Happy birthday to Gene Simmons of Kiss, Rob Halford of Judas Priest, and Vivian Campbell of Def Leppard

By Steve Newton

Three rockers from the realms of hard rock and heavy metal, all of whom I’ve interviewed in the past, are celebrating birthdays today (August 25).

Eldest of the bunch is Gene Simmons, the bassist and vocalist of Kiss, who turned 75 today. He was born as Chaim Witz in Haifa, Israel.

I interviewed Simmons in 1992, nine years after Kiss had taken off its famous makeup for the Lick It Up album.

“Every day of the year,” Simmons told me, “there are bankers holding up cheques in front of our faces, saying, ‘Put the make-up back on and you can keep this big cheque.’ And even though it’s appealing, we don’t really want to do that because it’ll become like a Las Vegas show. It deals with nostalgia, and I’m much more interested in the future and the present than I am in the past.

“You know,” he added, “it’s like somebody walking up to you and saying, ‘Wow, when you were a baby you used to wear diapers. Why don’t you put it back on again?’ And I’m not a baby any more. That’s exactly the point.”

Judas Priest vocalist Rob Halford, who turned 73 today, was born in Birmingham, England. I was fortunate enough to have interviewed him five times, four times as a member of Priest and once as the frontman for industrial-rock band Two.

I did my first interview with Halford back in 1984 when Judas Priest was touring behind its latest album, Defenders of the Faith.

At one point in the conversation I told Halford that I thought it was hilarious how, at the 3:46 mark of their video for “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin'”,  the authority figure who arrives to shut the group down loses his trousers–as well as his head.

“Well, of course that was an added bonus,” replied Halford. “The reason that happened was because the technical experts that were responsible for blowing the dummy’s head off had been hanging around the set locations for a good eight hours, and they were more than looking forward to letting us see what they could do.

“But they rather packed too much plastic explosive, with the result that not only the head blew up but the pants fell down as well, you know. But I think that gave the video a little side of humour and credibility. I think if that hadn’t of happened it would have been a little bit violent, you know.”

Def Leppard guitarist Vivian Campbell, the youngest of today’s volume-loving birthday boys, turned 62 today. The Belfast-born picker joined the band in 1992, replacing guitarist Steve Clark, who had died the before.

I interviewed Campbell when he was 30 years old, five months after he became an official member of Def Leppard.

“All I ever wanted was to be in a band,” he told me, “and, unfortunately, I’ve been in too many. This will definitely be the last one, and, God willing, everything will work out. I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t. I mean, if I can’t work with these guys, I can’t work with anyone.”

To hear the full audio of my interviews with Gene Simmons, Rob Halford, and Vivian Campbell subscribe to my Patreon page, where you can eavesdrop on over 450 of my uncut, one-on-one conversations with rockers since 1982.