Kiss Releases Digital Avatars to Stay ‘Forever Young and Forever Iconic’

The members of the rock band Kiss ended the last show of their goodbye tour on Saturday with a big surprise: as they left the stage, each member was replaced by a digital avatar who sang “God Gave Rock ‘n’ Roll to You.” Michael Sun of the Guardian writes, “They used their encore to debut their afterlife.”




Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Eric Singer, and Tommy Thayer left the stage at Madison Square Garden to make room for four younger versions of themselves: Demon, the Starchild, Catman, and Spaceman. It had been four years since the start of the farewell tour and more than 20 years since their first farewell tour. “Holographic rapture,” as Fast Company’s Burt Helm calls it, makes Kiss the first American band to digitally remake itself.

The virtual performances, on the other hand, were not meant to be exact copies. A real “superhero version of the band,” according to Maria Sherman of the Associated Press (AP), the avatars seemed to have superpowers like wings and pink, crackling fingertips. They were incredibly tall compared to the crowd.




It’s not enough, even though what we’ve done is great. Stan says in a video, “The band should live on because the band is bigger than we are.” “It’s exciting for us to see Kiss enter the hall of fame.”

Using motion capture technology, Industrial Light & Magic (George Lucas’s special effects business) and Pophouse Entertainment, a Swedish media company, worked together to make the avatars. This wasn’t the first time these two companies worked together. They made the virtual “ABBA Voyage” show in London, which featured the band’s digital characters and brought in over $2 million a week.




 

Per Sundin, CEO of Pophouse Entertainment, tells the AP, “Kiss could have a concert in three cities on three different continents on the same night.” “You could use this for that.”
Fast Company says that Kiss “has long pushed the boundaries of technology and spectacle” with stunts like fire breathing, floating drum kits, and blood-spitting even in their early years. The band is the first in the US to adopt digital avatars.

“We can be forever young and forever iconic by taking us to places we’ve never dreamed of before,” Simmons says in the band’s video. Because of the new tech, Paul Stanley will be able to jump higher than ever before.

 




After Saturday’s surprise, it’s still not clear what will happen with the band. Sundin thinks about the chance of rock operas and musicals, but one thing is for sure: Kiss isn’t going anywhere. Simmons says, “If you think you’re going to get rid of us, I’m afraid that’s not going to happen.”

 

Stan says in the video that people sometimes ask him when the band is going to stop. What did he say? “We don’t own the band, so it will never stop.” The band is owned by its fans, not by the world.