Me, Inc. (21 page)

Although my contract stipulates I could have signed up to six additional bands, I decided to concentrate on less rather than more. There
are
new bands that have the goods. But it takes so much money and hard work to launch a single act that taking on too many new acts would undermine chances of success.

Simmons/Universal Records continues.

I was a fan of the comic book
Jon Sable
, by Mike Grell. The origin of the character had to do with a young boy who grew up in the wilds of Africa. His father, a big-game warden, and his family are killed by poachers and diamond hustlers. The little boy grows up without parents and moves to New York, where he hires his services as a big-game hunter in the concrete jungle.

I was able to get the rights to the comic book, and set it up with film company InterMedia. I got Steven de Souza (
Die Hard
) to write the script. We were going out to Pierce Brosnan to star, and then everything fell apart, as so often happened. That's why they call it development hell. Few projects ever make it to the screen.

In a strange twist of fate,
Jon Sable
resurfaced, this time as a TV series project. Director/writer Gary Sherman, who directed me in
Wanted Dead or Alive
, was to direct the
Jon Sable
TV series. And perhaps because we enjoyed working together on that movie, Sherman offered me the part of Sable. I flew out to Chicago and met my costar, a young model who was just getting started in her acting career: Rene Russo. We shot the pilot and . . . I was terrible. I simply didn't come off well. I was let go, and I went back on tour with the band.

Even with all the glitz and glam, even after KISS's rise to fame and fortune, I failed in the most rookie of ways. Over and over.

Incidentally, the
Jon Sable
TV series actually saw the light of day on ABC, but only lasted six episodes.

One day, when all the dust settles and I come up for air, I may revisit the Sable story.

Stay tuned.

Gene Simmons Tongue
magazine started as an idea I first dreamed up as a teenager. I had published fanzines devoted to sci-fi, fantasy, movies, comics, and the like:
Cosmos
,
Faun
,
Tinderbox
and others. I self-published, wrote, edited, and distributed them. Good experience for what was to come later. Sterling/Macfadden publishing had often put out KISS-related magazines, and they always did well. Head publisher Allen Tuller and I became friends and started talking about doing a magazine together.
Gene Simmons Tongue
would be a natural extension of my interests in pop culture and a celebration of life.

As I mentioned earlier, we lasted five issues. The magazine world was in turmoil at the time, and publishing in general was going head-to-head with the Internet. Newspapers and magazines were going out of business, left and right.

But I'm proud to say that during our run, I interviewed Hugh Hefner, who graciously allowed us to premiere our magazine with him on the cover, as well as Sir Richard Branson, Marvel's Avi Arad, Roseanne, Snoop Dogg, and many others.

Will we do it again?

Stay tuned.

As
Gene Simmons Tongue
magazine was coming to an end, I started doing research and found that the electronic gaming world is many times bigger than the film world. So much so, that Black Ops and Soldier of Fortune and Grand Theft Auto outgross the biggest movies. And each one of these games sells for about fifty dollars new. So I looked into either starting another magazine, or morphing
Gene Simmons Tongue
into a new mag. The result was the planned
Gene Simmons Game
magazine. I also trademarked it. There was a business plan drawn up and some articles written, but honestly, I became so busy with other things, and the magazine world was, again, a difficult place to find success. I had to put it to the side for another day.

When I have some time, I intend on revisiting
Gene Simmons Game
.

Meanwhile, my Simmons Comics Group banner has given birth to three titles that I created and trademarked:

Gene Simmons House of Horrors
^TM
, which is currently being developed by Georgeville/Reliance for a TV anthology series, with yours truly hosting. Eli Roth has been given an offer to be the show runner.

Zipper
^TM
is likewise being developed as a scripted TV show by Georgeville/Reliance.
Zipper
is the story of a stranger in a strange land, an alien with Shakespearean overtones.

Dominatrix
^TM
—surprisingly, no one had trademarked the title, so I did—has garnered the interest of filmmaker Marc Forster, who directed
World War Z
. We are currently developing it as a film.

I have high hopes for these ventures. By the time this book is published, perhaps I will have succeeded. Perhaps I will have failed, with one or all of them.

Welcome to life.

I'm also working on launching my own rock music festivals around the country. Everything takes time, and so will this.

Titans of Rock
^TM
(notice the trademark) almost launched when I was asked to headline the Rock and Roll All Stars tour of South America. But the people behind it decided to keep the All Stars name. Generic, I thought. But, onward.

I designed and trademarked both the logo and the name. You will see it happen. Soon. With luck, and work.

The reason I'm telling you all this is that you must understand how relentless you have to be. To be an entrepreneur, and simply to be alive—since life
is
business. You will not only fail, you will fail miserably. And you will fail again. And again. And again. If the laundry list of ventures above felt exhausting to you, that's because your ventures will be exhausting. You will want to get discouraged. You will have a string of failures so consistent that it will seem like the world is working against you.

This is normal. Pay it no mind.

The next venture, and the next, and the next, you must attack with the very same ferocity, the very same enthusiasm, and the very same delusional faith in yourself as you had when you began your very first. Never slow down, even for a moment. It only takes one success to make all the failures worthwhile.

Like I said above—stay tuned. All of these might fail. Or some of them might succeed. Or all of them might succeed. No matter what happens—I will continue pushing relentlessly. And so must you.

