Me, Inc. (5 page)

I was not ready to start paying rent or to buy a car or for any of the other costs incurred when you go out on your own. I needed to finish my college education. So I decided to stay at home with my mother, who I'm glad to say was happy to have me. I also contributed to the household expenses.

Living at my mother's home while attending Richmond College wasn't easy. To get from my mother's home in Flushing, Queens, to Staten Island, I'd have to get up every morning at six, take the bus to the last stop at Main Street in Flushing, and then take the subway to the very last stop at the tip of Manhattan Island. From there I would have to catch the ferry, which would travel past the Statue of Liberty and finally arrive at Staten Island. The trip from home to campus took two hours each way. That's four hours of travel on every day I attended college.

That didn't leave me much time to get a part-time job, or for many other activities. I had already started playing in a band called Wicked Lester, with Paul Stanley and my junior high school friend Stephen Coronel (with whom I would write the songs “She” and “Goin' Blind”), but we were just getting started and had yet to make any money.

So I came up with a way to make money by buying and selling comic books. Since I knew the value of certain titles and dates, I put my old mimeograph machine to work and printed up a circular announcing that I would pay a dollar per pound for old comic books. The circular had my phone number on it, and I started getting calls immediately. Since I couldn't drive, Paul Stanley did me the favor of driving me around in his Mustang. We would pull up to a house, I would pay the owner in cash, and then walk away with stacks of old comic books.

It was a good business. If I paid ten dollars for ten pounds of comics, the chances were that one of those comic books, with the right title and the right date and the right quality, could fetch thousands of dollars. One of the finds that came from someone's attic was an old issue of
Action Comics
, the title that debuted Superman. It may have been number fifty-eight or so, but the condition was good. And that meant I could resell it to a collector or comic book store. I knew of a collector who owned his own store in Elmhurst, Queens, next to the high school I attended (Newtown High School), and after much haggling (and after he saw that I knew what it was worth), I sold it to him for around $800. This is the inferred fiduciary duty to myself that I mentioned, and will mention again—I knew what the book was worth because I did the research. Otherwise, he might have short-changed me—and it wouldn't be his responsibility to correct me. The onus was on me to make sure I knew the value of my merchandise.

In the fall of 1972, I began working at the Puerto Rican Interagency Council, a government-funded research and demonstration project. Its goal was to find out how government funding was being used to help Puerto Ricans in the northeastern United States. I ran the office, which was located on Lexington Avenue and East Ninety-Fifth Street in upper Manhattan, and I was the assistant to the two women who headed the project, Magdalena Miranda and Leticia Diaz. I had the keys, and I was responsible for opening the office, answering phones, typing missives, fixing the mimeo and Rexograph machines, whatever had to be done.

The report that we worked on was titled
Improved Services to Puerto Ricans in the Northeast USA and Puerto Rico
. I should know what the report was called, because I typed every single word of it. I still proudly have a copy. On the first page is the list of the people who participated in the project. All the way at the bottom of the list, there's my name, Gene Klein, as I was known at the time.

After my workday ended at the Puerto Rican Interagency Council, I would take the subway downtown to Fifth Avenue and Fourteenth Street to a deli, where I manned the checkout counter. I would work there until 10 or 11 p.m., for two dollars per hour. I could also eat as much as I wanted, and could even take out food with me.

Then, around 11 p.m., I would take the subway uptown a few blocks to 10 East Twenty-Third Street, where Paul Stanley and I were starting to rehearse with Wicked Lester. We'd play until one or two in the morning. It wasn't a particularly glamorous section of New York. And it's not much to look at now. But all we knew in 1972 was that there was a second-floor loft, with no windows and one door, and it was cheap. Paul and I arranged to rent the rehearsal loft for the grand sum of two hundred dollars a month. The elevator hardly ever worked and we were forced to climb the stairs and haul our amplifiers. But it's where the seeds of our success were sown. And we worked at it relentlessly.

