KISS frontman Paul Stanley has spoken to Steve Appleford from Rolling Stone on the North American street date of their long-awaited new album, Monster. Here are a few excerpts from the chat:

Rolling Stone: What was your plan for Monster?

Stanley: "I wanted to make an album that really harkened back to why I got into this in the first place. I was lucky enough as a kid to spend most of my weekends at the Fillmore East. On a great night, that was like a Holy Roller evangelical church. When rock n' roll is done with that fervor, it's close to gospel. That's what I wanted to go for with this album – passion as opposed to perfection. JAMES BROWN wasn't perfect. Motown, THE BEATLES, THE STONES, ZEPPELIN, early ELVIS – I wanted to maintain the essence of it, getting a first, second or, if you really had to push it, a third take and record on analog tape and capture the intensity of what you're doing, and not compromise it."

Rolling Stone: KISS has been pretty active on the road for years, but only recently have you been back in the mode of recording new music. What changed?

Stanley: "The stability of the band. We've been together long enough that it seemed a shame not to take advantage of what we were doing as a live band and transferring that to the studio. The band's just great at this point. Psycho Circus, which was the last album (in 1998, with the reunited original band) prior to Sonic Boom, was such a debacle and such a nightmare – in essence you had two guys in the studio trying to make a KISS album while talking to two other guys' lawyers. And those lawyers didn't play well. After that album, I was torn between never going into the studio again and having to go in the studio again."

Rolling Stone: Do you have contact now with original members Peter Criss or Ace Frehley?

Stanley: "No. It's not out of animosity. It just has no point in my life today. Safe to say, the band wouldn't be here without those guys having been in it. The band also wouldn't be here today if those guys were still in it. I respect and love what we created together, but that was a long time ago."

Read more at Rolling Stone.

Check out a BraveWords.com review of Monster at this location.