Is it just me or is the day after a KISS show a complete downer? You just feel like something is missing from your life (as well as having ringing ears and a headache!). Anyway, once again the KISS Army invades London, literally every where you went around town there was somebody wearing a KISS t-shirt! We started to queue at the arena at about 5:30, after getting right to the front we were told to bugger off to another queue. The miserable gits working at the Arena didn't even bother to tell anyone about there being a separate queue for standing tickets until it was too late, like it really bloody mattered seeing as you can walk there from either side (I got my own back later on by getting my camera into the show past a body search!).

Anyway, for me the show started after I went back to the car park to put something in the car: I walked past the other side of the Arena only to hear the sound check taking place! I heard the whole of Hotter Than Hell and some other stuff. Hotter Than Hell sounded brilliant, I don't know why they couldn't have added that to the setlist, it used to make a good intro to Firehouse. Buck Cherry were the openers and I guess they were okay, definitely an improvement over Verve Pipe (but let's face it, that ain't hard!). The lead singer was jumping all over the place (or doing Riverdance auditions as Martin Curtis put it!), desperately trying to hold up his 2-sizes too big trousers. I thought the cleaners coming on at the end of their setlist was a good touch, they started cleaning the stage and dismantling the drum kit while they were still playing!

Up went the new curtain, this time it was a red one covered with starts and moons as per the Psycho Circus cover. Just before the show started, in walked four Playboy models in full KISS make-up, the whole of the standing section starting cheering at them and the girls were loving it (they were sitting in the section to the left of the stage)! At this point the arena that was more then half empty during Buck Cherry really started to fill out, like Mercury told me this show was a complete sell out. The "Alright London..." announcement was made and Psycho Circus started the show, this was a great opener, much better than I expected. The red curtain was cool, but you could easily see the band behind it so it took away some of the excitement from it when it fell down.

The crowd was really getting in to the new opener, jumping all over the place. The only problem we had was that a few assholes decided that they were going to charge to the front at the start of the song, shoving anyone that happened to be in their way. I mean for god sake, get a life, there were kids nearby but they didn't give a shit. So this pushed us back a little but we were still nearer the front than I've ever been before. Shout It Out Loud and Deuce came next, these were great songs to get you in the partying mood and sounded as good as ever, it wasn't until Do You Love Me that the new 3-D effects came into play. I didn't really know what to expect, especially after the disappointing home video of Psycho Circus, but I was wrong to have any doubts, they were incredible. There was a mixture of Psycho Circus video footage, some new graphics and some live shots all in 3-D. The live shots didn't work as well as the others (they were in double vision during some of it), but the other stuff like the 3-D hearts, cubes and stuff were brilliant.

Around about this point Paul Stanley announced "I've got to tell you that when we started out we didn't like American Rock 'n' Roll bands, we listened to bands from England!", which went down well with the crowd. The next songs included Firehouse (also in 3-D), Shock Me, Let Me Go Rock 'N' Roll and Calling Dr. Love. These classics all sounded great, for once I actually got a great view of Gene's fire breathing in Firehouse. Ace and Peter were both sounding great, Ace didn't really mess up at all apart from on the next song. Into The Void was Ace's next chance to sing, I don't know what went wrong but there were some parts where you couldn't hear him at all, especially near the end. His solo was moved from Shock Me to this song and was a lot more enjoyable than previously (I think the 3-D effects helped out a lot). Near the end he said "This one's for Stan Kubrick" and he played some music from 2001: A Space Odyssey, which was a nice touch. The usual rockets and smoking guitars were all there — this time the second rocket 'knocked down' three lights from the lighting rig (they actually fell this time instead of hanging down as per the other tour), and the third rocket was fired right about the heads of everyone in the standing section!