Each night, after we'd finish rehearsing, I'd head out to my mother's new home in Bayside, Queens. Bayside was far from Manhattan and I would have to take the subway to the last stop in Queens, then hop on a bus and take that to the last stop in Flushing, which took an hour and twenty minutes. Eventually, I moved my bed and a TV set into our rehearsal space in Manhattan, aka “the Loft.” That way, we could rehearse as late as we wanted to and I could still be up at 7:30 a.m. and at work at the Puerto Rican Interagency Council by 8:45 a.m.

They say “never put all your eggs in one basket.” On Wall Street, they say “spread the risk.” It's kind of the same thing. And, though I wasn't trained in this area, I seemed instinctively to know certain precepts of good business practice. I wanted to try for a career in the music industry, otherwise known as forming a rock band. But there was no guarantee it would work. In fact, statistics should have been enough to tell me the cards were stacked against me. So I worked at two jobs at the same time I was trying to put together the band. I worked at the Puerto Rican InterAgency Council, as assistant to the Director. And then after 5:00 p.m., I would take the New York subway system down to Fourteenth Street and work at a delicatessen, as the checkout person (the person you paid, before you left). I also was allowed to eat there and take food with me, as well as being paid. By the time KISS started, I had amassed $23,000, because though I wanted to pursue a passion, I refused to gamble with my livelihood. The gamble would have paid off, as it turns out—I would soon have to quit my various jobs, because our new band would start taking up more of my time. Within a year and a half, we would be playing Anaheim Stadium in California. But that doesn't mean it would have been wise to put all my hopes in one area, sink or swim. The lesson I learned while working two additional jobs alongside the band was one I would implement later, even after the band—and it was a lesson that would save me, time and time again. Spread the risk. Play to win.

6

Who Am I?

“Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't, you're right!”

HENRY FORD

industrialist, founder of the Ford Motor Company, and developer of the modern assembly line

I
invented myself.

At birth, I was given the name Chaim Witz. Witz (pronounced
Vitz
) was my father's last name.

To most Americans, my given first name, Chaim, sounds like a cat coughing up a hairball. That's because the Hebrew guttural “ch” sound (probably the most common sound in the Hebrew language) is unknown in English and in most Romance/Latin-derived languages—except perhaps German, which has its own, slightly less guttural “ch” sound.

At any rate, it didn't take me long after our arrival in America to realize that my Hebrew name simply didn't work here. No one knew how to spell or pronounce it, for the same reason that people in Western society also have a hard time spelling or pronouncing the name of the Jewish holiday Chanukah, the Festival of Lights.

So, I decided to
change my name
.

That's right.

Just like that.

If I ask you what your name is, chances are you'll tell me. But I'm here to tell you it's not
your
name. You had nothing to do with choosing it. It was likely chosen for you before you were even born.

I decided I would have my own name. One that I would give myself.

Few things in life are choices. You can't pick where you're from. You can't pick the color of your skin. You can't pick if you're born male or female. So I decided that I would reinvent myself and I started with choosing my own name.

I picked Gene, probably because of Gene Barry, the 1950s and '60s actor who starred on TV in
Bat Masterson
and
Burke's Law
and in the sci-fi movie
War of the Worlds
. I thought Gene Barry was cool, so I became Gene.

When my mother divorced my father, she went back to her maiden name, Klein, in keeping with Jewish tradition. So when I left yeshiva and entered public school in the fifth grade, I became Gene Klein. I no longer needed to keep spelling or pronouncing my name whenever I introduced myself. My new name made me feel less like an outsider, less foreign.

However, while I liked the sound of Gene Klein a lot more than the sound of Chaim Witz, it still didn't resonate all the way for me.

I was Gene Klein from grade five through college graduation, up until the time I met Paul Stanley in 1972. Paul also had a different name at the time, and he changed it to Paul Stanley. Smart.

