KISS guitarist Tommy Thayer recently spoke to VW Music and talked about his new album with Black ‘N Blue frontman Jaime St. James. Also, he revealed whether the band’s bassist Gene Simmons produced this record by telling a story of the musician’s contribution to them.
Two high school friends, Thayer and St. James, founded Black ‘N Blue in 1981, but their original name was Movie Star for a while. The heavy metal band drew significant attention from metalheads and critics with unique sounds and well-written lyrics. The band released many hit records, and Simmons produced two of them, ‘Nasty Nasty’ and ‘In Heat,’ before he and Stanley recruited Thayer as KISS’ new lead guitarist.
Therefore, the two musicians have known each other for a long time and have had a deep connection. It’s not surprising that Simmons decided to support these talented young artists by financially supporting five songs’ recordings. Years later, Thayer and Simmons talked about this situation, and the bassist showed his kindness and respect to the band and guitarist by giving the songs to them for free.
However, they didn’t share those gifts from Simmons with the fans until today. Thayer and St. James wanted to drop those unreleased tracks from Black ‘N Blue, created during the ’80s. ‘The Lost Tapes’ will be available on June 3, 2022, but in CD format only, so the longtime Black ‘N Blue fans can get more details about it on the same day. Thayer unveiled that Simmons didn’t produce this time following the reporter’s question, but he had already supported enough.
Thayer said in his interview that:
“No, there wasn’t a producer; if anyone, it was Pat Regan. Interesting story, though. Back then, Gene had paid for the recordings of the five songs with the idea that he might shop them or be involved label-wise. Years later, we were talking about it, and he said, ‘You guys can have the recordings back; they’re yours, free.'”
You can listen to the albums that Simmons produced below.