Paul asked "What is the first song on Destroyer?," to which everyone shouted Detroit Rock City!, "Well we're going to play the second song!", and in kicked King Of The Night Time World, which went down very well with the crowd. Some blood spitting from Gene followed by a flight to the lighting rig was next. God Of Thunder sounded fantastic, especially the effects put on Gene's voice towards the end, made him sound more demonic than ever. Within followed with some more 3-D effects, although the chorus sounded okay I still don't think this one makes it as a live song. I wish they'd replace it with something else off the album (We Are One would be nice). Peter then started his solo, bit of a strange song to have a drum solo but there you go. This was much more exciting than the last tour, as the whole drum kit was lifted up and hovered over the first few rows of the crowd (I'll have photos of this soon!), smoke came shooting out from below as it was moving, excellent stuff.

After I Was Made For Lovin' You (which didn't sound as good as it sometime does, maybe this one could be replaced with something else?), Paul said that he wanted to come and see us but he didn't was to come unless we really wanted him too "I don't like it when you knock on someones door and they say oh no it's you!" So we all had to cheer until the tacky show meter hit the end of the scale, then out came Paul over the crowd while the rest of the band kicked into Love Gun. This was brilliant, probably the highlight of the show, I didn't have a brilliant view but I think Paul even stepped off his platform to see meet some of the crowd, cool or what! 100,000 Years and Rock And Roll All Nite finished off the main set, personally I would have preferred the latter to have been at the end of the show. The amount of ticker-tape that came flying down was incredible, we were absolutely covered!

Lots of people say they're fed up of this song always being played live, but as far as I'm concerned it's KISS' anthem, and one hell of a way for the band to say goodnight. During the solo Ace had a spinning catherine wheel on his guitar, at one point he even got it to stop and change directions, he must have a hell of a lot of guts to do that! Just before Rock And Roll All Nite (at least I think it was here) Paul asked us all to sing out national anthem, the problem here is that 90% of Brits (including me) haven't got a bloody clue what the words to God Save The Queen are so it sounded awful! Paul tried to start us all off again, but it still didn't work, he then said something along the lines of "I don't think you'll be getting the record contract."

After shouting "We want more!" out came Pete to sing Beth, a few roses were thrown into the crowd before the song. It sounded excellent, just a shame that the live version is so short, maybe it'd be nice if they played it acoustically as per Unplugged. All the guys returned to the stage (and took a bow) and Paul said he wanted to take us all home with him, so off we went to Detroit Rock City. The show then finally ended with Black Diamond with Pete's vocals sounding on top form. The band are no longer lifted out over the crowd during this song (Peter's drum kit rises again though), instead they stay put on stage. Did anyone else notice Ace shake his head in disapproval before Gene tried to start licking his neck? He didn't seem too chuffed from what I could see (but then wouldn't you if Gene tried to tried to place his 7-incher on you? — then again don't answer that!). The show then ended with a message on the screen saying 'Thank you London!'.

So that was it, another show over — and what a show! The pyro was amazing, I loved the huge columns of fire and indoor fireworks, they really worked well. The new effects were very good, especially the 3-D and Peters drums. I only wish the old setlist could be expanded, I didn't understand why there were so few new songs played, surely Raise Your Glasses and a few others would be worth a look? Obviously there's one other thing to moan about that I'm sure everyone agrees with: they go to all the trouble of getting their gear in our country, why couldn't they have stuck around for a few more nights? I mean it's not like Wembley had poor sales or anything: it was sell out! Tonight proved that there's only one way to put on a show — and that's KISS' way!

Setlist:
  Psycho Circus
  Shout It Out Loud
  Deuce
  Do You Love Me? (3-D)
  Firehouse (3-D)
  Shock Me
  Let Me Go, Rock 'N' Roll
  Calling Dr. Love
  Into The Void (3-D)
  King Of The Night Time World
  God Of Thunder
  Within (3-D)
  I Was Made For Lovin' You (3-D)
  Love Gun
  100,000 Years
  Rock And Roll All Nite

Encores:
  Beth
  Detroit Rock City (3-D)
  Black Diamond

Well, What a Show! Fantastic, incredible, loud, fun, energetic, professional. No real amount of words can really explain the complete Rock Show at Wembley Arena on Thursday night, the show had everything. Rock 'n' Roll KISS music to the full, fireworks, lights, flame throwers, exploding guitars, firing guitars, levitating drum kits, confetti, fire breathing, spitting blood, 3-D screens, and the most important aspect of all, the original group members Paul, Ace, Peter, Gene. You might think that I have not seen the group before, but in fact it was my sixth show, the first one being at Stafford Bingley Hall back in 1980.

