on a Kiss track, sometimes.

VG: What was your first electric guitar?

BK: A '65 SG Special. It meant a lot to me, and I used to polish it every night. I modified the bridge and tailpiece, but as I got into collecting guitars sometime later, I bought a completely original one and left it alone. The first real "pro" gigs I did were backing up disco artists like George McRae and Andrea True. I was the "rock guitar player in a disco dance band."

VG: The disco connection is going to surprise some readers.

BK: I know, but you have to remember that Top 40 in the mid-'70s was disco, and I wanted to work. I'd heard Beck's Blow By Blow with all of those creative cords, and as it turned out, the band would have to play for a half hour before George McRae would come on-stage, so we did Beck covers.

Did I want to be in those bands? No, but it was experience. I did it to learn how to "land on your feet" in almost any situation. With McRae, I played in a giant, sold out stadium, and I also did a concert with an orchestra, which was exciting. I didn't enjoy the Andrea True gig; we played nice places where she'd had big hits, but we also played Air Force bases. At times it was like Spinal Tap (laughs)!

After I got through with those gigs, I knew I needed to get a Strat, so I bought a stripped '63 model for $400. I also got a Les Paul Pro around that time, and a B.C. Rich. Then my brother and I both went out with Meatloaf on the Bat Out Of Hell tour, which was great.

VG: Your brother is enough of a "player's player" to where I've seen him in some endorsement ads.

BK: He's been in Washburn ads and others. Ironically, he auditioned for Kiss the same day Ace did, and they ended up going with Ace, but Bob kept in touch with the band, which kind of opened the door for me later. I'd gotten to know Paul through Bob. Bob was in a band called Balance, which had a hit called "Breaking Away," and his last band was called Murderer's Row; I wrote a song for them. He's currently producing some bands in L.A., so he's pushing forward.

By the time I got into Meatloaf's band, I knew what to expect, and this tour was the real thing. He'd had a huge radio hit, and we were selling out arenas around the world. It was a year long, and we'd had enough by the time it was over, but it was a professional effort

My next band was called Blackjack, which had Michael Bolton in it, but he was called Michael Bolotin back then. We were like Bad Company; we got a big record deal on Polydor, and our lawyer handled Led Zeppelin and Bad Company for Swan Song in America. Tom Dowd produced our first album, but I was really intimidated; that was one area where I wasn't experienced. Being in the studio, doing my music for a famous producer wasn't a fun time, and Michael didn't enjoy it either, but we did the best we could. We did another record with Eddie Offord, from Yes, producing; he was another hero of mine, but it also wasn't what I expected. I was kind of dejected after that, so I joined the Good Rats.

VG: The Rats had a "core" or "cult" following for some time, didn't they?

BK: Yeah, it was a regional thing, and the clubs were changing around then. I did one gig where the Rats were second-billed to Ozzy when Randy Rhoads was still alive, and Motorhead opened the gig. Let me tell you, Lemmy didn't like that too much (laughs)! By then, I was playing a Les Paul Custom and a B.C. Rich Eagle Supreme; I had a good sound. I was with the Rats from '80 to '82.

VG: Had you already started collecting by then?

BK: Not a lot, but I'd already starting holding onto a couple of things. I had let some other guitars go in the past. Once I got into Kiss, I was a lot smarter about getting collectible guitars.

By the early '80s, Michael had changed his last name to Bolton, and he got a gig to open for Bob Seger on a big concert tour, so I went with him, and I played on his record. I used the same rig I had with the Rats, but a lot of it got stolen in Manhattan. Around then I also recorded with Billy Squier, and he wanted me to tour with him, but I said no. His next record really hit big, so I might have regretted my decision, but I guess it meant I'd end up being available for Kiss.

VG: And obviously we'd want to know how that transpired.

BK: I got a call from Paul in late '84, asking me to fill in for their guitar player, Mark St. John, who was sick. They realized they had the right guy, after they'd had some changes in their lead guitarist and drummer slots.

By '79 or '80, Kiss was not Kiss anymore; they just didn't get along, and that's why they did the solo albums. And that was good for them, but when they tried to put things back together, things were very difficult. So Peter Criss left, then Ace. Eric Carr, God bless him, was on drums by then, and they finally went with Vinnie Vincent, because he was writing some decent songs with them. So he got involved with Creatures of the Night, but there's a lot of different players "ghosting" on that album, just like my brother ghosted on Alive II. He played on some of the studio tracks.

They took off the makeup and did Lick It Up, and Vinnie left; I don't want to get into the reasons. Then I think they wanted to find somebody who was really fast and extreme, and Mark was on a list of names that Grover Jackson gave them. I have a lot of respect for Mark's playing, but he was like Alan Holdsworth, which didn't make a lot of sense to me as far as Kiss went. You wonder how it might have turned out if he'd stayed healthy. Because of his illness, I played on a track on Animalize, and then Paul told me, "Don't cut your hair" (chuckles).

