Fans of the legendary 80s rock band Kiss<\/strong> were absolutely shocked when founding guitarist Ace Frehley<\/strong>died unexpectedly<\/a> on Thursday, October 16 after being on life support<\/a> as a result of a fall at his home studio<\/a>. The musician, who passed away at age 74, was an absolutely key part of the iconic group \u2014 but he once reflected on the moment he knew he had to leave the band.<\/p>\n “I used to get frustrated when I\u2019d read the paper the following day and read the review of our show. A lot of times, it talked about the pyrotechnics, the elaborate costumes and makeup,” he explained to Ultimate Classic Rock<\/a> in a February 2024 interview<\/a>. “And a lot of times, it didn\u2019t really talk much about the music. That used to bother me, because for me, it was always the music first and the show second.\u201d<\/p>\n Frehley also noted that he realized not long before his 1982 departure from the band that he was going down a different path. \u201cWith the success of my solo album with \u2018New York Groove,\u2019 having the only hit [from the Kiss solo albums], I kind of saw the writing on the wall,\u201d he told the outlet. \u201cI realized I was more creative away from Paul [Stanley]<\/strong>, Gene [Simmons]<\/strong> and Peter [Criss]<\/strong> than when I was with them. I knew eventually that I was going to end up forming my own band and leaving the group. That\u2019s what happened.\u201d<\/p>\n Peter Criss, Ace Frehley, Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of KISS in London, 1976Chris Walter/WireImage<\/p>\n That said, it wasn\u2019t an easy choice \u2014 but it was a necessary one. \u201cI mean, I lost millions of dollars by doing that. But what I gained was sanity,\u201d Frehley told UCR at the time. \u201cTo me, that\u2019s more important. I mean, if you don\u2019t have your health and sanity, it doesn\u2019t matter if you have a hundred million dollars in the bank. You\u2019ve got to be happy. I\u2019ve met so many rich people that are really unhappy people.\u201d<\/p>\n Kiss was formed in New York City in 1973 by Frehley, Stanley, 73, Simmons, 76, and Criss, 79. They became known for their outlandish on-stage style, with painted faces and crazy outfits, as well as their \u201cshock rock\u201d approach to the music. That consisted of smoking guitars, pyrotechnics, fire breathing, blood spitting, and levitating drum kits. In line with their makeup, the group even took on stage personas: Simmons was the Demon, Stanley was the Starchild, Criss was the Catman, and Frehley took on the role of the Spaceman (or Space Ace, as he was affectionately called).<\/p>\n Needless to say, every Kiss show was an experience.<\/p>\n The band went through several lineup changes over the years, with Simmons and Stanley as the only founding members to stick with the group until they retired in 2023 after their final show in New York City. The final lineup for the group consisted of Simmons, Stanley, Tommy Thayer<\/strong>, and Eric Singer<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Frehley went on to form his own band, Frehley\u2019s Comet, after his 1982 departure from Kiss \u2014 but he rejoined his original band in 1996 after releasing two albums with the second group and trying out a solo career. His second stint with Kiss lasted until 2002.<\/p>\n This story was originally reported by Parade<\/a> on Oct 17, 2025, where it first appeared in the News<\/a> section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fans of the legendary 80s rock band Kiss were absolutely shocked when founding guitarist Ace Frehleydied unexpectedly on Thursday, October 16 after being on life support as a result of a fall at his home studio. The musician, who passed away at age 74, was an absolutely key part of the iconic group \u2014 but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2099498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[381157,396774,348513,396775,319685],"class_list":["post-2099496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-ace-frehley","tag-criss","tag-gene-simmons","tag-kiss-solo-albums","tag-paul-stanley"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/I-Saw-the-Writing-on-the-Wall.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2099496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2099496"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2099496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2099500,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2099496\/revisions\/2099500"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2099498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2099496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2099496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2099496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/span><\/div>\n