ALIVE!
Alive! is the first live album, and fourth overall, by American hard rock band Kiss. It is considered to be their breakthrough and a landmark for live albums. Released on September 10, 1975, the double-disc set contains live versions of selected tracks from their first three studio albums, Kiss, Hotter Than Hell and Dressed to Kill. It was recorded from concerts in Detroit, Michigan; Cleveland, Ohio; Wildwood, New Jersey; and Davenport, Iowa. (More from Wikipedia)
For me, most heavy metal bands sound pretty much the same; I say that not with any sort of snooty, snobby air at all but instead with a wistful sort of desire – had I been 13 or 14 years old when heavy metal was at its peak, I would have lapped it up like manna. As it is, I was well into high school when the earliest heavy metal albums like the first albums by Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple came out; and I had already graduated from college when the first KISS album was released. I like a lot of the best heavy metal – Led Zep is so good that I hardly even think of them as a heavy metal band. I played that first KISS live album, Alive! a lot when it first came out for instance; and Shades of Deep Purple has been a long-time favorite. I might have had a completely different sensibility about me had I grown up a few years later.
(December 2012)
