Ace Frehley, American guitarist and founder member of Kiss, died at 74. The family confirmed the news with a press release on Thursday evening. At the end of September Frehley had canceled a concert due to a fall in his home in Morristown, New Jersey, which had led to hospitalization. No further details have been made of the causes of death.
Born in New York in 1951, Paul Daniel “Ace” Frehley began playing the teenage guitar, influenced by bands like Rolling Stones and Who. After some experiences with local bands, in 1972 he responded to an announcement published by Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons, who sought a guitarist for a new musical project. From that meeting the Kiss was born, one of the most recognizable and successful rock formations of the 1970s.
Frehley helped define the band’s image and sound. The white and silvery makeup with which he appeared on stage, inspired by a spatial character, became one of the symbols of Kiss. Its guitar style, based on melodic riffs and short but very effective solos, gave form to classical rock songs such as Detroit Rock City, Shock Me and Cold Gin.
During his first career, Kiss released eleven albums in ten years, imposing himself as one of the most popular bands in the United States. Their combination of theatricality, pyrotechnics and hard rock influenced many later bands and contributed to the birth of the so-called “rock arena”, the format of the great spectacular concerts that would dominate the next decade.
In 1978, while the group went through a period of internal tension, the four members released a solo album. Frehley’s was the most appreciated by critics and the most sold, driven by the single New York Groove, a reinterpretation of the song written by Russ Ballard. However, personal success increased contrasts with Stanley and Simmons, leading him to leave the band in 1982.
In the following years Frehley formed a new group, Frehley’s Comet, with which he published several albums and toured North America. Even without reaching the fame of Kiss, he maintained a solid fan base and continued to collaborate with other musicians of the hard rock scene.
In 1996 he participated in the reunion of the original formation of Kiss, which began a world tour and published new records. The experience stopped in 2002, when Frehley decided to leave the group again, believing that his path with the band ended. In recent years he had continued to play as a soloist, publishing albums and participating in festivals dedicated to classical rock.
Ace Frehley is considered one of the most influential guitarists of his generation. Revisions like Guitar World have often included him among the best rock musicians, citing his role in making guitar a play instrument as well as music. His contribution remains closely linked to the identity of Kiss, which transformed rock into a visual and popular language capable of crossing decades and generations.
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