Kiss – Sonic Boom – 2009
Sonic Boom is the Nineteenth Kiss album. With that said, I had a decent grasp of Kiss up until around Lick It Up in 1983. While I did acquire Animalize and Asylum, along with the Crazy Crazy Nights single at the time, I never really got into these albums. In recent years. I’ve started working my way through the albums chronologically and have written a bit about the first five at least. The musical quality varies. As it naturally does with any band. Here, however, they have managed to find a truly successful collection of songs. They strongly evoke the sweetness of the seventies. If it weren’t for the significantly improved production, this could very well have been an album that emerged during the band’s early years.
At the same time, Sonic Boom doesn’t sound outdated or out of touch in any way. But rather fresh and with newfound energy. Even if the album may have been made somewhat routinely, it doesn’t show in the overall result. The songwriting process, of course, must largely be attributed to Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons. But Tommy Thayer, who now adopts Ace Frehley’s old makeup as the “Spaceman,” contributes on a couple of occasions. All members, however, are included as backing vocalists. Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer each handle one song. Gene and Paul take care of the rest, just like in the good old days. It’s crowd-pleasing music, and it immediately resonates with the listener—existing fans of the band are likely not to be disappointed!
Getting all at once
There is, of course, a risk of quickly getting tired of music that is so immediate. It’s like getting everything all at once, with no specific nuances that gradually emerge. However, I haven’t experienced that so far. The nuance lies instead between the material primarily coming from Paul Stanley and that from Gene Simmons. The fact that Simmons’s songs are somewhat “harder” is not a surprise; it has always been that way to some extent if one looks at the matter somewhat generally. Choosing favorites is certainly no easy task. But I believe Simmons’s songs might endure slightly longer in a broader perspective and might, to some extent, be compared to the band’s early ’80s production, such as Creatures of the Night.
However, all of this is essentially speculation since we don’t know how things will unfold in the future. It’s perhaps better to base opinions on what we know and feel now, and what is known is that this is a really good record with a collection of catchy melodies dressed in arrangements that truly suit the band. As mentioned, there are no direct surprises, but perhaps that’s how it should be with a band like Kiss, right?
