READER’S DIGESTI know where I’ve been and I
certainly know where I want to go.
Having that clarity means you’re less
stressed and more confident, which
helps a lot in life....SMALL, SKINNY ENGLISH
PEOPLE WITH FUNNY HAIRCUTS
CHANGED MY LIFE. When The
Beatles first appeared on the Ed
Sullivan Show in 1964, I’d never
encountered anything like it. The
only British voices I’d heard were the
posh ones Nazis had in black and
white war films. When George spoke
in a Scouse accent, I was transfixed.
Even before I knew how to play an
instrument, I started singing in
bands. For at least a year,
I went around with a fake
accent, trying to persuade
chicks I was English....MOVING FROM OFFICE
JUNIOR TO ROCK STAR.
After school, while I was
getting bands together,
I worked as an assistant at
Vogue: a Man Friday who did
everything the editor wanted
me to do. The entire floor was
covered with females. That
didn’t hurt. The male of the
species has the primordial
urge to merge.
But by 1973, Kiss had
formed after Paul Stanley [the
band’s guitarist and other lead
singer] and I had been a bandcalled Wicked Lester. Kiss’s first
records weren’t big successes to begin
with, but we were much more of a live
band, and started selling 10,000-seat
arenas very quickly.
We opened for a lot of British
groups, such as Manfred Mann and
Argent. But they would kick us off
tours—for the simple reason that we
blew them off the stage. We just let it
all hang out. It was like scream
therapy, this safe place where you
could be your goddamn self....A TRIP TO WOOLWORTHS
CREATED OUR IMAGE. In early
1973, we were rehearsing in a
cockroach-infested loft in New York.Gene with Brooke
Shields, 1979© ZUMA/SHUTTERSTOCK