<\/p>\n
It would be a stretch to say that any member of KISS had a massively successful solo career, either while a member of the band or after leaving its ranks. However, guitarist Ace Frehley easily could be called the greatest success story that came from the greasepaint. Knowing the right musicians and songwriters to work with, along with having the skills on the guitar (and being more than just passable as a vocalist), he might not have been topping the charts with his solo efforts, but he certainly got the proper attention for some of his work.<\/p>\n
Take, for example, Frehley\u2019s Comet<\/i>, Frehley\u2019s first solo outing since the infamous 1978 solo efforts from all four members of Kiss. Did it top the Billboard<\/i> charts? No, but it did hit the top 50, which was impressive enough for someone who had been out of the spotlight for several years. With a solid backing band and powerful tracks, this disc showed just how much Frehley brought to the plate in KISS\u2014and how he possibly had been underused.<\/p>\n
From the opening march of \u201cRock Soldiers,\u201d Frehley puts everything on the line\u2014including exposing some skeletons in his own personal closet. What is noticeable about his guitar work is that it\u2019s fairly restrained; he\u2019s not out to be the guitar god \u201cspaceman,\u201d but rather a functioning part of a whole band. This isn\u2019t to say he didn\u2019t do this in Kiss, just that it carries a little more weight when it has his name on the dust jacket.<\/p>\n
Trading vocals with Tod Howarth turns out to be a smart move, as \u201cBreakout,\u201d \u201cSomething Moved\u201d and \u201cCalling To You\u201d seem to fit his singing style better than if Frehley had tried to adjust his. However, this doesn\u2019t mean Frehley is a slouch at vocals. Tracks like \u201cStranger In A Strange Land,\u201d \u201cDolls\u201d and the cover of Russ Ballard\u2019s \u201cInto The Night\u201d prove his singing had only gotten better with the passage of time. (I actually played \u201cNew York Groove\u201d from his solo KISS album as I was writing this\u2014and, yep, major improvement.)<\/p>\n
Not everything on Frehley\u2019s Comet<\/i> works perfectly. \u201cDolls\u201d was a bit creepy when it came out in 1987, and definitely suggest he wasn\u2019t singing about no Cabbage Patch Kids. \u201cWe Got Your Rock\u201d isn\u2019t terrible, but doesn\u2019t live up to the higher standards of tracks like \u201cRock Soldiers\u201d or \u201cInto The Night,\u201d though it\u2019s still listenable, even with lines like \u201cYou’ve got a backstage pass \/ And a nice little ass.\u201d<\/p>\n
The showpiece of the album is the closing track, \u201cFractured Too.\u201d An instrumental that builds off \u201cFractured Mirror\u201d from his KISS solo album, this is simply four minutes 15 seconds of musical perfection. While the guitar work is rightfully center stage on this one, the rest of the band\u2019s contributions certainly help to create the aural magic. This is one I find myself going back to again and again, and even after 35 years, it hasn\u2019t gotten old.<\/p>\n
Frehley\u2019s Comet<\/i> was a statement back in 1987 that Frehley was still a force to be reckoned with in the music industry, and remains one of the most powerful offerings he\u2019s presented in his career. If you can only own one disc of his solo works, this is undoubtedly the one to have.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34998,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7463],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-46870","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-ace-frehley","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46870"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46870\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46870"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}