Song of the Day 5/3: Kiss, “Love Gun”

Apparently every American citizen is now required to voice a position on transgendered youth. Paul Stanley, lead singer and rhythm guitarist of glam rockers Kiss, went public the other day with his take — he thinks it’s a “sad and dangerous fad” — which brought him praise from conservatives and charges of laughable hypocrisy from everyone else.

You don’t have to be as old as I am to remember when Kiss was viewed as a sad and dangerous fad. They were just a New York bar band that elevated its pedestrian rock repertoire by wearing gobs of greasepaint and treating concertgoers to shock-rock antics pioneered years earlier by Alice Cooper, but they seemed like a sign of declining civilization at the time. Considering what happened to rock and roll post-Kiss, maybe those critics were right.

It’s ironic that Stanley would be the one to say this — glam rock was all about androgyny, after all, and Stanley played the glamourpuss opposite Gene Simmons’ macho posturing — but maybe it’s a common insecurity for aging glam rockers. Among those voicing support for Stanley was Dee Snider, frontman of Twisted Sister.

Stanley called “Love Gun,” the title track to the band’s 1977 LP, a quintessential Kiss song. I think its sophisticated approach to its subject might have been an inspiration for some of the songs in “Spinal Tap.”