If you were a 12 y/o boy in 1976, and were making the transition from G.I. Joe, comic books and super heros to music and girls, then KISS was the perfect stepping stone into rock and roll and your teenage years. For example, I went from drawing Superman and Batman to being able to draw all KISS faces and suddenly I was popular with the other 5th graders who wanted me to draw KISS on their school book covers, etc. And while girls at first didn't really like KISS and thought we guys were strange, once the song "Beth" came out then even the girls started liking them, which gave us some common ground as we entered Jr. High School and started going to dances together.

So take all of that and add in a cool Les Paul guitar that smokes and can launch rockets, and you've got the new "hero" that a million 13 y/o boys want to grow up to be... a Rock Star ala' Ace Frehley. So it was "Mom/Dad... please buy me a Les Paul, an amp, and sign me up for guitar lessons!" Plus the fact that their music is chocked full of pure 70's classic rock riffs, sing-along hooks, and (at the time) the biggest, loudest and most spectacular show on the planet, and you've got a winning combination. And the fact that our parent's didn't "get it" was just icing on the cake since every teenager seems bent on finding something that can set them apart (and piss off their parents in the process - LOL).

KISS was really no different than what Elvis did in the 50's with his hip shaking moves (heaven forbid they show THAT on TV so we'll just film him from the waist up) or the Beatles and Stones in the 60's (with their long hair and drugs) or KISS in the 70's (fire breathing, blood spitting, make-up wearing comic book characters)... it's a classic story of teenage rebellion and being at the right place at the right time, which was where KISS found themselves from late 1975 to 1979. Before that they were just 4 guys trying to find their niche in order to make it big. After that they became a marketing success story but that also became the running joke that still follows them (something like "Gene Simmons would put make-up on his mother's coffin if he thought he could make a buck off of it!")

Now as for some song suggestions...
These songs still bring a smile to my face and take me back to those nights sitting on my bed with my Montgomery Wards catalog bought Les Paul copy, a little Fender Champ amp, and records like KISS Alive, Destroyer and Love Gun (plus BTO, Skynyrd, Hendrix, Zeppelin, and a couple of K-Tel's greatest rock hits) scattered across the floor as I would pick up the record player needle and put it back over and over again, while trying to figure out some riff or guitar solo..... ah, Good Times! :)

Detroit Rock City
Love Gun
Hard Luck Woman (I always liked this better than Beth)
Watchin' You
Makin' Love
Firehouse (I like the guitar solo)
Rock Bottom (the acoustic intro was one of the first things I figured out all by myself... I was so proud!)
Strange Ways
Goin' Blind
2000 Man (better than the Stones' original version)

And now, almost 35 years later, one of my favorite memories is being 13 years old and my dad driving me and 2 buddies for 4 hours, through winter snows, to see my first real rock concert... KISS on their Alive II tour in January of 1978.  Dad's "cool factor" went up several points that day in my eyes.