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Those that know me well know that I and Jenda – my great friend from secondary school – are hard-core KISS fans for many years. I've been longing to see them live for 9 years since I started to listen them. Unfortunately it was just after their last concert in Czech Republic. For the whole time I was awaiting the moment they announce some tour in Europe cause I really didn't have money to see them in USA or Australia (although Alive IV Symphony in Melbourne must have been ultimate once-in-a-lifetime experience). This moment came in February and since then I was monitoring their site several times per day to find out more info about the tickets. Those of you who know something about them are aware of their 45-minutes-lasting Detroit Tiger Stadium (40,000 people) sale. I was very lucky to get 5 out of last 16 tickets to the mosh-pit in Prague's O2 Arena. Tickets for three concerts in Helsinki and Stockholm have all been sold in 7, 9 and 20 minutes (13000+13000+32500 tickets). :-)

Of course, it wouldn't be so great without make-up so we spent 2 hours near Wenceslas square preparing us ... and you can see the result here:

Long waiting in front of Arena and stage was worth it. Forerunners Cinder Road were ... well, not really bad, but nothing special and mainly people came there for different reason than listening such half rock—half boyband. After them an impressive huge canvas with KISS logo appeared in front of the stage which made the waiting really thrilling. Maybe it does not look such impressive at photos but when you stand in front of it, it's a very different feeling. After putting the hall into darkness and screaming well-known “All right Prague! You wanted the best, you got the best! The hottest band in the world! KISS!” followed something which cannot be confused with any other band. Piercing sound of electric guitars playing Deuce followed by burst of light, deafening fireworks and falling canvas with KISS logo to prepare audience for those guys descended to the stage on the elevator. Just say wow!

Photos from Melbourne 2004, just to give you the idea of how mighty the impression should be :-) even though in Prague, the fireworks were not so bombastic.

KISS Alive/35, Mannheim, Germany:

Get out, and get your grandma outta here...

For those you're not familiar with KISS so much ... it is not that kind of band which gets on stage, plays 15 songs, one bonus and lets you go home. If you wanna KISS and you listen only their music you get only half of it. It's mainly the great show which gets you to another world. World where you only have sex, drink cold gin and have rock'n'roll all night and party every day. You get simple, straightforward rock songs with catchy tunes supplemented by tons of pyrotechnics, petards, light effects, confetti, Gene Simmons' fire and blood spitting. Here are few my favourite quotes from Ace Frehley:

I asked my daughter when she was 16, What's the buzz on the street with the kids? She's going, to be honest, Dad, most of my friends aren't into KISS. But they've all been told that it's the greatest show on Earth.

I can't even read notes. But I can teach someone how to make a guitar smoke.

Whenever I start to really think about what I'm playing, I may play it better musically, but the feeling isn't there.

Got it? Put KISS Alive! to your CD player and turn it louder ... louder! It's my most favourite KISS album because of its beautifully raw sound, it's not too polished and I have great feeling from that music every time I listen to it. So I was very glad that on this tour most of the tracklist was made from Alive! – they only didn't play Watching You, Rock Bottom and Firehouse. After that, they continued with some famous newer hits: Lick It Up, I Was Made For Loving You (which sounded definitely much much better than that crappy disco-like Dynasty version), Shout It Out Loud, Love Gun – during which Paul flew to the center of the hall, I Love It Loud – sung by Gene standing on top of the stage after flying there. Of course, they couldn't skip guitar and drum solos of all members. Those guys were so full of energy that one wouldn't guess that they are in their fifties. The last one was Detroit Rock City with huge fireworks after which I was just standing there thinking about what has just happened.

Perhaps the only thing which surprised me in a bad way was the people which were quite static. I cannot say they were not moving and jumping at all, but I was expecting much more enthusiasm from people in the mosh pit. But speaking about the band, they did a great job. And a small comment – though I don't usually say such things about men, Eric Singer was really sexy as Catman. :-)

A great piece of news is that Paul Stanley told us he is looking forward to see us next year, so I hope that I will have another chance to see this rock circus.

If you want, you can also read Reverend's blogpost about this concert and see some other photos.

Here are few photos from this tour – they are made by Marcus Vegas at Riga, Latvia and distributed under terms of Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 license. Our photos can be found in photogallery.