ASHLAND —
When Dressed to Kill, Kentucky’s own KISS tribute band kicked off Summer Motion festivities Wednesday evening, no one was more excited than Dave Miller, one of Ashland’s biggest KISS fans.
Miller, 46, of Ashland, doesn’t claim to be KISS’ biggest fan, but he does have a life-size cardboard cutout of its members in his home, and his office at Championship Fastpitch in Ashland is filled with clocks, lamps, potato heads and other band memorabilia.
Miller attended his first KISS concert with his cousin in 1977 at the age of 11.
“It was just incredible,” Miller said. “I bet you can’t guess how much my ticket was ... It was $7.25. I wish I still had it, but I have the ticket to my second concert hanging in my office. That one was $10. That was in 1979.”
He has been to about nine KISS concerts and has been able to sit in the front row a couple times, but he has never had a chance to meet the band, he said. Last summer he drove nine hours to Lincoln, Ill., to see one of their shows.
His love for the band began when he was about 10 years old, Miller said.
“Just the makeup and the show ... When you’re a little kid and you see that, it just kind of sticks. I guess the music draws you in in the beginning,” he said.
Decked out in a T-shirt sporting the KISS band logo and a picture of Gene Simmons, he came to Summer Motion with high expectations for Dressed to Kill.
“I looked them up on YouTube, and they looked pretty good, but we’ll see,” he said.
The band, made up of Mike Collins, 39, Brandon Collins, 18, Casey Miracle, 37, and Christian Fugate, 39, all from Harlan, first came together for a 2008 Halloween show in their hometown.
Mike Collins said it all started when a local business owner who was putting together a concert for Halloween thought it would be a good idea to have a KISS tribute band play, and he put Collins in charge. He put together a band, which played at the end of the night, and the crowd went wild for them.
“The people just went nuts. You would think we were the real band,” Collins said. “We thought it was hysterical.”
The band has played several shows since then, often to crowds of thousands. They farthest from their hometown the band has traveled was nine hours to Wheeling, W.Va., for a show, Mike Collins said. They go all out at every show, with tight black costumes, boots with towering heels, curly black wigs and, of course, the eye-catching makeup KISS is known for.
“It’s 100 percent a theatrical performance,” Fugate said. “With KISS it’s go big or go home.”
“I’ve been playing in bands since I was 14, and this is the most musically satisfying experience I’ve ever had,” Mike Collins said. “This is the closest four regular guys with day jobs can come to being rock stars,” he said.
The band went on in front of hundreds at the river front at 8 p.m., followed by fireworks and a performance by Johnny Lang.
SHANNON MILLER can be reached at smiller@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2657.
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