Gene Simmons Reveals the KISS Song Everyone Thought Was Rod Stewart
- - Gene Simmons Reveals the KISS Song Everyone Thought Was Rod Stewart
Victoria MillerJanuary 9, 2026 at 4:50 PM
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Photo by Paul Natkin on Getty Images
In the 1970s, the band KISS was known for their hard rock sound and glam persona, but a 1976 ballad changed everything. In a January 2026 interview with Professor of Rock, KISS founding member Gene Simmons revealed that when the band released the 1976 song “Beth,” some people confused them for an iconic English singer who had a very different style.
The unlikely KISS song, originally the B-side to “Detroit Rock City,” was performed by drummer Peter Criss, who had a raspy voice like fellow rock singer Rod Stewart. Simmons said the comparisons were immediate.
“Initially, people didn't know it was KISS,” Simmons said of the song. “They thought they thought it was Rod Stewart.”
“Beth” became KISS’s biggest chart hit. The song reached No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 and won a People’s Choice Award for Favorite New Song of 1976.
In the new interview, Simmons, 76, explained how the song became an unexpected AM radio hit for the hard rock band.
“We’re a rock band, so you want that first song to be a rock song, but radio doesn't do that,” he explained. “During the daytime, the moms are staying home, and the kids are off at school and dad is working, so she's not going to listen to a rock song when it’s got too many guitars. No. ‘Play me John Denver ‘Rocky Mountain High,’ you know.”
“And people don't know it because they think the world was always like this,” he added. “No, it wasn't. A single used to be a small record of vinyl, and you had an A side, which the record company told the radio stations is the song you should be playing. And sometimes, not often, sometimes. radio ignored it because on the other side was another song called the B-side. This is not the song you should play. In other words, they thought, ‘Oh, they'll never play this one.’ Well, radio turned it over and played it, and immediately it got traction.”
Simmons said that after the success of “Beth,” KISS won awards and could “play anywhere and would sell out sometimes multiple shows.”
“So we get up to receive our awards, and we tied first place with ‘Disco Duck’ by Rick Dees,” he recalled. “We were both number one song that year, number one song that year with 'Beth.'”
KISS co-founder Paul Stanley was already a huge fan of Stewart, who was known for his work with The Jeff Beck Group, The Faces, and his solo songs such as “Maggie May,” “You Wear It Well,” and “Tonight’s The Night.”
Stanley revealed that the KISS song “Hard Luck Woman” was inspired by Stewart’s work—and that he originally planned to give the song to the music legend.
“I was a big fan of Rod Stewart, who around that time had a big hit with ‘Maggie May,’ ” the KISS frontman told Guitar World in an interview. “I figured I could write a similar song and came up with ‘Hard Luck Woman’ with the idea of giving it to Rod. But we recorded it ourselves because we needed a follow-up to 'Beth,' which had just been a huge hit for us. “
“We wanted something similar to Beth, so we let Peter sing 'Hard Luck' too,” Stanley added. “He had a real raspy voice, and when people heard it on the radio, they thought it was Rod Stewart. I also used my Guild 12-string acoustic, which helped it sound like a Rod Stewart song.”
In the 2005 biography Kiss: Behind the Mask, Criss recalled telling Stanley that he should be the one to sing the song. "I said, 'Hey f----o, how about me? F--- Rod Stewart, I'll sing the s--- out of it,’” Criss recalled.
While Stanley pushed for Criss to sound like Stewart, the drummer insisted, “'Let me do it my way. Let me sing it.’ You'll get your raspy s--- when you want it, but I've still got to sound like Peter. I'm not Rod Stewart, Paul. I know you wanted him to do it, but I'm not going to mimic him.'"
"Hard Luck Woman" appeared on the 1976 KISS album Rock and Roll Over. The song ultimately reached No. 15 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1977.
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This story was originally published by Parade on Jan 9, 2026, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