24

Investing

“Every day I get up and look through the
Forbes
list of the richest people in America. If I'm not there, I go to work.”

ROBERT ORBEN

comedy writer, author, magician, and speechwriter for President Gerald R. Ford

I
nvest in the stock market

Invest in your future.

Invest in yourself.

I always made sure I saved anywhere from 25 to 50 percent of every dollar I made. I still do.

Remember, we all have to pay taxes, so that whittles the amount we earn down by as much as half before you decide whether to spend or save your money.

Always live below your means.

I'm like you. I wasn't educated in these areas. And they never taught me any of this in public school.

When I was twelve, at my mother's urging I opened up my first savings account in a local bank. It was a good idea. Money I didn't have in my pocket would be money that I wouldn't spend, especially on things I really didn't need. Eventually, I noticed over time that I actually
made
a little bit of money in my account. It was called “interest.”

As I accumulated more money, I also saved more. I started learning about things like inflation. And how prices of everything seem to keep going up and up. Inflation means the decrease in the actual value of money. Simply put, ten cents no longer gets you into a movie theater. Nor will a dollar. It's now increasingly common to pay ten dollars or more for a movie ticket.

When you combine the fact that a dollar loses value every year and things cost more every year, it becomes clear that savings accounts in banks will only do so much for you. They simply don't earn enough interest to make up for the rise of the cost of things and the rate of inflation.

I had to learn about the stock market.

When I first started reading about it in newspapers and books, it seemed no different than learning Mandarin Chinese.

It was difficult to learn, but I had to do it.

If you've built up a decent amount of cash that you don't need to pay your bills with, you might consider investing in the stock market. Millions do.

Early on, I learned about spreading the risk, mutual funds, and the Dow Jones Industrials, aka “the Dow.” And penny stocks. And futures. And commodities.

You don't have to learn all of that, but it helps if you do.

So let's simplify.

You're twenty-five to thirty years old.

You've been able to save $40,000, after tax. I commend you. That means that you've already paid your tax. You've already paid your bills.

And remember, I'm a novice, just like you are. I am not a trained accountant or a financial or business adviser. These are just my opinions. I have to say that to minimize my legal risk. (I don't wanna get sued. Who does?)

You will need to keep some cash handy, in case there's an emergency (this is known as being somewhat “liquid”). After you pay your bills and your tax, keep 10 percent “play money.” But don't keep too much cash around. You will spend it.

You may decide to invest the rest of your money. If so, get some professional advice. Some investments may punish you if you take out the cash too early. You may have to wait a certain period until the investment “matures” in order to withdraw the cash. Which is good, because we are told that the longer you stay in the market, the better your chances of making money by investing.

Take the remaining money and invest in the stock market. Get a financial adviser, and ask about mutual funds.

Mutual funds sprinkle your dollars across a few different investments. In the game of roulette, they tell you not to bet all of your chips on one number. It's also known as not putting all of your eggs in one basket. The simple idea is that if something goes wrong with one investment—and it certainly can—you still have other investments that will hopefully make up for the loss and keep you in the profit margin.

Spreading the risk
means exactly that. Some of your investments will go up. Some will go down. Hopefully, the overall number will give you an increase—a profit—above the rate of inflation (that is, larger than the rate at which the dollar is losing value).

I've done well in the stock market. In fact, it has made me quite a bit of money.

In 2009, I was invited by the New York Stock Exchange to ring the bell at the start of the trading day. It was a proud moment. I never imagined that I would wind up there, let alone that I would be there by invitation. As it happens, the former head of the New York Stock Exchange was a classmate of mine in high school. And when I came down to the NYSE, the media was there. Photographers were there. And our TV show,
Gene Simmons Family Jewels
, filmed the event.

From my vantage point above the trading floor of the world's trading center, I was reminded that I came to America as a legal immigrant with my mother, and step by step, day after day, worked to get where I was. Tears almost rolled down my face, and I was grateful to America and its people for allowing me all of this. I was humbled.

I know—the big bad capitalist actually had an emotional connection to the money game. Strange, isn't it, since guys like me are always portrayed as the villain? That is because my preoccupation with money comes from somewhere real—it comes from buying my mother a house, making her comfortable. It comes from putting as large a wall as possible between myself, my children, and starvation. Doesn't sound quite like the evil CEOs you so often hear about, does it?

Around 2008, the marketplace was unhealthy. It was the beginning of a period of big plunges in the real estate market, with people and banks both getting hurt. The Dow (meaning the stock market) was right under 8,000 points then. That number was bad. It signaled a very bad time for the investment community, and a general lack of health in America's economy.

As I was leaving, I walked the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, and there were photographers and TV crews shooting there. One news outlet, Fox Business, asked me what my view was regarding our economy in general, and about the Dow being in the unhealthy neighborhood of 7,800.

My answer, in so many words, was this: I don't know about you, but I'm investing in America. I am taking all of the money that I stupidly waste throughout the year, and instead of throwing it away, I'm investing in the stock market. In biotech, in food, in McDonald's, in Coca-Cola. Take all your stupid money, and don't throw it away on needless things. Take it and invest in yourself—invest in America.

If you followed my point of view, and had a little gut instinct and luck, you would have
doubled
your investment in just a few years with picks of a few of the right stocks. Today, the Dow is over 17,000.