Kiss' "The Elder" reimagined as a hard-rock epic

Kiss’ ambitious concept album, Music from The Elder, fell flat on its face. It was the first album the band released that didn’t go gold, and it was widely derided as a detour that marked the low point in their career.

The next full album they released, by contrast, has been hailed as one of their best. Following The Elder, Creatures of the Night was seen as a return to form and then some: the hard rock album Ace Frehley had argued they should make before he left the band in frustration over The Elder as he sought to forge a solo career.

Unfortunately, Creatures was largely ignored by the record-buying public, who thought Kiss had jumped the shark with The Elder (if not before) and had moved on. So, although Creatures fared slightly better, neither record was anything like the success the band had enjoyed in the 1970s.

But maybe they could have been, if...

An alternate history

Bear with me here, because this might sound bizarre on the face of it, but what if Kiss had combined the two albums into a single project?

The Elder was supposed to be Kiss’ answer to The Who’s Tommy and Pink Floyd’s The Wall. It was supposed to be epic, but it simply wasn’t. It was supposed to be a movie soundtrack, the way Tommy turned out to be, but the movie never got made. It could have been a double album, like The Wall, but it wasn’t. It was just a single disc.

Kiss has, on occasion, put out albums with a lot of filler, Hot in the Shade and a couple of the solo projects being prime examples. But Creatures is loaded with good material, and much of what’s on The Elder is underrated.

Could they have fit together?

I think the answer is yes.

Kiss' concept album "Music from the Elder" was never epic enough and it flopped so badly that its stellar follow-up, "Creatures of the Night," wasn't the hit it should have been. But what if they had combined the two? Here's what it might have looked like, and it's pretty awesome.

The concept behind The Elder is fairly simple: A mysterious unseen council recruits a boy to become a hero and restore the balance between light and darkness. He goes off on a quest, does battle with the forces of evil, and proves himself. It’s your basic coming-of-age, good-vs.-evil fantasy theme.

Now, Creatures of the Night is pretty dark (just look at the title), so a lot of its material fits well into the dark side of the light-vs.-darkness theme — which, coincidentally, is one place The Elder is lacking. “War Machine,” for instance, is a heck of a lot more menacing (and a lot better song) than “Mr. Blackwell.”

The narrative of The Elder is loose as it is, so it isn’t difficult to reimagine the project with much of Creatures woven in. Many of Creatures’ cuts, like “Danger,” “War Machine,” and “Rock and Roll Hell” would fit very well into the middle section, where the boy hero is doing battle with the forces of evil.

A couple of cuts from Killers, released within the same year time frame, fit pretty well, too. “Nowhere to Run” and “Escape from the Island,” for example, share the same theme of trying to get away. Putting these projects together also allows us to dispense with some of the weaker cuts from The Elder, namely “The Odyssey,” “Under the Rose,” and “Mr. Blackwell.”

As the boy matures, we can even add a hint of romance near the end with “I Still Love You,” and “I’m a Legend Tonight” (which takes on a double meaning as the boy becomes both a man and a hero).

How it might have Sounded

Here’s how I’d set up the track list for a hypothetical double album:

Disc One - Side One

1.   Creatures of the Night (Creatures) — Leading off with a strong Paul Stanley rocker is always a good idea, as “Detroit Rock City,” “I Stole Your Love,” and “Psycho Circus” all demonstrate. Plus, putting “Creatures” front and center introduces the conflict of the narrative right up front. These creatures represent the forces of darkness that will need to be overcome.

2.   Fanfare/Just a Boy (The Elder) — The original first cut off The Elder, these two cuts introduce the boy hero. They’ve taken a lot of flak from those who don’t like their softer sound, but this wasn’t the first time Kiss had changed things up with something more melodic, and it sets the stage for the epic story to come.

3.   Only You (The Elder) — As on The Elder, this one comes next. It identifies the boy as the only one who can complete the quest ahead.

4.   I Still Love You (Creatures) — The boy and his young love part ways, as she refuses to accept his decision to embark on the quest, and he realizes what he’s sacrificing. In his despair, he laments. “Now people tell me I should win at any cost, but now I see as the smoke clears away, the battle has been lost.” Yet the battle lies ahead.

Disc One - Side Two

5.   Dark Light (The Elder) — Ace’s contribution creates a sense of looming darkness.

6.   Danger (Creatures) — The darkness grows into an imminent threat.

7.    War Machine (Creatures) — The danger is manifest in the form of an actual nemesis, an archvillain who epitomizes war and destruction. One of Gene Simmons’ best cuts, period, and the one that fits his persona as well as any this side of “God of Thunder.”

8.    Keep Me Comin’ (Creatures) — The darkness is shown to be both relentless and seductive.

9.   Nowhere to Run (Killers) — This cut from Killers makes it plain that there’s no escape.

Disc Two - Side One

10.   A World Without Heroes (The Elder) — The boy has apparently been vanquished, leaving a world without heroes.

11.   The Oath (The Elder) — But he’s not vanquished, and vows to persevere.

12.   Escape From the Island (The Elder) — Ace’s instrumental: The boy makes a break for it, fleeing his island prison.

13.   Rock and Roll Hell (Creatures) — “He’s on the run, won’t stand for second place.” The boy breaks free entirely.

14.   Saint and Sinner (Creatures) — The boy sheds the last of the darkness power’s seductive grasp in this cut from Creatures, which makes the good-and-evil dichotomy as plain as anything on The Elder. He tells his adversary to go to hell and declares he’s not gonna fall on his knees: No, not at all.

Disc Two - Side Two

15. I Love it Loud (Creatures) — The boy unleashes all his newfound power against his enemy. 

16.  Sword and Stone (Demo) — This was recorded a few years later, but it fit so well with the theme I couldn’t ignore it. It never appeared on any album, but it deserved to be on one, so why not here? The hero is reunited with his young love, and together, they are invincible.

17.   I’m a Legend Tonight (Killers) — The boy’s triumph coincides with the return of his young love, now realized.

18. It’s My Life (Creatures demo) — This was ultimately left off of Creatures, but it deserves to have been included. Here, the boy celebrates his victory and declares his independence from the Elder’s guidance.

19.   I (The Elder) — The finale to The Elder, a tribute to the poise and confidence that brought the boy his ultimate victory. It’s an underrated anthem that stands up well alongside classics like “Rock and Roll All Nite,” and “Shout it Out Loud.”

What should the album be called? Music from the Elder never really worked without a movie to go with it, but Creatures of the Night was always a great title, so I’d probably go with that.

Stephen H. Provost is the author of Pop Goes the Metal, a history of pop, glam, and hair metal from its roots in the late 1960s through its heyday in the 1980s and beyond. It’s available on Amazon. For more alternative Kiss history, check out my post Alternative Kiss history: 1978-1981.