Hanz Harris* We are here today at the New Orleans International Airport with Bruce Kulick, an incredible talent, incredible guitar player, and a former member of KISS for 11 years. We are here today to talk about his KISStory and new and exciting things in his career.

Hanz*   The first thing I would like to talk about is your current project or album release, "TRANSFORMER"  this album was released on your private label and released independently. We would like to know a little about the production of this album such as what kind of time frame it might have taken you and some of the things you may have been thinking while writing lyrics for this album.

Bruce Kulick*  Well  Transformer I started writing on tour last year actually, it started in the spring and throughout the summer while on tour with Grand Funk, I've been playing guitar with Grand Funk for a few years now. It's a little different from the first solo record "Audio Dog" in the sense I didn't dig in the closet to get a basis for the record, I literally just started writing whatever came into my head, I like to sit around with a guitar even with the T.V. on, if I come up with a good idea,I'll just mute the T.V. and I always keep one of those little inexpensive tape recorders near by, you know , really all I need to have is that.I mean sometimes I used to do demos for songs that I've thought about recording or certainly for KISS, Sometimes it would be on just a little tape recorder or sometimes I  would demo up the whole thing on a drum machine and all, but I've matured enough in my career to kinda get a sense of a song from right on the little tape recorder. So that's what happens,I just keep writing and by I'd say AUG of that year I kind of saw that definitely I had enough songs for a record, and then I started on the plane rides with the band, I started to write lyrics.

At the time I was going through kinda an up and down, you know, a relationship with a woman that I was in love with, so it opened up alot of you know, feelings and emotions that I was able to express which was as much as the lows were lows the highs were very high , so as far as some of the songs I have a very clear ,ya know, pop love lyrics cus that's how I was feeling and some of them are like a little mistrusting, a little bit confused, a little bit scared, you know all that came into play. and I know a lot of people who have heard the record that know the lyrics they have related it to some of their own relationships. so it's all part of the youth tradition, that whole thing of falling in love and all the good and bad that come with those emotions.

So I liked that I was able to finally write all the lyrics myself and I'm greatful of the fact that I was able to tap into that part of me, and that things came rather easily,so I started recording in Dec. I'm able to play everything but drums on a record and my albums being mostly guitar oriented, I was able to play bass well enough to cover. And now that I have inserted myself as a vocalist, I'll sing. I have some instrumentals and I did have John Corobi from "UNION" & "MOTLEY CRUE" perform on a  track because I knew the vocals for that song, he could sing a bit more angsty than I could handle ya know. So over the course of last year (02")DEC through the end of JAN I got the record done. I was mastering it in FEB, putting all the artwork together and getting all that done and so by April I was able to start selling it. April of 2003.

Because it's on my own label and in the sense that  I'm not really a label...I funded the record. I knew I could sell it on the internet, I knew I could sell it at KISS expos, word of mouth that sort of thing. I do wholesale it to certain distributers that have been able to sell it around the world actually, Australia, England, Europe and Canada but really I tend to do the most business myself, and that's good. It's a good feeling to be able to see it and say well damn I'll just sell it out of the trunk of my car kind of vibe and a lot of people are doing it that way. Really it has become more popular doing it that way so in every way it's been a success for me. From the fact that I'm proud of what I did and from that fact that I even got some mainsteam press over it. It's weird because I'm not a label ya know. So it's all been good, the fans enjoy it.

Hanz*  So is there a favorite track you enjoy preforming live say doing a show or  doing an expo?

Bruce* Well really I have only done two songs from it, but I plan on adding a few more that I can do live. I have plans to go to Australia early next year to do a couple shows over there and I do get a chance to get a proper rehearsal with a band, unlike these expos where everybody's just sitting around in a hotel room the night before going over some things. By the way that's not always easy because you can't plug in because of the noise and ya know the neighbors, so ultimately um I will try a few more songs. I don't have a favorite, I love all  the songs and I can't, I'll have to admit that I know some songs I would love to do live but they would be just to hard to do, I would not be able to play some of the guitar parts and sing, or whatever, but um of course ya know "Crazy" has been great! "Jump the Shark" has been fun to play and those are the two that I've been doing from the record, but I'm gonna add in one or two different things. I'll know better how they feel when I play with a band once I get to Australia.

Hanz*  So after you do the Australian thing will you do sort of a club tour here in the United States for this record ?

Bruce*   I don't really have any aspirations to do it, I was talking to a friend this morning and its funny that where you live in America makes it easy or not, I know if I lived on the east coast meaning New York ,New England area or if I lived in the Chicago ,Indy area I could probably more readilly string together some dates that would make sense, what I mean "make sense' that means I won't lose my ass financially ok.

What you've got to understand is when you got a tour, you spend a lot of money, you travel and it's one thing when it's just me ya know and it's another thing when you got a band with you and everybody's got to make some money and get out there, and the club scene is really not that great,um I live in L.A and I do enjoy living their, but I don't think there's enough of a market to do it. I prefer to just do it overseas where I can have a band there and I like working with, and I come off as the"international artist" and all that ya know, so right now it's simple to say if somebody gave me the opportunity and it made sense I wouldn't turn around and say "Oh well I gotta make a million dollars a night" if someone made an offer and it made sense I would do that. But unfortunately it's very hard, you would be surprised how diffucult it is. Many of those bands that do that have a lot of tour support. But in my case i'm the label and I'm not willing to go into debt just to go and play at some clubs, anyway I feel about it..but it's just a reality.

Hanz*  Well we did get a chance to see you last night at The First New Orleans KISS Expo, and you were great!!, what we wanted to get from you is your opinion of the fans reaction and sort of tell us about the food and your overall experience with just the whole atmosphere of our great city and how you feel about us.

Bruce*  Well I've always enjoyed myself coming here. I remember many times coming with KISS visiting the places for the coffee and the powdery donuts, and the wonderful hurricanes and things like that. You know the music is great here and people have a party atmosphere and all that's great, and actually I know i've mentioned some of the more greasy food but um but the real food here is amazing here I really do enjoy it. It's a great town and I was happy there was going to be an Expo here I was suprised knowing that a lot of rock shows don't get a chance to make it here, but I definitely know there's KISS fans here and they were out and they were very passionate. I saw them buying a lot of stuff, just a lot of support, I know I got it from the fans, I felt it. It's good to know , not only were there people here from Louisiana but Mississippi as well and that was great, so all in all you know it was great to do one here and I was proud to be a part of it. 

  Thanks Bruce! More of this Informative Interview to come stay tuned. Until then here are some cool pic's to enjoy.