It Took Me A While, But I’m Finally Ready to ‘Lick It Up’ with KISS
My review of KISS’ ‘Lick It Up’ album from 1983
When I was a kid, roughly between the ages of 10–14, I was a big fan of KISS. It started for me shortly after the band released their album Destroyer in 1976. That one contained great classic songs like “Detroit Rock City,” “Shout It Out Loud,” “Flaming Youth,” and “Beth.”
I spent the next few years buying and absorbing KISS’ earlier albums, and also the remaining albums that they released in the 1970s: Rock And Roll Over (1976), Love Gun (1977), Alive II (1977), and Dynasty (1979.)
KISS was definitely one of my favorite bands — in the 1970s, that is.
The first album I had no interest in buying by them was Unmasked, which was released in 1980. Maybe it was because I had recently turned 14 and was just a few months away from starting high school. Maybe I felt like I was growing up and KISS was a part of my childhood. Regardless of why I felt the way I did, I didn’t buy the album and I pretty much stopped listening to KISS then.
I wasn’t the only one. Although Unmasked sold relatively well and reached gold status, it was the first album by the band to not achieve platinum status since Dressed to Kill, which was released in 1975.
KISS’ next two albums, Music from The Elder (1981) and Creatures of the Night (1982), also sold poorly and were considered to be commercial failures. However, things turned around in a big way for the band when they released the Lick It Up album on September 18, 1983.
The band had gone through some big changes in their lineup since the last album I bought from them, Dynasty, from 1979. Original members Gene Simmons (vocals and bass guitar) and Paul Stanley (vocals and rhythm guitar) were still with KISS, but Eric Carr had replaced original member Peter Criss (drums and vocals) after Dynasty. The other original member, Ace Frehley (lead guitar and vocals), was credited as a band member on the Creatures of the Night album in 1982, but he had left the band and didn’t play on it. Most of the lead guitar work on that album had been done by Vinnie Vincent, and he then became an official member of the band prior to the recording of Lick It Up.
Another major change for the band at that time was that Lick It Up was the first album KISS released after they stopped wearing their legendary stage makeup.
Since the public could now finally see what the band members really looked like, there was a renewed interest in KISS. Their music video for the title track from the album, “Lick It Up,” became a huge hit on MTV and other places that played music videos.
The song also saw great success on radio stations and it sold well as a single. This all helped to make Lick It Up become KISS’ most successful album since the previous decade.
I loved the song “Lick It Up” and I enjoyed the music video. I was very happy to see one of my former favorite bands achieving great success again.
However, I was 17 years old then and heavily into then-popular acts like Journey, Adam Ant, and Huey Lewis and The News. I may have been happy for KISS, but I’d moved on and didn’t care enough about their new music to buy it — or even go too far out of my way to listen to it. Other than the title track, I ignored KISS’ Lick It Up album and moved on with my life.
Flash forward to the Summer of 2022…
A friend and I were chatting about KISS in the middle of the summer and it inspired me to revisit the albums I loved by them from the 1970s. I spent a lot of time over the next month or so listening to and loving those old albums again. Around the same time, I started hearing the song “Lick It Up” frequently on the Hair Nation station on Sirius XM.
I re-fell in love with the song and it made me wonder if I’d been foolish to not listen to the Lick It Up album when it came out almost 39 years earlier. I headed to Spotify and then I finally heard the entire album for my first time.
After the first time I played it, I liked it a little more than I expected — but I didn’t love it. I initially thought that two or three songs on it were great, but I felt that most of the others were fair or just “sort of” good. Plus, there were one or two songs that…well, I thought that they sucked the first time I played them.
However, because some albums take a little while to grow on you, I always listen to albums at least three times before I make a final judgment on them. In the case of Lick It Up, each additional listen made a difference and I grew to appreciate the album more and more.
After my third listen, I was ready to write a review and classify the album as “good” by giving it 3 stars, but I got a little busy and didn’t write the review then. However, I continued to play the album several more times in the next few weeks — and my originally planned rating for it changed.
But before I go any further with that, here are some of my favorite songs from the album. “Lick It Up” is probably my favorite song from it, but I’ve grown to love these songs also:
Exciter
This is the opening track of the album and it kicks things off very nicely. Although it was co-written by lead guitarist Vinnie Vincent, the rocking guitar solo on the song was performed by legendary guitarist Rick Derringer. I’m not sure why he played on it rather than Vinnie, but he did an awesome job.
Gimme More
“Gimme More” rocks hard right from the opening notes and it doesn’t stop rocking until the very end. Lead singer Paul Stanley sounds especially great on it.
All Hell’s Breakin’ Lose
Even though it’s from the band’s official YouTube channel, the picture quality of the above music video isn’t very good. That’s okay. What matters the most here is the song itself, because it’s a great rocking tune!
If you’d rather not watch the video, here’s the song on Spotify:
A Million To One
This song is probably my favorite on the album next to “Lick It Up.” It rocks, but it’s a little on the slow side, so I suppose it would be considered “a power ballad.”
Whatever. I loved it the first time I heard it. It doesn’t matter what label anyone puts on it, it still rocks!
Fits Like A Glove
This is probably my favorite of the songs written and sung by Gene Simmons on the album. He sounds great here, as does Vinnie Vincent’s awesome guitar playing.
And On The 8th Day
This is my second favorite by Gene on the album. It’s the final song on Lick It Up and I think it was a fantastic choice as the closing number.
Here’s the complete album on Spotify:
This album very much surprised me. As I said above, my first thought after a few listens was that I was going to give it three stars. But then I listened to the album more — a lot more. I got hooked on it and it’s been the album I’ve listened to the most over the past few weeks.
I love it!
Out of 5 possible stars, I give it…drumroll, please…4 stars!
NOTE: Lick It Up is #42 on my list of ‘100 New-To-Me Albums in 2022.’ To see the complete list and learn more about this fun self-imposed challenge I’ve given myself, click below:
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