Customer Reviews

Alive 2 (Mlps)

5 star:		(48)
4 star:		(30)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

KISS ALIVE II! Need I say more? I was 8 years old when I first saw and heard this album. Up until this time I was being raised on the likes of Ernest Tubb, John Denver, Waylon Jennings and such. Then one day I walked into my grandmothers house and heard my uncle listening to something extremely loud! I asked what it was and he showed me the album ALIVE II. That did it! Today it is by far the loudest recorded live album I have ever heard. KISS was way before their time. From the opening explosions of "Detroit Rock City" to the screaming chant of "we want kiss" following "Shout It Out Loud", this album is still rocking heavy almost 25 yrs later! Check out Ace Freyleys intro to "King Of The Nightime World", his guitar sounds like a screaming siren not to mention the rest of his blistering fingerwork! I have owned this recording on 8track, vinyl, cassette, and currently Cd. This is music worth listening to over and over and it still rates and sounds fresh with todays heavy new artist. If you have a chance to catch KISS live I promise you it will be a show that you never forget! If you don't see them live, this record is the next best thing. One listen to this and I think you will agree why KISS is called "The hottest band in the world!" Crank this one!

That growling intro to this legendary, kick-a$$ CD says it all! This is probably the ultimate live rock-n-roll CD as far as I'm concerned. While it's questionable just how "live" this CD really is, there's no question that it just plain ROCKS! Not only does it contain live versions of most of the classic tunes from the Destroyer, Rock & Roll Over & Love Gun CDs, but it also features 5 great studio tracks that are only available on Alive II! I could go on forever about this CD, but you really have to hear it (& CRANK IT) to understand how awesome this collection is. If the music itself does grab you, check your pulse while you're thumbing through the color 18-page booklet that comes inside the case.

Nearly as potent as Kiss-'Alive'(see my review).With a total of twenty songs and a duration of 71 minutes,I simply cannot believe that any label would reissue this 1977 live hard rock classic on a 2-CD set.I mean,come on.Seventy-one minutes can EASILY be put on one disc.Alright,enough whining.'Kiss II' is still well worthy of frequent spins in your CD player,stereo,boom box,etc.The tracks that are more than certain to bring back memories of classic Kiss are the heavy-hitting opener "Detroit Rock City","Ladies Room"(I've always liked this tune),"Love Gun"(should never be played without Ace),"Calling Dr.Love",their timeless ballad "Beth","God of Thunder","Shout It Out Loud" and "Rockin' In The USA".Also,check out the band's Instant Live CD's they make available to all concert-goers at their shows.Those are pretty good as well.Kiss is STILL Kiss

KISS' eighth album Alive II was released in November of 1977 in time for the Christmas sale that year.
The album was recorded over three nights at the LA Forum in Los Angeles in August of 1977.
The songs that were live were pretty much most of the album (save "Hard Luck Woman" and "Tomorrow and Tonight" which were recorded in the studio with crowd noises and there were some edits on the live tracks and overdubs). They attempted those aforementioned songs live but didn't work during rehearsals. However, "Detroit Rock City", "King of the Night Time World" (the former are rumored from the KISS live shows in Japan from 1977), "Ladies Room", "Makin Love", "Love Gun", "Calling Dr Love", "Christine Sixteen", "Shock Me (with a slightly edited Ace Frehley guitar solo)", "I Stole Your Love", "Beth" (rumored to be from Japan 1977), "God of Thunder" (with edited Peter Criss drum solo), "I Want You" and "Shout it Out Loud" surpass their studio counterparts.
KISS felt that repeating songs from 1975's Alive! album would have been useless (though I do like later live versions from the 1977 tour of "Firehouse", "Black Diamond" and "Rock and Roll All Night") so the band decided to record five new tracks at a theater with a mobile truck without an audience. With Ace Frehley gone AWOL (he does play guitar and bass and sing on his composition, the killer rocker "Rocket Ride"), rhythm guitarist/singer Paul Stanley, bass player/singer Gene Simmons and drummer Peter Criss went and recorded four new tracks (with Bob Kulick doing lead guitar to mimic Ace's playing on the first of the three new tracks) which were Paul's rocker "All American Man" and two Gene rockers out of "Rockin in the USA" and "Larger Than Life". There's also a cover of Dave Clark Five's "Any Way You Want It" recorded as a five piece.
When the album was released, it went Double Platinum and hit #6 on the Billboard Top 200 and was the second Top 10 album for KISS in 1977, the year they were kings of American rock. I first got this cassette in June of 1988 when my older sister gave it to me. Then, eventually got on CD then bought the digitally remastered edition which comes with the book and tattoos that were on the original album and the sound is superb 30 years on!
Highly recommended!

The only reason this CD doesn't get a 5 star rating from me is that the last 5 songs were done in a studio. They are great songs, but they could have put them on another album and used some of their other live works to fill up the last side of the album. This CD features live versions of songs from Destroyer, Love Gun, and Rock And Roll Over. It has the mega hit "Detroit Rock City", and their Top Ten Hit "Beth". Beth and Hard Luck Woman are the only slow songs of the CD, the rest are hard hitting Rock-N-Roll. Kiss has won countless awards for best live show and once you hear this CD, you'll understand why. Also, check out any live videos of them on tour and you'll know why they are so hot. They have a huge following around the world and thousands of fan clubs. The album was recorded live in Los Angeles at the Forum before thousands of screaming fans. They heard Ace's screaming guitar on King of the Night Time World and on Shock Me, a song written about when Ace was literally electrocuted on stage. They witnessed Peter Criss' sounding like an approaching train on the song God Of Thunder and seen all the fire and explosions of the Greatest Metal Band of all time. No other band in history is as easily recognized as KISS. I've seen them perform in 79 84 and 96 and hope to see them in Oct. 2000, and let me say that no one puts on a better show than them.This is Rock music pure and simple.

