Gene Simmons

Gene Klein is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, entrepreneur, actor, author and television personality. He is the bassist and co-lead singer of Kiss, the rock band he co-founded with lead singer and rhythm guitarist Paul Stanley in the early 1970s. Simmons has a baritone singing voice which contrasts with Paul Stanley and Peter Criss’ tenor voices.

About Gene Simmons in brief

Summary Gene SimmonsGene Klein (born August 25, 1949) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, entrepreneur, actor, author and television personality. He is the bassist and co-lead singer of Kiss, the rock band he co-founded with lead singer and rhythm guitarist Paul Stanley in the early 1970s. Simmons has a baritone singing voice which contrasts with Paul Stanley and Peter Criss’ tenor voices. He was born as Chaim Witz in Haifa, Israel to Jewish immigrants from Hungary. His mother, Florence Klein, was born in Jánd, Hungary, and survived internment in Nazi concentration camps. She and her brother, Larry Klein, were the only members of the family to survive the Holocaust. His father, Ferenc \”Feri\” Yehiel Witz, was a carpenter. Simmons spent his early childhood in Tirat Carmel, and was raised in a Jewish household. He practiced playing his guitar for hours on end. He has said that his family was \”dirt poor, scraping by on rationed bread and milk. At age seven, he began to pick wild fruit and sell it on roadsides together with a friend. At age nine, he briefly attended a Jewish religious school, Yeshiva Torah Vodaas, before transferring to a public school. He later attended Richmond College and Sullivan County Community College, both in New York. He chose a stage name in tribute to the rockabilly singer Jumpin’ Gene Simmons. Simmons became an extensive force behind what is now the Kiss merchandising franchise.

In 1983, when Kiss’ fame was waning, he came from the wing of his comic book character Black Bolt. The band played for its own fan conventions until his death in 1991. The new drummer for Kiss was Paul Caravello, who went by the stage name of Eric Carr, and played for Kiss from 1980 until the death of Paul Carr in 1995. The original Kiss drummer was voted out of the band in 1995, and a replacement was sought to fill his vacancy, the original drummer, Paul Criss, was sought out to fill the vacancy. At this time, Criss and Simmons also appeared on an unreleased album by Captain Sanity together with members from Criss’s previous band Chelsea. Simmons attended Sullivan County community College in Loch Sheldrake, New York, He joined a new band, Bullfrog Bheer, and the band recorded a demo, \”Leeta\”; this was later included on the Kiss box set. Simmons became involved with his first band, Lynx, then renamed the Missing Links, when he was a teenager. Eventually, he disbanded the band to form the Long Island Sounds, the name being a pun on Long Island Sound. While he played in these bands, he worked at odd jobs on the side to make more money, including trading used comic books. The Beatles had a significant influence on Simmons. He served as an assistant to an editor of the fashion magazine Vogue.