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Artist News Awards
Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame justifies Kiss induction technicalities
By Chris Cooke | Published on Friday 21 March 2014
Ah, the politics of celebrating bands of old with all those line-up changes to navigate. After Chad Channing expressed his disappointment in not actually being inducted into the US Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame alongside the band he drummed for in their earliest incarnation, Nirvana, who will be honoured by the American institution this year, now a spokesman for the awards initiative has had to defend the specifics of the Kiss induction.
The celebration of Kiss at next month’s Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame induction show has already caused a mini-controversy, after founder but former members of the band complained that the current line-up of the outfit planned to perform at the event, even though it is the original set up being celebrated.
The founder members still in the band, Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley, subsequently announced that they had decided not to play at all at the show, because of the tensions around which line-up should take to the stage. Meanwhile fellow founders Ace Frehley and Peter Criss will also be inducted into the Hall Of Fame, but current members Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer, who have been in the group way longer overall, will not.
Defending the decision to only induct the original line-up, Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame Foundation CEO Joel Peresman has told Billboard: “With Kiss there wasn’t one person here who didn’t agree that the reason Kiss was nominated and is being inducted was because of what was established in the 70s with Ace and Peter with Paul and Gene. That’s what put them on that map… It’s not like they [Singer and Thayer] created these other characters with different make up and playing different songs. They took the persona of characters that were created by Ace and Peter”.
So, that’s that. Lord knows what they’re going to do when they inevitably induct the Sugababes in twelve years’ time.
