Kiss sells its catalog and intellectual property, Gene Simmons says it is a “collaboration”

Kiss hasn’t completely said goodbye. The hard rock quartet sold its catalog, brand and intellectual property to Swedish company Pophouse Entertainment Group in a deal estimated at more than $300 million that was announced Thursday.

This is not the first time Kiss Is associated with Pophouse, co-founded by Björn Ulvaeus of ABBA. When the band’s current lineup, which includes the founders Paul Stanley and Gene Simmonsas well as the guitarist Tommy Thayer and the drummer Eric Singertook the stage on the final night of their farewell tour in December at New York’s Madison Square Garden, revealed that they had made 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 show “ABBA Voyage” in London, where fans were treated to a full concert of the Swedish band depicted in their heyday, which was performed by their digital avatars.

How avatars will be used Kiss has not yet been announced, but the CEO of PophousePer Sundin, says fans can expect a Kiss biopic, documentary and experience on the horizon.

An avatar show is expected in the second half of 2027, but it will be different from “ABBA Voyage,” Sundin told the AP. And it will most likely start in North America.

Sundin says the goal of the purchase is to expose Kiss to new generations, which he believes sets Kiss apart. Pophouse from other music catalog acquisitions.

“The record companies, the big three that remain, are doing a fantastic job, but they have a lot of catalog and can’t focus on everything“, says. “We work together with Universal (Music Group) and Kiss, even though we will own the rights to the artists, and we are doing it together with Kiss. But yes, we bought all the rights, and that is not something I have seen so clearly before”.

“I don’t like the word acquisition“, said Gene Simmons to the AP via Zoom, assuring that the band would never sell their catalog to a company they didn’t appreciate.

“It is exactly a collaboration. “It would be negligent in our inferred fiduciary duty to abandon what we created,” he continued. “People might misinterpret it and think, ‘Okay, now Pophouse is doing that stuff and we’re sitting around in Beverly Hills.’ That is not true. We are in the trenches with them. We talk all the time. We share ideas. It’s a collaboration. Paul (Stanley) and I especially, with the band, will remain committed to this. “He’s our baby.”

But there is some truth in that there was a goodbye: There will be no more live tours, really. ““We are not going to tour like Kiss again, period,” Simmons said.. “We are not going to go put on makeup and go out into the street.”

Kiss is the second investment of Pophouse Outside Sweden: In February, Cyndi Lauper partnered with the company in a deal that includes the sale of most of her music and a new project that she calls a “immersive theater piece” that transports the audience to the New York in which he grew up.

The goal is to develop new ways to bring Lauper’s music to fans and younger audiences through new shows and live experiences.

“Most executives, when you tell them an idea, their eyes glaze over, they just want your best hits.“Lauper told the AP at the headquarters of Pophouse in Stockholm in February. “But these guys are a multimedia company, they’re not just looking to buy my catalog, they want to do something new”.