And Party Every Day: The Inside Story of Casablanca Records by Larry Harris, Curt Gooch, Jeff Suhs Page B
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sold enough product to make us comfortable with the arrangement. This eventually became a point of contention, as George would claim that he was owed royalties—he seemed to have forgotten about the tour advances.
To look at Parliament and their absurd stage show—which eventually came to include an enormous UFO called the Mothership (which would land onstage in a billowing cloud of dry-ice fog), and a giant skull with a glowing four-foot doobie dangling from its mouth—you would think there would be a never-ending series of strange Parliament tales to tell. But, to be truthful, the band was really fun to work with, and aside from a few battles of the kind that typically occur between artists and their record companies, everything went well between us. In fact, I believe that we were the only people who were able to understand and put up with some of their shenanigans—and they with ours.
6 Kiss∼Off, America!
Eddie’s idea—Scott’s bigger idea—The biggest mall in the
world—Two sloppy seconds—Roy’s—Getting fucked by
Warner—The Hudson Brothers—Ira’s offer—A huge
strikeout—Three’s a crowd—A divorce—Neil’s new place—
Guns and the panic button
April 22, 1974
2836 Lambert Drive
Hollywood, California
Late one night in April 1974, I received a call from Eddie Pugh. Eddie was Warner’s Florida promotion man, and for him to ring me at home at such a late hour was a real surprise. I was half asleep when he called, and he was talking so fast that he was ten seconds into his story before I could figure out what he was talking about. I pieced together something about a progressive rock station in Fort Lauderdale (WSHE) that on April 20 had held a kissing contest in which the couple who kissed the longest won some prizes, including a few KISS albums. The response to the contest had been great, and Eddie wanted to bring it to our attention. I was elated to hear the news, seeing the potential for a national marketing blitz.
I cannot overemphasize how vital it was to our early success to have relationships with people like Eddie—people who not only had the acumen to recognize a good thing when they saw it but also the generosity to bring it to our attention. Eddie Pugh was different from most promotion people, even within Warner Brothers. Warner had very little black product in the mid-1970s, and Eddie, who was black, was the kind of promotion man who was always looking for a challenge, so rather than stay within the narrow confines of Warner’s small R&B catalog, he would promote whatever he had, regardless of its genre. Here was a guy who covered all the bases. Neil and I were so impressed by Eddie that we eventually hired him.
As soon I said goodbye to Eddie, I called Neil. By the next morning, he had a plan. We would arrange for radio stations throughout the country to compete in a huge national Kiss-Off. Eddie had not been the only one to notice the success of the WSHE contest. Scott Shannon, a DJ at WMAK in Nashville, had the inspired idea for KISS to record a cover of Bobby Rydell’s “Kissin’ Time” as part of the promotion. Neil loved it. KISS hated the thought, however. They and their producers, Kenny Kerner and Richie Wise, were dead set against it; they didn’t want to record a cover song when they were perfectly capable of writing their own material. Neil always tried to be positive—positive people were successful people, as far as he was concerned—but if he couldn’t get his way through ebullient enthusiasm, he had no problem rolling up his sleeves and wrestling you to the ground. After his cajoling had failed (and, I’ll admit, KISS doing Bobby Rydell struck me as pretty odd, but I wasn’t about to tell Neil that), he told them, “Look, either you record the song or we’ll pull our support for you.”
It was pure bluff. KISS was our first signing, and, frankly, they were the only thing we had going for us. Neil would never have purposefully killed their
To look at Parliament and their absurd stage show—which eventually came to include an enormous UFO called the Mothership (which would land onstage in a billowing cloud of dry-ice fog), and a giant skull with a glowing four-foot doobie dangling from its mouth—you would think there would be a never-ending series of strange Parliament tales to tell. But, to be truthful, the band was really fun to work with, and aside from a few battles of the kind that typically occur between artists and their record companies, everything went well between us. In fact, I believe that we were the only people who were able to understand and put up with some of their shenanigans—and they with ours.
6 Kiss∼Off, America!
Eddie’s idea—Scott’s bigger idea—The biggest mall in the
world—Two sloppy seconds—Roy’s—Getting fucked by
Warner—The Hudson Brothers—Ira’s offer—A huge
strikeout—Three’s a crowd—A divorce—Neil’s new place—
Guns and the panic button
April 22, 1974
2836 Lambert Drive
Hollywood, California
Late one night in April 1974, I received a call from Eddie Pugh. Eddie was Warner’s Florida promotion man, and for him to ring me at home at such a late hour was a real surprise. I was half asleep when he called, and he was talking so fast that he was ten seconds into his story before I could figure out what he was talking about. I pieced together something about a progressive rock station in Fort Lauderdale (WSHE) that on April 20 had held a kissing contest in which the couple who kissed the longest won some prizes, including a few KISS albums. The response to the contest had been great, and Eddie wanted to bring it to our attention. I was elated to hear the news, seeing the potential for a national marketing blitz.
I cannot overemphasize how vital it was to our early success to have relationships with people like Eddie—people who not only had the acumen to recognize a good thing when they saw it but also the generosity to bring it to our attention. Eddie Pugh was different from most promotion people, even within Warner Brothers. Warner had very little black product in the mid-1970s, and Eddie, who was black, was the kind of promotion man who was always looking for a challenge, so rather than stay within the narrow confines of Warner’s small R&B catalog, he would promote whatever he had, regardless of its genre. Here was a guy who covered all the bases. Neil and I were so impressed by Eddie that we eventually hired him.
As soon I said goodbye to Eddie, I called Neil. By the next morning, he had a plan. We would arrange for radio stations throughout the country to compete in a huge national Kiss-Off. Eddie had not been the only one to notice the success of the WSHE contest. Scott Shannon, a DJ at WMAK in Nashville, had the inspired idea for KISS to record a cover of Bobby Rydell’s “Kissin’ Time” as part of the promotion. Neil loved it. KISS hated the thought, however. They and their producers, Kenny Kerner and Richie Wise, were dead set against it; they didn’t want to record a cover song when they were perfectly capable of writing their own material. Neil always tried to be positive—positive people were successful people, as far as he was concerned—but if he couldn’t get his way through ebullient enthusiasm, he had no problem rolling up his sleeves and wrestling you to the ground. After his cajoling had failed (and, I’ll admit, KISS doing Bobby Rydell struck me as pretty odd, but I wasn’t about to tell Neil that), he told them, “Look, either you record the song or we’ll pull our support for you.”
It was pure bluff. KISS was our first signing, and, frankly, they were the only thing we had going for us. Neil would never have purposefully killed their
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