KISS producer Vini Poncia recently appeared as a guest on Artists on Record with Stefan Adika and revealed that Paul Stanley didn’t like most of Peter Criss‘ debut solo album.
Drummer Peter Criss released his self-titled debut solo studio album in 1978, along with the other band members who dropped solo albums in the same year. Criss wrote much of the material on the album during his tenure with his pre-KISS band, Lips. The drummer also covered Bobby Lewis’ ‘Tossin’ and Turnin” in the album. The record was produced by Vini Poncia, who has worked with many notable artists in his career.
The album marked Poncia’s first collaboration with any member of KISS. Later on, the band went on to work with the famous producer in their 1979 album ‘Dynasty’ and 1980 album, ‘Unmasked.’ Besides the production process, Poncia also co-wrote the band’s hit song, ‘I Was Made For Lovin’ You,‘ with Paul Stanley and Desmond Child. He also sang backup vocals on both albums.
During his recent appearance, Vini Poncia talked about how he got into working with KISS by producing Criss’ debut solo album. Then, the producer revealed that Paul Stanley and Peter Criss didn’t get along well personally, and Stanley also didn’t like the drummer’s solo album at the time. However, he still thought they could use a couple of songs in the next KISS album. Thus, they went into the studio and took some potential tracks from it, and one of them, ‘Dirty Living,’ appeared on the band’s ‘Dynasty’ album.
Vini Poncia speaking on Paul Stanley’s reaction to Peter Criss’ solo album:
“Peter’s solo album was my intro into the sweepstake of who’s going to produce the next KISS album. That was my entry. Paul said, ‘I will tell you the truth.’ He wasn’t really fond of Peter, to begin with. They weren’t bosom buddies for a long time. Paul said he didn’t really like most of the album, and he said he got to be honest with it, but I think he said maybe there were a couple of tracks on there or something, a couple of songs that could qualify for a KISS album then. We went in and did like three demos on potential songs for the ‘Dynasty’ album. One song called ‘Dirty Living’ ended up on the album.”
You can watch the entire conversation below.
