Legendary KISS drummer and founding member of the band, Peter Criss, has decided it is time to gracefully bow out of live performing and touring. The Catman is in Australia for his penultimate show. He will perform his One Last Time Dinner Performance Show at The Sofitel on Melbourne tomorrow night, Friday 12th May, with his final performance in New York in July. In addition to tomorrow’s special show, Peter will also be at The Australian KISS Konvention at Wick Studios this weekend, 13th and 14th May where he will be doing Signing and Photo sessions with fans.
Backing Peter tomorrow night, will be Australian band Sisters Doll and Peter’s long-time friend and guitarist, Mike McLaughlin who flew in especially for tomorrow night’s show.
At a press conference in Melbourne last night, where Peter was joined by Mike and the guys from Sisters Doll, Peter spoke with great admiration for his fellow musicians. He has been busy rehearsing with the guys from Sisters Doll in the lead up to their show tomorrow and was impressed with the speed with which they picked up the songs. He can’t speak highly enough of them. “I love these guys!” he tells us. “These guys are amazing musicians.” And he is really looking forward to being on stage with them on Friday night.
So, what is behind the decision to put the brakes on performing?
“It’s not the same world I see any more,” he laments. “I see a lot of change and it doesn’t really please me. I see the world kind of in turmoil and I guess I just want to get off the boat now and start enjoying my life while I’ve got it.” He says he doesn’t want to be another casualty that we hear about on T.V, “Like, God bless his soul, David Bowie and all the other guys we’ve just lost. I don’t want to see that for myself. I’ve got some time. I’m not in the box yet.”
And why did he choose Melbourne for his second last performance? “I think it’s a cool energy in Melbourne. You people are amazing. The respect I get, I can’t get that at home. New York’s a hard town.”
While Peter might be retiring from performing live, he is certainly not planning to live an unproductive life.
He tells us, “I’m working on other things. I’m working on a children’s book. I’m working on a comedy screenplay and I have an album I didn’t finish.”
Apart from the children’s book, Peter also feels he has another book to write about his life and experiences. While he has written such a book previously, he feels that he would still like to write another. As he points out, “It’s hard to cover in 138 pages, fifty years of what you’ve done in life.” And, as a major advocate for both men and women with breast cancer, following his own personal experience with the disease, he says that he has some ‘amazing experiences’ to share and he wants to make people aware that men also get breast cancer.
And Peter’s fans will be pleased to know that he does plan to pick up where he left off with said unfinished album. “It took me a while. I got all the music done and, again, when I got sick, I kind of stayed stagnant.” He says that this is very different from any other album that he has done. “It was right next to my cancer so I wrote I song called ‘Walking on Water’ which I felt I could when I beat it.” He says that this will be a “good rock ‘n’ roll album” which will no doubt make his fans happy.
by Sharyn Hamey
Copyright © Sharyn Hamey 2017. All rights reserved
For more information and to purchase tickets for Peter Criss ‘One Last Time at The Sofitel on Melbourne
go to: https://shoutoutloudevents.ticketbud.com/peter-criss-one-last-time
For more information about the KISS Konvention and to purchase tickets,
go to: https://shoutoutloudevents.ticketbud.com/australian-kiss-konvention-2017
