By Maria Sherman, Associated Press | It’s never really the end of the road for Kiss. The hard rock quartet have sold their catalog, brand name and IP to Swedish company Pophouse Entertainment Group in a deal estimated to be over $300 million, it was announced Thursday.
This isn’t the first time Kiss has partnered with Pophouse, which was co-founded by ABBA’s Björn Ulvaeus. When the band’s current lineup — founders Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons as well as guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer — took the stage at the final night of their farewell tour in December at New York City’s famed Madison Square Garden, they ended by revealing digitized avatars of themselves.
The cutting-edge technology was created by George Lucas’ special-effects company, Industrial Light & Magic, in partnership with Pophouse. The two companies recently teamed up for the “ABBA Voyage” show in London, in which fans could attend a full concert by the Swedish band in their heyday, as performed by their own digital avatars.
The ways in which Kiss’ avatars will be utilized has yet to be announced, but Pophouse CEO Per Sundin says fans can expect a biopic, a documentary and a Kiss experience on the horizon.
An avatar show is scheduled to launch in the second half of 2027 — but don’t expect it to look anything like “ABBA Voyage,” Sundin told the AP. And fans can expect it to kick off in North America.
Sundin says the goal of the purchase is to expose Kiss to new generations — which he believes sets Pophouse apart from other acquisitions of music catalogs.
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Read more on this innovative process here:
https://apnews.com/article/kiss-sells-catalog-brand-name-ip-pophouse-061d34ce4e92efffc25f35c62670a4f2
[Thanks to Alex Teitz for contributing this article! http://www.femmusic.com]
Photo: KISS Meme | From their Facebook page | By Thomas Kilmister | End of the road #KISS50
KISS Sells Catalog, Brand Name and IP. Gene Simmons Assures Fans It is a ‘collaboration’
