Gene Simmons has said Ace Frehley’s death followed years of personal struggles that the late KISS guitarist never managed to overcome.
Speaking to The Post, Simmons suggested that a long pattern of “bad decisions” contributed to the accident that ultimately ended Frehley’s life.
Frehley, 74, suffered a serious head injury after tumbling down a staircase in his Morristown, New Jersey home studio. He died on October 16th from a resulting brain bleed. According to the Morris County medical examiner, the fatal injury was a “blunt trauma injury of the head due to a fall”, with a toxicology report still to come.
Simmons said Frehley repeatedly ignored warnings from those who tried to help him. “He refused [advice] from people that cared about him – including yours truly – to try to change his lifestyle. In and out of bad decisions. Falling down the stairs — I’m not a doctor — doesn’t kill you. There may have been other issues, and it breaks my heart,” he said.
“The saddest thing – you reap what you shall sow unfortunately.”
Now 76, Simmons is currently in Washington, DC to receive a Kennedy Center Honor with the other surviving KISS members and to testify in the Senate on proposed radio royalty legislation. He recalled attending Frehley’s private funeral on October 22nd, describing the experience as deeply painful.
“It breaks my heart. Peter Criss, our founding drummer, Paul [Stanley] and myself went to the funeral, open casket. It was just heartbreaking,” he said. He said that the most tragic part was that “Ace just couldn’t stay alive long enough to sit there proudly at the Kennedy Center” and hear tributes from “really impressive people”, adding: “What can you say – sad.”
Simmons has previously addressed why the bandmates sometimes didn’t intervene more forcefully as Frehley struggled. Speaking to People, he said: “Let’s just continue doing the tour because you want to get through it for selfish reasons because it’s working, and the chicks, and the money, and you don’t want to ruin anything… Meantime, somebody who might be your brother is ruining their life by bad decisions.”
With his smoking guitar solos, silver makeup, and effortless swagger, Frehley helped define KISS’ sound and style during the ’70s. He wrote fan favourites like “Cold Gin”, “Shock Me”, and “Parasite”, and became a hero to young guitarists everywhere.
Frehley’s 1978 solo album spawned his signature song, “New York Groove”, and outsold the solo releases of his bandmates. After leaving KISS, he formed Frehley’s Comet, touring and releasing music through the ’80s before reuniting with KISS in 1996 for their blockbuster reunion tour.
