KISS’ Paul Stanley gives a sneak peek into the band’s digital future: Listen

KISS has spent the better part of its five-decade career disguising its faces in makeup. Now, as the band plans the next phase of its music and iconic personas, KISS continues to leave fans with mystery and intrigue.

After the peak of The End of the Road Tour In December, KISS started the year by selling its name and likeness and plans to live forever in the digital world. Details are scarce, but the band has said that the virtual performance should kick off in 2027 in Las Vegas. Speaking to Billboard‘S Behind the setlist podcast, frontman Paul Stanley won’t say exactly how the group will carry its legacy into the future. But in typical KISS fashion, Stanley has ambitious goals.

“It’s a must-see, go-to experience,” Stanley boasts. “It’s beyond anything anyone else has ever considered.”

Virtual performers aren’t new: A hologram of Tupac Shakur appeared at Coachella in 2012, and avatars have resurrected deceased musicians like Ronnie James Duo and Whitney Houston for live performances. Those earlier examples of digital likeness pale in comparison to Abba Voyage, an expensive, mixed-virtual-reality live music concert in London that has received rave reviews.

In April, KISS sold its name and likeness rights to Pophouse, the Swedish company that helped build Abba Voyage, centered around virtual versions of Abba’s four members who looked decades younger. While those first few generations of avatars wowed audiences, KISS isn’t content to simply copy the models that came before, Stanley says.

“We’re creating something that’s not a concert,” he explains. “The idea of ​​a hologram — and it’s not a hologram, but that term seems to be used a lot — but the idea of ​​a simulated concert is not what we want to do. I would find that boring, to be honest.”

Like Abba Voyage, which takes place in the purpose-built 3,000-capacity ABBA Arena in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, the KISS experience requires a special venue built around the technology, Stanley says. Las Vegas is full of venues, from Sphere to T-Mobile Arena to countless theaters hosting long-term residencies (Bruno Mars at Park MGM, for example). Stanley is tight-lipped about the location, but says Billboard The end product will be more advanced than Abba Voyage.

“Now, remember, the Abba show is an older technology, because technology moves forward exponentially,” Stanley says. “So when that show came out, there was new technology.” For that reason, he adds, KISS will be working with Industrial Light & Magic, the visual effects company founded by filmmaker George Lucas that has produced special effects for the Star Wars, Terminator and Jurassic Park franchises.

KISS fans got a taste of the plans in December when the band unveiled digital images shown during the final End of the Road concert and released a two-minute sizzle reel, KISS: A New Era Begins, which shows the band using motion-capture technology to create their digital likenesses. Stanley emphasizes that the final product will be much more advanced.

“That was just an early — I don’t want to say rendering — but an early version of what’s coming and is still being worked on,” Stanley says. “But it doesn’t look much like what was there. What we showed was just the start of the idea that we can go beyond flesh and blood.”

As for Stanley, he expects to be busy outside of preparing for the Las Vegas show. Stanley fronts a retro-soul band, Paul Stanley’s Soul Station, which plays original and classic soul songs and has released an album, Now and thenin 2021. He has built a successful career as a painter. Asked if he will release another solo album, after his eponymous album from 1978 and Live to win from 2006 — Stanley keeps his fans in suspense.

“We’ll see,” he says. “I’m not done with music, that’s for sure. I’ve become more judicious in what I do, picking and choosing, because as you get older, you see more and more that everything you do takes you away from something else. And at some point it really comes down to picking and choosing what you do in relation to what you’re not allowed to do. So yeah, I mean, I’m definitely going to make more music. Music is a big part of who I am.”

Listen to the full interview with Paul Stanley via the Spotify player below, or head to Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, iHeart or Everand.