Maps of Music

Destroyer (1976)

Where the lyrics of Destroyer take you, and where it was really made.

Producer Bob Ezrin rejected most of the songs the band brought in; only two heavily reworked tracks, "God of Thunder" and "Detroit Rock City", made it onto the record.

Key places

Basic tracks recorded at Electric Lady Studios (1975)

Recording site Electric Lady Studios — The first recording sessions for the album took place in New York City in September 1975, during a brief break between tours. Most of the sessions followed in January 1976. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Recorded and mixed at The Record Plant (1976)

Recording site The Record Plant — Discogs credits The Record Plant in New York City as the place where this release was recorded and mixed. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Destroyer: fourth studio album by American hard rock band Kiss
• Released March 15, 1976 by Casablanca Records in the US
• Third successive Kiss album to reach the US top 40
• First Kiss album to chart in Germany and New Zealand
• Platinum certification on November 11, 1976, the first platinum album for Kiss
• Marked a departure from the raw sound of the band's first three albums

Background

• Kiss's first three studio albums brought only modest commercial success
• Commercial breakthrough came with the 1975 concert album Alive!, the band's first gold album
• Alive! spent 110 weeks on the charts and also helped the cash-strapped label Casablanca Records
• New contract with Casablanca in late 1975, covering only two albums
• Rehearsals for Destroyer began in August 1975, during the supporting tour for Alive!

Recording

• Bob Ezrin, who had previously worked with Alice Cooper, was brought in to produce
• First sessions took place September 3–6, 1975 at Electric Lady Studios in New York City
• Most sessions took place in January 1976, after the Alive! tour ended
• Ezrin introduced sound effects, strings, screaming children, reversed drums and a children's choir
• First Kiss album to prominently feature outside musicians, including New York Philharmonic members
• Dick Wagner replaced Ace Frehley on "Sweet Pain" without credit

Cover

• Cover painted by fantasy artist Ken Kelly
• Front shows the band striding on a pile of rubble in a desolate city with burning buildings

Sources: en.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

• Rolling Stone cited "bloated ballads", "pedestrian drumming" and "lackluster performances" in its review
• Robert Christgau in The Village Voice called it Kiss's "least interesting record" and faulted producer Ezrin for adding "only bombast and melodrama"
• The band and Ezrin blamed fan backlash for sales falling short of expectations
• Ezrin said the "grassroots rock press" was particularly critical of the album

Reappraisal

• Kerrang! listed the album at No. 36 among the "100 Greatest Heavy Metal Albums of All Time" in 1989
• Rob Sheffield in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004) called it "the inevitable arty concept album"
• Greg Prato of AllMusic described it as "one of Kiss' most experimental studio albums, but also one of their strongest and most interesting."
• Pitchfork's Jason Josephes called it "easily one of the best albums in the Kiss canon"
• Martin Popoff called it a "success of early no-chops metal"
• Guitar World ranked it No. 60 on its 2006 list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Albums of All Time
• Rolling Stone ranked it No. 489 on its 2012 list of the 500 greatest albums of all time

Records

• Peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard 200 on May 15, 1976, then fell to No. 192 by August
• Certified gold on April 22, 1976, and platinum on November 11, 1976
• Re-certified double platinum on September 9, 2011
• Sold 726,000 copies in the US from 1991 to March 4, 2012, the band's best-selling album in the post-1991 Soundscan era

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• Ezrin rejected most of the band's demo material; only heavily reworked versions of "God of Thunder" and "Detroit Rock City" made the album.
• Ken Kelly's original cover was rejected by the record company as too violent, and it showed the members in Alive! costumes.
• Ezrin halted sessions to teach basic music theory, since none of the members were trained musicians.
• "Great Expectations" uses the first phrase of the main theme from Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 8 in C minor, but the songwriting credit goes to Simmons and Ezrin.
• "Beth" was deliberately placed on the B-side of "Detroit Rock City" to force radio stations to play it, and it became an unexpected hit that reignited album sales.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Maps of Ages ↗ (mapsofages.com)

Privacy · Contact