In my newest guide, Speak to Me: Conversations With Ace Frehley, I collected all of my many interviews with Ace through the years. Plus, all-new interviews with such famend rock names as Eddie Trunk, Joe Bonamassa, and Soundgarden‘s Kim Thayil (amongst others), to pay tribute to certainly one of rock music’s all-time greats, who handed away on October 16, 2025, on the age of 74.
Additionally interviewed for the guide was That Metallic Present co-host and slapstick comedian Don Jamieson. And through our chat, I could not assist however ask if he felt that Ace might have lower it as a comic. Right here is an excerpt from the guide, by which Jamieson shares his opinion.
“Nicely, here is the factor – being a stand-up comedian, you need to be very self-disciplined. It’s important to take the job actually critically. Be lethal critical, to have quite a lot of enjoyable with it. And I believe Ace was a bit bit extra scattered. The factor that he put all his power in was enjoying the guitar. That is the place his focus all the time went. But when he simply needed to place the guitar down and stand up there and do jokes, with a bit superb tuning, yeah, he might have been hilarious. As a result of, hey, a minimum of he would have laughed at his jokes.”
Additionally within the guide, I had the chance to ask Jamieson about an notorious TV interview from Halloween 1979, by which the unique 4 members of Kiss have been interviewed by Tom Snyder on The Tomorrow Present. Throughout which, Ace steals the present together with his joking method and infectious laughter.
“I’m going again and watch that Tom Snyder factor a minimum of yearly. It truly is like watching a headline comic do a full set, as a result of there’s even a degree in direction of the tip of the interview – it is a few 30-minute interview – the place Ace does have a lull with Tom. However then like, the final couple minutes, he has a flurry of actually humorous jokes, and he ends robust. That is like, each comedian – you are killing the entire present, then you may have this lull for a bit bit, however then you may have a couple of extra that it may kill them on the finish. And also you get off stage on the large giggle. And that is what it was like.”
“Tom Snyder cherished Ace a lot – to the purpose the place he actually turned his again on Gene and Paul. He wasn’t even them for minutes at a time. And even the director had turned the digital camera in direction of Ace and Peter, and you may hear Gene off digital camera making an attempt to throw one-liners in. However they don’t seem to be touchdown. They’re simply all bombing. However each time they’d convey the digital camera again to Gene and Paul, they have been livid – this was every thing they did not need the general public to see.”
Lastly, Jamieson recalled a memorable look Frehley made on VH1’s That Metallic Present again in 2011, which once more, displayed his humorousness, and, unpredictable nature.
“When Ace did That Metallic Present, he would all the time come ready with one thing humorous, which I all the time cherished. Ace had such an excellent humorousness. So, we have been interviewing him about how he created the smoking guitar he is well-known for. And he goes, ‘Truly, I’ve a brand new invention that I need to debut in your present right now.’ Now, our producer didn’t inform us this was coming, so it was a complete shock. He goes, “You guys know the electrical smoking guitar. Nicely, I received a brand new factor…the smoking flute.” And he takes out a bit wood flute. He begins enjoying it, smoke begins billowing out the tip of it, and the three of us doubled over in laughter. It was such a priceless second. And I believe Eddie nonetheless has that flute to today.
Speak to Me: Conversations With Ace Frehley is accessible on the market now, as paperback, hardcover, and Kindle editions.
