April 27, 1951-October 16, 2025
I know that I’m a little late posting about the tragic death of the legendary Ace Frehley, but I wanted to post about him after Thirty-One Days O’Horror so that I could give his death my full attention. As many of my readers know, I’m a massive KISS fan and have been for a very long time. Back in 2022, I spent an entire year celebrating all of KISS’ studio albums including the four solo albums. The first solo album that I reviewed was Ace’s album. It has long been considered the best album out of the four. There have been theories abound about why the band decided to release the four solo projects in 1978. One theory is that they were released in an attempt to bring the band closer together after a number of years of backstage fighting amongst the members of the group. Others believe that Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley came up with the solo albums idea in order to put Ace Frehley and Peter Criss in their place, expecting both of them to flop tremendously with their albums while Gene and Paul’s albums would be massive successes. Ace’s album proved to be the most popular one and over time, has become the most successful of the solo albums.
One thing Ace’s solo album did do was prove that he could write and perform music without the help of his KISS bandmates. It may or may not have been the catalyst that eventually lead to Ace leaving the band in 1982, but in any case, he did just that. This would lead to a string of solo albums, the first two being released under the moniker of Frehley’s Comet. His fourth album, Trouble Walkin’, and the six releases after it, were all released under Ace Frehley’s name.
While Ace didn’t achieve the massive success as a solo artist that he experienced while in KISS, he remained a relevant rock star throughout the 80s and, much like KISS, began to fade as the decade came to a close. In 1996, Ace rejoined Gene, Paul, and Peter and embarked on a successful reunion tour. Ace remained with the band until 2002 when he made his second exit. He would experience something of a renaissance with a string of six amazing solo projects beginning with Anomaly in 2009 and ending with 10,000 Volts in 2024.
Ace’s relationship with KISS has always been a bit tense, but just months before his death he talked about his close friendship with Gene on a podcast. He also addressed a number of his experiences, good and band, with KISS in his memoir, No Regrets (2011), a book that I highly recommend. He was also very open about his battle with alcoholism and took great joy in hearing of fans who won their own battles with alcoholism after being inspired by him.
Ace fell in his home studio on September 25, 2025 and ended up on life support due to a brain bleed. The life support was turned off on October 16, ending the life and career of Ace Frehley.
Ace’s death hit me hard. I cried on a number of occasions as I watched old interviews, listened to his music and the music of KISS, and just sat alone thinking about him and his work. I’m no musician, but I always describe his playing style as drunk, sloppy, yet clean. He always sounded, in my opinion, as if he was about to lose all control of his hands on the guitar, but he played so ridiculously well. His style sounded sloppy, but it was beautiful and much more intricate than he was ever credited for it being. Ace was the coolest guy in KISS and he was cool with zero effort. He just WAS cool. It didn’t matter if he was ripping out a solo or telling jokes or laughing his ridiculous laugh, he was cool the entire time. That’s a rare quality in people, especially rock stars. Most of them try very hard to be cool by changing their image, acting a certain way in interviews, or doing things for attention. Ace wasn’t like that, Ace was just Ace twenty-four seven. The guy would literally stroll into a Walmart and buy the five and ten dollar tees that average folks would buy and then wear them to meet-and-greets. Ace is credited with designing KISS’ iconic logo. He’s the reason so many guitar players have a lightning bolt guitar strap. He was Ace Freakin’ Frehley, the Space Ace, a “plumber,” and one of the greatest guitar players of all time.
Rest amongst the stars, Space Ace. You will never be forgotten.
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