Maps of Music

Carnival of Souls: The Final Sessions (1997)

Where the lyrics of Carnival of Souls: The Final Sessions take you, and where it was really made.

Recorded in 1995 and early 1996, this Kiss album was shelved for the original lineup's reunion and only reached release in 1997 after bootleg copies spread among fans.

Key places

Recording begins at Music Grinder in Hollywood (1995)

Recording site Serenity West Recording — Recording started in November 1995 at Music Grinder studios in Hollywood, and mixing was planned to finish in January 1996. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Carnival of Souls: The Final Sessions is the seventeenth studio album by American rock band Kiss.
• Released in 1997; recorded between late 1995 and early 1996.
• Final album with lead guitarist Bruce Kulick, and with drummer Eric Singer until 2009's Sonic Boom.
• Moves away from the classic hard rock style toward a dark, dense, grunge-oriented sound.
• Last album of the band's unmasked era.
• No supporting tour was held for this album.

Background

• Kiss cancelled the release after committing to a reunion tour with the original lineup.
• Bootleg copies circulated among fans, which led the band to release the material officially in 1997.
• Revenge (1992), the album before this one, was Eric Singer's debut with the band.
• At 60 minutes and 11 seconds, it is the band's longest album.

Recording

• Recording began in November 1995 at Music Grinder studios in Hollywood.
• Toby Wright co-produced, engineered and mixed the album.
• Bruce Kulick played bass on several tracks in place of Gene Simmons.
• Mixing was scheduled to finish in January 1996, when the reunion plan was disclosed to Singer and Kulick.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · es.wikipedia.org

Tracklist

Sources: musicbrainz.org

Artist

Formation

• Kiss was formed in New York City in 1973 by Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley and Peter Criss.
• The band traces its roots to Wicked Lester, a New York rock band led by Simmons and Stanley.
• Their first performance took place on January 30, 1973, at the Popcorn Club (later Coventry) in Queens.
• Casablanca Records signed the band on November 1, 1973, as the label's first act.

Members

• The four original members were Stanley (Starchild), Simmons (Demon), Frehley (Spaceman) and Criss (Catman).
• Eric Carr replaced Criss in 1980; Vinnie Vincent, Mark St. John and Bruce Kulick later held lead guitar.
• Tommy Thayer and Eric Singer formed the final lineup.

Career

• Kiss became one of America's most successful rock bands in the late 1970s, with a 1977 Gallup poll naming them the most popular band in America.
• The band unmasked in 1983 and reunited the original lineup for the 1996 reunion tour.
• The band announced its retirement after its final show at Madison Square Garden on December 2, 2023.
• Kiss was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 10, 2014.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Reception

At release

• Allmusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine said the album should have stayed unreleased.
• Erlewine found no standout songs and described the sound as canned, forced and overproduced.
• Chuck Klosterman of Grantland said the album has no memorable anthems or melodies.
• Rustyn Rose of Examiner ranked it as the band's second-worst work.
• Critical reception was mostly negative.

Reappraisal

• Mike McPadden of VH1 placed it sixth on a list of the worst albums by top heavy metal bands.
• Ultimate Classic Rock ranked it twentieth among the band's albums.
• It is often considered one of Kiss's worst works.

Records

• Reached No. 27 on the US Billboard 200 chart.
• Its only single, Jungle, reached No. 8 on the US Mainstream Rock chart.
• The album never earned a RIAA certification, one of the few band albums without one.
• Around 175,000 copies had sold in the United States by 2007.
• Did not enter the UK Albums Chart, the first time since Love Gun (1977) that the band missed it.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · es.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• No music video was made for the single Jungle, which later won a 1997 Metal Edge Readers' Choice Award for Song of the Year.
• Bruce Kulick provides his first and only lead vocal with the band on I Walk Alone.
• Two former members of the band Black 'N Blue co-wrote songs: Jaime St. James on In My Head, and Tommy Thayer on Childhood's End.
• Producer Toby Wright had produced Alice in Chains' self-titled LP, and the band members listened to Alice in Chains, Soundgarden and Stone Temple Pilots.
• According to Kulick, the bootleg versions in circulation lacked songs that were part of the official release.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · es.wikipedia.org

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