(Credits: Far Out / Tilly Antoine)
Tue 9 December 2025 2:00, UK
Drugs are intrinsically linked with rock and roll; that isn’t a judgment, nor is it an endorsement, it’s just a fact.
The three pillars of the genre are quite literally sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll. The sad fact remains that these damaging substances follow the genre like a shadow, and they manage to sink their claws into plenty of rock stars throughout their career. If there was one band that you might think is almost certainly on drugs, it would be Kiss, after all, how else would you come up with a look like the one that they made famous?
A band who are dressed head to toe in costumes, singing songs about never-ending parties, and with face paint that makes them look like aliens… there aren’t many places that your mind goes to than drugs. However, if you were to ask the Kiss band members, they would tell you that their iconic looks weren’t the result of substances, but instead came from wanting substance.
While the band were fans of a lot of the music that was being made in the ‘70s, they admitted that they hated the way different musical outfits looked. The problem wasn’t with the literal outfits that people were wearing, rather with a lack of cohesion. Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley spoke about how much they loved bands from the ‘60s, not just because of their music, but how they looked like they belonged in a band together, and they didn’t think the same could be said for their ‘70s counterparts.
“Those ‘60s British groups all looked like real bands,” explained Stanley, “No member of The Beatles could have fit into the Stones. No member of The Who could have been in the Dave Clark Five. You had unified images of those bands, and at the same time, there was an emphasis on the individual members.”
So, drugs didn’t play a part in Kiss deciding to dress up like space aliens, but as one of the biggest bands of the ‘70s, you would think they still dabbled, right? Well, not according to Gene Simmons. Simmons is adamant that he has only done drugs once in his life, cannabis at least, and that time was allegedly a complete accident. After having a pretty bad experience, he opted, accident or not, to never touch the stuff again.
The story goes that he was once in the presence of some brownies, and with the rumbling stomach of a rockstar making itself known, he decided to tuck in. Little did the Kiss bassist know that these brownies were laced with weed, and as a result, he slowly started to feel the effects. For Simmons, those effects manifested as anxiety and paranoia, with him constantly asking questions such as: “Are my feet as big as I think they are?” “Does my head look funny?” And “Why are my hands so big?”
The journalist Jaan Uhelszki was there to witness the incident, and he described it “like being with E.T., tentatively discovering the wonders of planet Earth, complete with long fingers outstretched to touch ordinary objects.”
Since his poor experience with cannabis, Gene Simmons insists that he has never touched the drug since. Even if he wanted to, he probably wouldn’t be able to roll a joint if he wanted to, what with those big hands of his.
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