KISS to ‘rock forever’ as digital avatars
At their so-called ‘final show ever’ at Madison Square Garden, the glam rockers announced plans to tongue wag for eternity.
The so-called “final show ever” for glam rock band KISS at Madison Square Garden in New York City on Saturday night turned out to be just their last hurrah in the flesh.
During the encore of the ultimate date of their protracted End of the Road Tour, the current line-up — Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, Tommy Thayer, and Eric Singer — revealed their intentions to “rock forever” as digital avatars.
At 11pm, a super-powered digital version of the band appeared on the screen to perform ‘God Gave Rock’n’Roll to You.’
The avatars were created by the George Lucas special-effects company, Industrial Light & Magic, in partnership with the Swedish entertainment company Pophouse Entertainment Group, co-founded by ABBA’s Björn Ulvaeus — the two companies behind the “ABBA voyage” show in London.
In order to create their digital avatars, the band were hooked up to motion capture technology. “We can be forever young and forever iconic by taking us to places we’ve never dreamt of before,” bassist Gene Simmons said in the press release announcing the project.
“The technology is going to make Paul jump higher than he’s ever done before.”
Paul Stanley added: “What we’ve accomplished has been amazing, but it’s not enough. The band deserves to live on because the band is bigger than we are.”
The question of whether founding members Peter Criss and Ace Frehley will be included in the digital fold remains uncertain. Per Sundin, CEO of Pophouse Entertainment, indicated that the new technology would allow KISS to carry on for “eternity.”
He noted, “KISS could have a concert in three cities in the same night across three different continents. That’s what you could do with this.”
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