In my newest e book, Discuss to Me: Conversations With Ace Frehley, I collected all of my many interviews with Ace through the years. Plus, all-new interviews with such famend rock names as Eddie Trunk, Joe Bonamassa, and Soundgarden‘s Kim Thayil (amongst others), to pay tribute to one in all rock music’s all-time greats, who handed away on October 16, 2025, on the age of 74.
Additionally interviewed for the e book was That Metallic Present co-host and humorist Don Jamieson. And through our chat, I could not assist however ask if he felt that Ace might have lower it as a comic. Right here is an excerpt from the e book, wherein Jamieson shares his opinion.
“Properly, this is the factor – being a stand-up comedian, you must be very self-disciplined. It’s important to take the job actually critically. Be lethal severe, to have quite a lot of enjoyable with it. And I feel Ace was a bit bit extra scattered. The factor that he put all his vitality in was taking part in the guitar. That is the place his focus all the time went. But when he simply wished to place the guitar down and stand up there and do jokes, with a bit advantageous tuning, yeah, he might have been hilarious. As a result of, hey, not less than he would have laughed at his jokes.”
Additionally within the e book, I had the chance to ask Jamieson about an notorious TV interview from Halloween 1979, wherein the unique 4 members of Kiss had been interviewed by Tom Snyder on The Tomorrow Present. Throughout which, Ace steals the present along with his joking method and infectious laughter.
“I’m going again and watch that Tom Snyder factor not less than yearly. It truly is like watching a headline comic do a full set, as a result of there’s even a degree in the direction of the top of the interview – it is a couple of 30-minute interview – the place Ace does have a lull with Tom. However then like, the final couple minutes, he has a flurry of actually humorous jokes, and he ends robust. That is like, each comedian – you are killing the entire present, then you may have this lull for a bit bit, however then you may have just a few extra that you already know it’ll kill them on the finish. And also you get off stage on the large chortle. And that is what it was like.”
“Tom Snyder liked Ace a lot – to the purpose the place he actually turned his again on Gene and Paul. He wasn’t even them for minutes at a time. And even the director had turned the digicam in the direction of Ace and Peter, and you may hear Gene off digicam making an attempt to throw one-liners in. However they don’t seem to be touchdown. They’re simply all bombing. However each time they might carry the digicam again to Gene and Paul, they had been livid – this was every little thing they did not need the general public to see.”
Lastly, Jamieson recalled a memorable look Frehley made on VH1’s That Metallic Present again in 2011, which once more, displayed his humorousness, and, unpredictable nature.
“When Ace did That Metallic Present, he would all the time come ready with one thing humorous, which I all the time liked. Ace had such a terrific humorousness. So, we had been interviewing him about how he created the smoking guitar he is well-known for. And he goes, ‘Truly, I’ve a brand new invention that I wish to debut in your present at this time.’ Now, our producer didn’t inform us this was coming, so it was a complete shock. He goes, “You guys know the electrical smoking guitar. Properly, I acquired a brand new factor…the smoking flute.” And he takes out a bit picket flute. He begins taking part in it, smoke begins billowing out the top of it, and the three of us doubled over in laughter. It was such a priceless second. And I feel Eddie nonetheless has that flute to this present day.
Discuss to Me: Conversations With Ace Frehley is out there on the market now, as paperback, hardcover, and Kindle editions.