KISS' first live album, "Alive!" was a fluke...nobody expected it to perform as it did, and that album basically started KISS on thier meteoric rise in fame amd world-reknown. "Alive!" was really just a live set of thier first three studio albums, all that they had released up to that point in thier career. KISS tried to duplicate that formula for "Alive II", and released a set of live performances of thier following three studio albums: "Destroyer", "Rock and Roll Over", and "Love Gun".
Many things conspired to prevent this album from turning out as awesome as the first live album: This was the era when wireless guitars and amps were just becoming practical for concert use, and KISS was one of the early-adopters of the technology for obvious reasons. Unfortunately, this also imparted a rather trebly, tinny sound to the recording which dramatically reduced the bombast and thrust of the music. Compounding this was the venue where it was recorded: The LA Ampi-theatre, a large outdoor complex, which made the acoustics something less than favorable for a professional recording.
For the first live album, many of the studio songs were lengthened with longer intros, longer guitar solos, and in the case of a couple of tunes, an additional, second guitar solo. This enabled the meager amount of songs to nicelty fill up 4 album sides of the first release, a double album.
For "Alive II", the songs were played with no 'extras', so they were all realatively short. Even the 'long' drum solo in "God of Thunder" was miniscule as compared to the drum solo on "Alive!" Consequently, there was not enough material to fill up four sides of a double album by using tunes only from the last three studio releases. KISS even went so far as the record three songs 'live' that they did not actually play during that 3-night concert: "King of the Nightime World","Hard Luck Woman" and "Tomorrow and Tonight" were all recorded 'live' during the day-time soundcheck before that night's actual concert, and the crowd noise was edited into the tracks for the album.
The fourth 'studio' side was a harbinger of things to come. Not one of the studio songs on the album contained all the members of KISS playing on the same track. These were more like preliminary efforts made for thier up-coming individual solo albums.
Whereas the first live album, "Alive!", definitely improves on nearly every studio version of the songs they played, "Alive II" almost universally presented inferior versions of every song. The fact that KISS' production values made a vast improvement in studio recordings from thier first three studio albums to thier second set of three studio albums has a lot to do with that.
Nevertheless, "Alive II" is not the phnomenon that "Alive!" was (and still is!)
To make it clear, "Alive II' is a good album when compared to most other typical albums of the era (especially the average 'live' album), but "Alive II" has the unfortunate disadvantage of always being directly compared to "Alive!"...a comparison that very few albums could ever hope to end up favorably.

KISS is back for Alive II, I would say that alomost every song on here is worth a KISS fan's time. Alive II is made in 1978 which is after Love Gun AND Destroyer, two of KISS' most classic albums. Most of the songs had a lot of energy but a few were not as much effort. I love the way it starts. Paul has so much energy in Detroit Rock City. The one thing I still don't get is why the record people made this a duel disc when each disc is only 39 minutes, which means both could fit onto one disc. There are a few problems with it, but not enough to make you even care. This CD is a KISS fan's dream; most of KISS' hits with a great effort.

The classic "Kiss Alive" LP came out after Kiss' third studio album had been released in 1975, and three more albums later it was time for yet another live album - right in time for the Christmas shopping.

"Alive II" contains fiery live renditions of songs like "Detroit Rock City", "Calling Dr Love", and the heavy metal stomper "God Of Thunder", and Peter Criss performs his classic ballad "Beth" accompanied by a taped backing orchestra, to the delight of a very audible female part of the audience.
A rip-roaring "Shout It Out Loud" is perhaps the best song of the lot, but it gets stiff competition from the anthemic "Love Gun", the melodic "Hard Luck Woman", and Gene Simmons' dirty fantasy "Christine Sixteen". Kiss had an incredible knack for writing big riffs and even bigger hooks, and they don't get any bigger than on this album.
The last five tracks are studio recordings; they originally took up the fourth side of the original double-LP format. There are no real classics, but they're certainly worth a listen...Gene Simmons provides the gritty riff-rocker "Larger Than Life", which deserves better than total obscurity. "All-American Man" and "Any Way You Want It" are pure bubblegum pop, "Rockin' In The USA" is a pleasant trifle, and Frehley's staccato "Rocket Ride" is really good.

The sound is very good, and, yeah, it was undoubtedly doctored in the studio. Who cares. All three "Alive" albums are a must-have for fans of Kiss, and they remain the best place to start building a Kiss collection. This is a great way to hear the best songs from three of Kiss' best studio albums.

When I was 8yrs. old, the only thing I wanted for Christmas was KISS's Alive 2. I don't remember if I even knew who they were then! That's how big they were. My dad bought it for me, complete with stick-on tattoos & all. (remember the big PCP scare of 1979?)If that wasn't enough for the old man,the following year I begged him to take me to the concert. Never have I been influenced by any band as a whole.(OZZY is the man) Fun lyrics, wild antics, and catchy riffs is exactly what you'll get with every single song KISS does;old or new.I've been a LOYAL fan for 20 years and will be until I die. Anyone who loves good, solid Rock'n'Roll and great times must own everything by "The Hottest Band In The World....KISS! "

R.I.P. Eric Carr

Sincerely, NITEMARE

Great Live album. This was at the height of their popularity and you can hear it by the unbelievably loud crowd. Should have added Do You Love Me, Plaster Caster, Love Em and Leave Em to this. Only Kiss can do 15 live songs out of 30 that they recorded in the studio and still leave off 3 classics. Something for Alive 4 maybe?