Sunday, June 23, 2013

Mini-concert review: Kiss Army, with the Tramps

Thursday, 20 August 2013 (Aggie Theatre, Ft. Collins CO)

Kiss Army is one of the most well known Kiss tribute bands out there. The crowd ranged from the Old Guard who remember the '76-'77 tour to younger fans ready to rock and roll all night (and party every day).

The Tramps


This mostly female local band (their drummer's a dude) normally plays under the name "La Cucarachas", but tonight they added a singer to open this show in the persona of a Cramps cover band.



The first half of the set showcased their original songs. They had a fun garage-punk energy, while their songs had a calculated shock value effect.


Their take on the Cramps evoked more of front-man Lux Interior than I would have expected.



There are three approaches for appreciating a tribute band:
  1. You can pretend that you're getting the original band experience.
  2. You can enjoy the band on their own merits and accept that it's not a real substitute.
  3. You can treat the experience as a campy send up of the classic band.
Kiss Army is best suited for the second response.


They did their best to create '70s era Kiss. They had the stage gestures and musical skills, but they couldn't bring the same gravitas to their performance.


"Ace" (Rob Evans) did the best job matching his real-life counterpart, with frontman Bryan Angel a close second as "The Starchild".


Both "Peter Criss" and "Gene Simmons" were talented players, but neither quite delivered the right physical presence (although "The Demon" did have some decent tongue moves).

More photos on my Flickr.

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