Ex-KISS Guitarist Says “Missed Opportunity” At Band’s Finale Was “Terrible”

KISS concluded their “End of the Road” world tour last December marking the end of the band as a touring entity — at least for the time being. KISS has had a few members come and go throughout the years, but outside of the original lineup perhaps no ex-KISS player has been more important that guitarist Bruce Kulick.

Kulick has consistently flown the flag for the non-makeup era of KISS, and he’s even guested with the band in recent years on the KISS Kruise. In a new interview with Chaoszine, Kulick talked about KISS’ final shows at Madison Square Garden, and he lamented the fact that the band missed an opportunity to properly celebrate their legacy.

“I got a sense that it wasn’t gonna happen for quite a while,” Kulick said about a possible guest spot on one of the final shows. “Because certainly if there was gonna be an invitation, you don’t do that the week of — you don’t. And that doesn’t even mean even if I lived there in New York — I don’t. And then when I would say to  Eric Singer — we always keep in touch — and I’d be, like, ‘All right, well, I guess I’ll see you when you get back.’ And he’d say, like, ‘Yeah, I should be home on…’ So he didn’t hint around, ‘Well…’”

“They missed a really huge opportunity,” Kulick continued. “I talked about it quite a bit In January when I finally came out to tell everyone I’m not in Grand Funk Railroad anymore, and here’s my take on what happened on that last KISS show, because I didn’t say nothing for about a month or so. And it’s not just about me — Eric Carr, mention Ace and Peter and (late KISS manager) Bill Aucoin. Come on. Terrible. They really missed making a better feel-good evening for everyone when it was much closer to every night before. And those who say, ‘Well, I saw you up on the screen.’ They’d been doing that for years where they’d have little things. So they didn’t feel it was important. I feel they missed an opportunity.”

He added: “I know they really respect everyone I just mentioned — it’s not that they don’t — but the fact that they didn’t understand that that’s what you’re celebrating along with, ‘Wow, this current band made it through all this. And look at us with the with the multimillion-dollar show. And now we’re going to show you the avatar.’ I think that that was a big part of them dropping the ball in looking at the past. I applaud them in thinking broad and big and future. Okay. Fine. I knew that they would never want to find, ‘Let’s start a TV show, find the best Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons.’ I knew they wouldn’t do that because there’s something, like, ‘Ewww’ — for them to be a part of that or judge that, it would be very awkward, but to take them and then make them avatars, it totally made sense to me that they did it. It was an extra ‘ouch’ for me when all of a sudden I saw some videos the next day of how they [ended the concert]. I mean, they said, ‘Good night. We are immortal.’ And then, all of a sudden, a lot of smoke and you don’t see anything. And then the screen opens. But what do you hear first? My guitar playing ‘God Gave Rock ‘N’ Roll To You’. My big appearance. But ‘God Gave Rock ‘N’ Roll’ was their choice, was the right song. I’m sure that was chosen probably in collaboration with the people who are helping make [the avatars]. So it wasn’t, like, ‘Oh, let’s do ‘Shout It Out Loud’.’ And especially that’s a song that they don’t generally do much; they’ve done it on occasions. So there you go. I’m a part of it. All the guitar parts are there, and I was, like, ‘Whoa, this is really weird.'”

Kulick’s full interview can be viewed below.