My wife and I had driven all the way from the north west of England to see the group, since Wembley appears to be their only U.K. date on the Psycho Circus Tour. When arriving at the arena at about 5:00 PM to start queuing for a good standing position, you mind starts to wonder how close to the stage would we get on this particular show, little did we know how good it was to be. There seemed to be a wide variety of nationalities from around Europe at the show, certainly from Holland, Spain, and from wider areas of the U.K. in the north, including Scotland and Ireland. The atmosphere was starting to build from around 5:20 PM, since we were in a line near the Stage end, we could clearly hear the Band rehearsing the start of the show. First was Psycho Circus, then followed by about 4/5 starts of Shout It Out Loud. As you can imagine the atmosphere continued to grow until the doors opened just after 6:30 PM.

Once the doors opened it was straight to the front of the Arena, unbelievably it was actually right to the front of the stage. We waited as patiently as possible for the arena to fill up, since we knew the show was a total sell out, the support band came on right on time at 7:30 PM. I'd read many reports from other concerts on the European leg of the tour of Buck Cherry, nearly all the reports were bad to say the least, I'd tried to keep an open mind, I shouldn't have bothered, they were awful! They were incredibly loud, and very poor indeed. KISS and their management have had a habit in the 1970's and 80's of having support acts which have gone on to much bigger things, I truly believe this will not be the case with Buck Cherry.

The security guards at the front had informed us KISS would be on stage virtually right on 8:30 PM. Within 2/3 minutes they were dead right. Stagehands had gathered around the stage curtain a few minutes before KISS came on, they were there to remove the curtain once it had dropped to the floor. From our vantage point right in front of Gene Simmons microphone, we could see the curtain hadn't totally covered right down to the floor, therefore we could see the group walk onto the stage before the music started. Again the atmosphere was electric, and the band hadn't even started the show yet. As soon as the arena lights went out, Gene Simmons was already raising his hands behind the curtain to the first few rows that could see him, then we had the familiar, but still original KISS introduction: "Alright London... You wanted, you got the best... The HOTTEST BAND IN THE WORLD...KISS!"

The opening song was Psycho Circus and the front half of the Arena went mad, the atmosphere was absolutely incredibly. I've seen the band close up before, but never this close with their full make-up and costume, they were larger than life, and totally KISS. The full setlist of the Wembley show was as follows: Psycho Circus, Shout It Out Loud, Deuce, Do You Love Me, Firehouse, Shock Me, Let Me Go Rock 'N' Roll, Calling Dr. Love, Into The Void, King Of The Night Time World, God Of Thunder, Within, I Was Made For Lovin' You, Love Gun, 100,000 Years, Rock And Roll All Nite, Beth, Detroit Rock City, Black Diamond. I've read a lot of comments about the setlists for the current tour, and I suppose they could have varied it slightly more than the 1996-1997 reunion tour, but nevertheless the show was fantastic, and in my opinion the group had even more energy than the last show on the previous tour that I saw.

Gene Simmons was totally relaxed, I've never seen him smile and laugh so much before while dressed in the full KISS make-up and costume, he was having an absolute ball! Paul Stanley never stopped moving around the stage, Ace was Ace, still looking spaced out, but holding the music together while Stanley/Simmons went around performing to the vast audience. Peter Criss was superb, working harder than ever with great timing during the songs. It was real treat to hear him sing Beth in the U.K., since on many occasions this song had been omitted. The 3-D was only limited success from where we were right at the front of the stage. But then again, it was only due to our superb viewing position. One of the obviously song highlights of the show was Rock And Roll All Nite, with the KISS anthem playing to the maximum, and the confetti dropping and being fired over the audience as Simmons and Stanley prowled and danced all over the stage. This culminated with Ace's guitar setting of further fire works on the end of his guitar; this was a pure Rock 'n' Roll party in London!

To summarise the show, it was pure KISS, and was certainly the hottest band in the world. Anybody who is thinking of going to see the band in the near future, go and see them and have a party.