KISS Drummer Eric Singer - "I Don’t Feel Like Someone Handed Me A Winning Lottery Ticket"
March 22, 2010, 14 years ago
Billy Amendola recently interviewed KISS Drummer Eric Singer for Modern Drummer Magazine. An excerpt, detailing Eric's thoughts on KISS with and without makeup, reads as follows:
"To be honest, I like both. I look at them as two different animals. I’ll never forget the first time I did a gig with KISS in makeup. It was in 2001. The show was in Japan and Ace (Frehley, original guitarist) was still in the band, and it was surreal, like an out-of-body experience. I was like, 'I’m on stage with KISS, and I’m the drummer!' Mind you, I had already played in the band without the makeup, so I wasn’t like a star-struck fan. But we’d gotten to Japan late, so we never did a production rehearsal. I never had the makeup on, other than for a photo shoot, so when I walked out on stage with the makeup, that was for the first time! It was so trippy and a very cool situation. Be careful what you wish for, right? [laughs]Now, trust me, I don’t feel like someone handed me a winning lottery ticket either. In life you go through a lot of ups and downs. Sometimes learning how to survive is as important as learning to play. And I never had a drug or alcohol problem — I watched other people around me, and it taught me that wasn’t the path to go down. Life in general is about learning how to survive. Anyone in the arts can tell you it’s not easy. Unfortunately a lot of times you’re not going to be successful or you’re barely going to get by, but you live and learn. Maybe you’ll get a job behind the scenes and can still be in the business. The main thing is you have to persevere. If you want to be a musician you have to be smart enough to learn survival tactics and be business-minded so you can make a living. I don’t want to be a 'great' starving artist; that’s not attractive. Remember, I’ve been in and out of KISS three times in 18 years. So I’ve learned that nothing is forever. But anything is possible, and I feel very blessed."
To read the article in its entirety, click here.