Three months later, they asked me to go on the road with them to Europe. We started on September 30, 1984, in Brighton, and I was really excited; that was where all of those years of performing in stadiums or for small audiences that didn't give a **** paid off. But it still didn't mean that I knew how to perform with Kiss immediately, but within a week I was comfortable being on-stage with the guys.

VG: The first indication I saw that there had been another change in the lead guitarist slot was the Animalize concert video, which I saw on MTV.

BK: We recorded that in December of '84, after the European tour. As for guitars, I had nothing at that point. I had kind of a Strat with a Floyd, and I might have still had a Les Paul, but I really didn't have much gear then. Paul told me to go over to Manny's and pick out whatever I liked. I got a gold Charvel with an angled headstock, another Charvel, and a B.C. Rich, so those were my guitars for the road. Unfortunately, most of the guitars I had then were stolen from our warehouse a couple of years later, and that's when I really started collecting guitars to use in the studio, but not to take on the road. It was around that time that ESP started getting into some "Charvel-ish" or...I hate to use the word, "heavy metal" guitars. The quality was great, and I knew Richie Fliegler, who was working there at the time, so that's when I hooked up with ESP.

VG: Albums and tours you've done with Kiss?

BK: Animalize, Asylum, Crazy Nights, Hot in the Shade, and Revenge. All of those albums had tours, and there was a record called Smashes, Thrashes and Hits, which was a greatest hits album with two new tracks. The tribute album doesn't count, even though we backed up Garth Brooks on it; Garth's a great guy. Alive III was from the Revenge tour. Then there was a convention tour, which relates to the new MTV Unplugged album.

VG: On a video of a live version of "I Love It Loud," it looked like most of your guitars were of the "Super-Strat" configuration, but I thought I saw what looked like a Les Paul Jr. as well.

BK: That's right. Through the mid-'80s I used an ESP Horizon with a stop bridge if I needed a guitar without a Floyd Rose. It worked, it behaved, and it was perfect for live work. I broke a collar bone in '89, and heavy guitars had always bugged the hell out of me anyway, so I went on a quest for light guitars. In '89 and '90, I bought a Custom Shop Explorer that was made from Korina, but it wasn't loud enough to use live. I bought a Moderne when they were cheap; 600 bucks. During the most recent tour I got a '57 Les Paul Custom reissue from the Custom Shop; it's a perfect weight for me, and it sounds great.

But the other "find" was at Guitar R'Us in Hollywood; it was a beat to **** Les Paul Jr. that has a neck which had obviously been broken in three places, but it had been repaired pretty well. It had the wrong kind of bridge, and had already been routed for a humbucker, which I would never do. The pickup was a Patent Number, the pickguard wasn't original, and it already had Schallers on it. Albert had it on consignment and told me to take it home and try it. That guitar ended up as one of the main guitars on the Revenge tour, and I've done some other recording with it since then.

VG: What about other guitars you've collected?

BK: I've got to mention Ed Seelig at Silver Strings Music; I've done a lot of guitar business with him over the years. Around '90, I asked him to find me a utility Les Paul Special, and he found a gorgeous '58 one that was mint. I paid market value for it then, but I don't play it. One time when I got it out I put a tiny scratch on it, and nearly had a heart attack. That's why something like that Junior is perfect for the road.

Ed also got me a clean '60 ES-355; I used it on "Domino" and the new studio record, but you'll never see it on-stage. I also found and bought a clean, stock Les Paul Jr. while we were on the road; it must have belonged to some church guy because it had .012s on it!

Then I started re-living my teenage years by getting into SGs (chuckles). I got a gorgeous '64 SG Jr., and a '65 SG Standard because of Harrison. It has a reset neck; I try to stay away from such things like that but the front of the instrument was beautiful, and it had a combination of chrome and nickel parts. I finally found a '65 Special that was like the one I had when I was a kid; it has a stop bridge on it.

One Les Paul I need to tell you about is a "Frankenstein"; it's a converted '53 my brother got back in the early '70s. Someone had put some PAFs on it, and the guitar also had a ****ty sunburst refin. I finally found the right nickel parts to go on it, and I got Gibson to refinish it for me; it's gorgeous. This thing has even been on Alive II, when my brother used it. It's the most "important" guitar I own.

I also bought a Korina Heritage V that showed up on a "Monday Night Football" promo a couple of years ago. Most of the tour guitars I take out are some great ESPs and a couple of Gibsons.

VG: Tell me about the 1995 "convention" tour.

BK: We'd finished touring South America, Japan and Australia; those were regular concert dates. It was gene's idea to come with something that meant we could spend some time with the fans. We didn't want to do a full concert in a hotel, so we decided to play unplugged; we kind of said: "Let's show 'em we can do it." I'd used a Chet Atkins acoustic solidbody on "Forever," so that's what I took, along with a Marshall Acoustic Artist amp and a SansAmp. We had about 12 songs prepared, and we took requests. There was an Eric Singer drum clinic, I did a guitar clinic, and we signed autographs and answered questions.

