Every so often denizens of the “record reviewing community” toss out the term “cock rock” to generically refer to some sort of easily dismissed, riff heavy, usually seventies in origin, rawk. It’s becoming one of those widely encompassing terms used, often lazily, to quickly categorize something and move on (see “post punk”, “prog rock”, “alternative” etc.). What I’m getting at is that I have no idea what exactly cock rock is. Are the New York Dolls cock rock? It would seem so, though I’ve never heard them referred to as such. What about the Grand Funk? Whaaa – ya kiddin? Even if I cannot define cock rock, there is one and only one record I’m sure falls into the category, and that is Kiss® Alive. This ain’t no blooze, it ain’t no boogie, it’s just straight ahead juvenile riffing with juvenile lyrics – and that’s why it deserves a spin. The whole Kiss® thing begins and ends here. This is all you need. Is it really live? Of course not – overdubs are everywhere – but the handful of great Kiss® songs are mostly here (see Kiss® Alive II for the remainder, and for similar reasons as with this one), and with better production and a more organic playing style than the somewhat stilted versions on the earlier studio albums. If it wasn’t for this record Kiss® almost certainly would have faded away and would now be filed away in the collective memory somewhere between Rose Tattoo and Krokus. Thanks to the success of Kiss® Alive there exists fortysomething more mostly horrible Kiss® albums, as well as the Gene Simmons marketing empire churning out such pop culture kitsch as Kiss® Axe Guitars, Kiss® Condoms, Kiss® Caskets, and Kiss® Comic Books printed in Real Kiss® Blood. Furthermore, the world would have been deprived of that wonderful bit smarmy satisfaction one felt in hearing Simmons tell NPR host Terry Gross that she was too uptight and a night of good lovin’ from him was what she needed to get herself calmed down. To review the record song by song would be pointless. They’re all variations of the same thing, and you’ll either love ‘em or hate ‘em collectively. To be sure such Kiss® hits as “Deuce”, “Strutter”, “Black Diamond” and “Rock and Roll All Night” are present and accounted for. Cock rock? I still don’t know what it is for sure, but if it does exist then this is it.

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