Sadly, Eric Carr passed away on November 24, 1991 due to an aneurysm that probably stemmed from the numerous surgeries he had to remove tumors related to his heart cancer. Before his death, Eric was always writing songs as he was a very creative soul. He could write, he could sing and he could play more than just the drums. ‘Rockology’ is a collection of the songs he had been working on prior to his death. These are demos and not necessarily full fledge songs in some cases so keep that in mind. Think of this as his ‘Vault’ because it is very similar in the type of songs you get on Gene Simmons ‘The Vault’. You get some fully fleshed out songs, you get some where lyrics are being scatted because their aren’t any yet and you get some straight-up instrumentals.
The album was put together by one of Eric’s great friends and former Kiss bandmate, Bruce Kulick. With the help of Adam Mitchell (co-writer of numerous Kiss songs), they pieced together a collection of songs from old cassettes or where ever they could find them. They would clean them up the best they could, add some backing vocals where appropriate and even Bruce overdubbed some killer solos in a few songs to help complete them. Bruce produced the album and I think this was a wonderful tribute to his old friend and bandmate.
This release is a Record Store Day release that came out on April 22, 2023 and it was released as a 2 LP Vinyl and a limited run of CDs (only 500 available). Luckily I got them both. The cool thing about this release is that there are 5 bonus tracks that have been previously unreleased so this it the only place to currently get them. The other really cool thing is how they changed up the cover to look like the 4 Kiss Solo albums with Eric getting an orange color around him. They even included a poster done in the same style of posters from the original Kiss Solo albums. The LP version comes on 2 LPs with translucent splatter vinyl, one orange and one clear. Both beautiful. The CD was designed as a Vinyl replica with a cardboard sleeve and the CD looks like a vinyl. Both packages done with care.
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2 Loud 2 Old Music 