VG: The attendance was limited to specific numbers, and there were some questions about the admission fee.

BK: In some towns, we could have easily pulled a couple of thousand fans into a hotel ballroom, and there was no way that could have been handled. We had 1,300 people at the Chicago event and it was scary. I had mixed feelings about [charging] $100 per ticket, but I know the fans got their money's worth. It was a 6-hour event; we performed for two hours, and it was an intimate setting. The ticket price was an issue in the band, but we didn't want just anyone; for that kind of money we got the real diehards (laughs)! It was hard work for us, but it was a lot of fun and very rewarding for us and the fans. I think we proved that the '90s Kiss could really play, and could play songs from any era.

The convention tour was very successful, and I know some other bands that are interested in doing the same thing. They've contacted Gene and said "How the hell did you do this?"

VG: That tour begat the MTV Unplugged album. Did your equipment setup differ from the tour setup?

BK: When MTV came to hear us, they were impressed, but they wanted us to do it really unplugged, so I went through "guitar hell" over the Chet Atkins acoustic; it was a solidbody instrument and they didn't want me to use it. I was asking myself how I'd bend strings, play lead, tune down a half step, and manipulate an unwound G string on a typical Martin, a typical Takamine, or a typical whatever. I tried a lot of brands, but I couldn't keep them in tune and I didn't feel comfortable playing leads on them. I wound up using an Ovation, which wasn't my favorite-sounding guitar, but it was the most "friendly" for what I was doing. It didn't feed back, and I could rip all of the leads without it going out of tune. The neck was almost like a Charvel; the fretboard was a big piece of rosewood with big frets and fast action. The Ovation I used was great. I used a different SansAmp for the MTV concert as well; the one I used on the convention had some distortion capability, and MTV wouldn't have gone for that, either (laughs)! SansAmp is a great company.

The MTV Unplugged album is more extended that what was seen on the MTV special. It's an hour of music; 15 songs. There were some songs that we were kind of fooling around with that weren't included; for example, we did a country version of "God of Thunder" (chuckles). The band worked really hard while performing, then Ace and Peter came out and did "2000 Man" and "Beth," then all six of us did "Nothin' to Lose" and "Rock and Roll All Night." I'm really proud of it. There's also a longform video of it that will be available.

VG: Do you collect amps as well?

BK: I've got a lot of little "tweed guys" (chuckles). I had a great birthday last year; gene bought me a reissue Rickenbacker 12-String, and Paul got me a gorgeous '54 tweed Deluxe. I also have a lot of old stomp boxes; I love those things.

VG: Any guitars that you're still seeking?

BK: I've got a soft heart for Epiphone Casinos, but they're way overpriced. I like Rivieras as well, but they're hard to find. I just like a nice, clean, round neck.

VG: Do you think the necks on Epiphones are different from those on Gibsons made during the same time, like an ES-330?

BK: No, I've played some clean 330s, but I can't believe the sounds the Beatles got out of their Epiphones; twangy, weird stuff! But if I saw a clean 330 at the right price I'd get it; I'd want one with a stop tailpiece.

VG: Tell me about your new ESP signature model.

BK: I'd been an ESP endorser for some time, and when I finally started designing my own signature model, it took about a year to get it done. I grew up with an SG Special, so we knew that would be part of it's look, and I always loved B.C. Rich guitars; I always thought some of their late-'70s and early-'80s models were underrated. Matt Maciandaro, with ESP, is a terrific guy; he and I started looking at SGs and B.C. Riches in order to utilize all of the features I liked. The first prototype was a neck-through with great access, and two humbuckers. We've been working on a bolt-on model; I wanted something that would be less money, but that's going to be tricky. They should be in stores before the end of the year.

VG: Why double parallelogram markers?

BK: I always thought they looked sexy on 345s. But this guitar is "between a powerful SG and a powerful B.C. Rich," so I'm happy. After all the years of buying, selling and collecting, I'd better love something that I helped design!

VG: So your current activities seem like a bit of a paradox; you're introducing a loud solidbody electric guitar, while the band is releasing an acoustic album.

BK: But I still see that as a one-off for the band, even though it was "ground-breaking" for a lot of our fans, and we've got a new studio album coming out; I used my signature prototype on it. This band is constantly evolving. Some people only know of the band from the days when they wore makeup, or as a heavy metal band. But Kiss had a hit with a song called "Beth," they also had a disco hit, they had heavy metal hits, they had a hit in the '90s with "Forever." We can't be pinned down; we cant be "pigeonholed." No way.

As Kulick himself noted, guitar lovers shouldn't expect to see his collectable instruments on-stage at a Kiss concert. But his respect for classic guitars and his use of them in the studio is a surprising and admirable facet of his career. Stay tuned for further information.

Note: After this story ran in Vintage Guitar Magazine, a follow-up interview with Bruce was done. We will be bringing it to this the Virtual Studio very soon... keep watching!