When it looked like I was going to be in a rock band, it became crystal clear to me that Jewish-sounding names simply didn't resonate for the masses in America, or in the rest of the world for that matter.

I'm not here to say whether it's right or wrong, or whether it shouldn't matter what your name sounds like or if it's easy to spell. But it
does
matter, whether you like it or not.

I didn't take it personally. I recognized the facts. I realized that Robert Zimmerman had turned himself into Bob Dylan. That Marc Bolan from T. Rex had been born Mark Feld. And that Leslie West from Mountain had originally been known as Leslie Weinstein. They all reinvented themselves, changing their names, and their images along the way.

It was clear I needed to finish creating myself. Honestly, I can't remember where the name Simmons came from but it sounded American to me, and I wanted to
be American
.

So, in 1971, I became Gene Simmons. I remember it clearly. After a night of rehearsing with our new band, Paul and I were riding the subway back to our homes in Queens. (Neither of us could afford our own homes at the time; Paul lived with his parents and I lived with my mother.) It was past midnight and I remember telling Paul that I was going to change my name to Gene Simmons.

And just like that, I reinvented myself.

I also didn't look like I was in a rock band. Rock bands looked like they came from England, and were mostly white. I'm not here to give you the socioeconomic reasons; I'm just telling you that that's the way it was. And that's the way it still is, for the most part. In life and in business, it's always important to recognize what the predominant pattern is. That's just good market research. Remember, we're not just talking about recording artists; I'm talking about
rock stars
.

In the modern rock era (from 1962 onward), the vast majority of rock stars were young and white. There were virtually no African-American rock stars. There are barely any still, depending on how you define “rock star.” One of the few exceptions was Jimi Hendrix, although it bears noting both his bandmates were white and British.

There were never any Asian rock stars with the same worldwide appeal—not from India, Japan, China, or anywhere in Asia. There were never any Hasidic rock stars. And aside from perhaps Janis Joplin, there were never female rock stars of the magnitude of the Beatles and Elvis.

The few Jewish rock stars there were changed their names and/or downplayed the fact that they were born Jewish. They understood the masses didn't care, and that waving the Jewish flag was a turnoff. The masses just wanted
rock stars
.

We're talking
rock
here, mind you. Not pop or disco or new wave or any other form of music. R-O-C-K.

You needed to be a band. You needed to write songs and play your own instruments. You needed to have guitars, bass, and drums. And you needed to be young, white (there, I said it) men. I'm not here to make a value judgment on this fact—it might be a terrible result of whitewashing media, or some awful, unfair acts of subtle racism in pop culture. Whatever the cause—I wanted to succeed. If they wouldn't bow to me as I was, I would become something else. I would beat them at their own game.

R&B, meanwhile, was black. The Temptations, the O'Jays, and many others, all gloriously black.

The Beatles, the Stones, Led Zeppelin, and the rest of the rock stars at the time were all young white males and had a certain aesthetic. I didn't have that look. I wasn't quite “white.” Not in the way the Brits were. So I did the best with what I had. I grew my hair. I learned to straighten it and blow-dry it, and used lots of hair spray. I still do. I started wearing loud clothes and taught myself how to write songs and how to play guitar and bass.

In 2012 Jimmy Page had come to check out KISS when we played London, England. And a year or so afterward, I had to be in New York on business. Jimmy, who happened to be in New York and was ever the gentleman, came over to say hello. The man who single-handedly came up with more classic riffs than all the other bands combined. The Riff Meister of them all.

I didn't know anything about marketing, and had never heard the term. But I instinctively knew what worked and what didn't work, without asking others. Either you do market research, or you have a gut instinct. I had, and continue to have, “gut instinct.” My gut has served me well and has made me a good living.

Rock stars didn't just
look
like rock stars. Their names
sounded
like rock stars. Mick. Jimi. Yeah, “that rocks.” There was something intangibly cool about those names.