KISS rocker Gene Simmons visits Pentagon on a different mission

McClatchy DC ^ | 5/16/19 | BY TARA COPP

[NohSpinZone]

KISS lead singer Gene Simmons visited the Pentagon Thursday for a very different mission from entertaining fans since the 1970s in a band famous for wild pyrotechnic displays on stage.

Instead, Simmons spoke emotionally about what the country means to him.

“I’m a proud son of a concentration camp survivor of Nazi Germany. My mother was 14 when she was in the camps,” he said. She died recently at the age of 93.

[NohSpinZone]

It was hard for me to fight tears back watching Gene talk so lovingly about how much his late mothered loved this country and why America is the true Promised Land.

[redshawk]

Detroit Rock City

[GOPJ]

ping

[sparklite2]

I see where KISS, his arena football team
has folded.  Too bad.  It was fun to watch.

[ETL]

[God luvs America]

WOW-WOW-WOW!!!! You must watch that video!!

[redshawk]

Here’s part 1 of a 5 part on Youtube.
How KISS became. .....

https://youtu.be/5jCl1GqgvFQ

[freedumb2003]

My 95 YO Father In Law passed a few months ago. While getting ready to GO TO WORK for the day.

An amazing man who I miss dearly every day.

[Pontiac]

Later

[higgmeister]

later and a bump

[real saxophonist]

bump

[SunkenCiv]

She's a dancer, a romancer, I'm a Capricorn and she's a Cancer... yeah, they just don't write 'em like that since he retired. ;^)

[21twelve]

Geddy Lee from RUSH (his parents met in Auschwitz) had good things to say about KISS. Rush toured for KISS in the early days, and KISS sort of took them under their wing and treated them well.

“And, say what you want about their music, but they showed us how us how to put on a show, and how to work hard.”

[dfwgator]

“Farm animals?”

[21twelve]

“I may have been born in the country that people throughout history have referred to as the Promised Land.
.
.
But, take my word for it,

America is the Promised Land.”

[21twelve]

LOL! It’s cool to see the respect those two bands gave each other, despite the difference in music and after-concert activities.

[wardaddy]

Hattip Gene

[nutmeg]

.

[Albion Wilde]

I remember his mother, Flora, who appeared on his cable show with his wife and family. Imagine what she went through. It made her so tough, and so grateful, that when she got here, she survived and thrived into her 90s. It is wonderful to see a grown man give such a tribute to his mother. And he was a handful, no doubt.

[dfwgator]

Well it’s understandable that Geddy and Gene have a common bond with parents who were Holocaust survivors.