Gene Simmons’ pick for the best frontman ever: “It had never been seen before”
While not a frontman himself, Gene Simmons has always loved being the centre of attention, which has forever been a prominent feature of his presence in Kiss.
It’s unusual for a bassist to be the one continually trying to upstage the lead vocalist, but if there was anyone on stage alongside Paul Stanley who could match his exuberant personality and theatrics, it was Simmons. Not even guitarist Ace Frehley can hold a candle to ‘The Demon’ and his long-tongued histrionic displays, and that’s perhaps why the relationship between the band members has often had sour undertones due to the amount of egos on display.
Even if he wasn’t meant to be the main focal point of the group, you can bet that he was always keeping tabs on those who professed to be the the best showmen in the world of rock and roll, passing judgement on their abilities to engage an audience and make them want to observe their every move. Having Stanley in the group would have been both a blessing and a curse for Simmons in this sense, as he would have ultimately used him as a yardstick for how successfully they established themselves at their craft, but even so, he’d have provided a high barometer to work from in the first place.
However, one of Simmons’ favourite frontmen of all time was one of his most prominent rivals; a vocalist who channelled pure theatricality along with a sublime vocal ability and a pure desire to rock out. Van Halen were arguably one of the biggest metal bands in the world alongside Kiss, and while the presence of Eddie Van Halen is similar to that of Simmons where he was constantly trying to upstage the frontman, their original vocalist, David Lee Roth, gave all he possibly could to ensure there were still eyes on him.
Speaking about Roth and Van Halen’s peak of popularity in the 1970s and early ‘80s, Simmons professed to MusicRadar in a 2025 interview that there was simply no other frontman who was capable of doing what he did. “David, in his prime, was the super frontman of all time. There was nobody — and I mean nobody, in any form of music — who ever stepped up on that stage and took being a frontman to the heights that he did.”
It wasn’t your usual showmanship, whereby a frontman might strut about the stage authoritatively, but he had something far more outlandish to offer, and Simmons had to respect his dedication to making sure all onlookers were aware of just how fantastic he was. “David had the acrobatics and sexuality — all that stuff,” Simmons continued. “It had never been seen before, and it was so in-your-face.”
While a frontman having a sense of bravado was, of course, nothing new at all, and there had been plenty of examples of frontmen who carried just as much bombast as Roth did before him, what he did offer was nothing short of spectacular, and very few can say that they’ve ever been able to operate on the same level as him.
