Download festival: Kiss close with spectacular heavy metal onyesha but where was Crazy, Crazy Nights? 

Download festival: Kiss close with spectacular heavy metal show but where was Crazy, Crazy Nights?

The rockers headlined the final night of the rock and metal weekender

If any band was ever going to blast the mud off the crowd’s wellies after three damp and boggy days at Download, it was festival closers Kiss. Bursting out with Detroit Rock City and enough pyro to crack the tribute makeup off the front row, this was never going to anything less than a full-on stomping rock spectacle.

Add in confetti bombs, flame throwers, blood spitting, tongue waggling and a bonfire night’s worth of fireworks to finish, and the self-proclaimed hottest band in the world were literally setting the Download stage on fire.

An hour earlier, Motley Crue had gamely battled through a sound more squelchy than the campsite loos, but Kiss reaped the spoils of the headlining slot. Crowd-pleasing classics like Shout It Out Loud, Creatures Of The Night and Rock ‘n Roll All Nite were served up via clean, crisp speakers turned all the way up to 11.

In short, all the ingredients were there for a trip to heavy metal heaven. But while this was certainly a Kiss with tongues, it felt like a Kiss without quite enough feeling or imagination.

Before anyone starts harrumphing about ‘haters’ - and there are plenty when it comes to Kiss - I speak as a long-term fan who’s seen the band many times over the past three decades, makeup on, makeup off (them, not me) and always come away feeling like I’d been at an awesome party.

This time though? It felt too much like the same overly-70s-skewed show they’ve performed for best part of a decade, with a hefty chunk of their best songs left off the invite list.

The staging I’m not quibbling with; it must be pretty hard to flog "levitating drum kit; slightly worn" on eBay. And personally I’m still rather charmed by Stanley’s endless cajoling for love and adoration, even if a couple of my fellow gig goers considered it "a bit needy".

No, it’s the set list that desperately needs a freshen up. Would it really be so terrible to include a smattering of feel-good highlights from the non-makeup era, much of which has actually aged beautifully?

You really would have to be an insufferable nitpicker to complain that the likes of Unholy or Heaven’s On Fire should never be sung through grease-painted lips. And besides, one of the best moments of the Download set, Lick It Up, belongs to the unmasked days.

Who knows: perhaps Stanley and Simmons themselves are embarrassed about their fresh-faced work or unwilling to be reminded of the career slump the tail end of it (unfairly) represented? But surely some of the well-worn, more overblown 70s numbers (Black Diamond, I am looking at you) could be jettisoned for a riotous blast of Crazy, Crazy Nights or some much-needed emotion and change of pace with Forever?

Note to Kiss: look how Download erupted when Motley closed with Home Sweet Home.

Of course, their Download finale had more than its share of moments. You would have to be a miserable old grunger not to enjoy Stanley swooping over the crowd, Go Ape-style, to belt out Love Gun, and stompers like I Love It Loud, Deuce and I Was Made For Lovin’ You will always have a place in any Kiss set.

But as with any long-term relationship, things simply need spicing up from time to time. And just as Kiss in the 90s so desperately needed their 70s makeup back, Kiss in 2015 would do well to take another look at their clean-faced back catalogue and inject a bit of tongue-in-somebody-else’s-cheek fun back into their show.

Because it would unspeakably sad to think I’d just had my last ever Kiss.

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