Im sarah montague. There arent many people who are recognisable only from their make up, but mention a zig zag of black flames around the eyes painted on a white face, and millions of people around the world will know you are talking about the frontman of the rock band, kiss. Take away the makeup and you have gene simmons, a man so canny about business that he realised he could make more money from marketing the kiss brand than from selling records. His famously long tongue has also proved a loose one. Hes frequently invited on chat shows and revels in scandalising his critics. But is that also all part of the act . Gene simmons, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you. Wonderful being here. Is it all front with you, promoting an image and a brand through both your music and your opinions . Well, i mean, i think its fair to say we all wake up and stand in front of a mirror and try to see how the rest of the world sees us. If your own shakespeare says the whole worlds a stage then were alljust players. I mean, all of us to some effect, were alljust trying to figure out what to wear, what to say, and how to act, in some ways it is all real. The only time we are as honest and purely innocent without trying to figure out what anyone thinks is perhaps when we are at home alone and there is nobody there tojudge us. But as soon as you leave your home, people have something to say, look at, think about, and so on. So, of course, everything is all an act in the same way as you. Youre a professional, but of course its an act. Ok, but as far as the music is concerned, there are people who say it was always about the front rather than the music. Yeah, they dont care. I mean, take whatever you will from it. But for you, what was it . Well, its a combination of both. We wanted 44 years ago to put together a band no one ever saw on stage, to write the songs that we believed in, and so on, and to make, you know, quite honestly, a complete spectacle out of ourselves, because critics say that we are. And youre damn right we do. We believe in giving folks bang for their buck. And the idea ofjust getting up there cross legged with some incense and an Acoustic Guitar and charging people 100 bucks for a ticket is anathema, which is a big word like gymnasium, we wont go there. We give bang for the buck. But only recently, when you look at the critics of. Can i react to the word critics . Well, the guardian writer, one of the guardian addicts talked about your concert earlier this year, he described it and all earlier concerts as a masterclass in self parody from day one. Well, thank god the guardian thought that. No, listen. But perhaps it is something you agree with, though. Perhaps you set out to say. No, not at all. Not at all. Look, i appreciate the good will and good natured fun, but i have a few houses the critics have bought me. If those are bad reviews, please bring them on. But you have also been honest about how much is spectacle rather than the music. It is clearly both. I dont want to get up on stage with a band i am so proud of and just play the songs. I believe that would be a slap in the face of the audience. We also dont use backing tracks or anything fake. It is a legitimate hard rock band that goes up on stage, and we prefer to give the audience something more than just incense. You said yourself, im not an artist. No, i think thats highly overused. Its not up to me to decide if i am. Its always up to the people. Of the people, for the people, by the people. When someone goes up there and says, im an artist, i would say, who are you . There are some people who write and sing because they feel driven to do it. Is that the same with you . I dont want to tell you the facts of life about those sorts of things. Those people will tell you what you want to hear, its beautifully poetic. Then privately they go back to their mansions and love it in the same way we do. And the attention and the attraction of this sex or the opposite sex, its all part of the game. The real question is would anybody or everybody do this if they did not get a single penny . Ok, but do you still write music . Are you still moved to do so . I wrote a song two weeks ago called your wish is my command. Did you write it to make money . That is a good point. So, the people who create stuff and write stuff are in the Creative Process and afterwards they want to make money. But there is absolutely nothing wrong with sitting down and being hired by somebody, because you are hired by the wonderful and iconic bbc, to sit here. You know full well what you are going to be doing, you are going to be paid money. What is bad about that . 0k. And foryou, i mean, as a band. You mean americas number one Gold Record Award Winning Group of all time in all categories . It is hard wired into your dna, isnt it, to promote . Well, you snooze you lose if im gonna wait for the bbc or anyone else to tell the world how fantastic we are, we will lose. That is why early on you invented band merchandising. But you did not do teacups and coffee cups. Tea cu ps how english i love it. Or t shirts haha you went so much further you have 5,000 different licensed items yeah. Anything from kiss condoms to kiss caskets. Well get you coming, well get you going. The latest, the box set that youre selling at the moment, is called the vault. Almost. Its called genesimmonsvault. Com. Thats actually the title. Its the only place to get it. One of the most extraordinary things youre doing with it, is people can pay extra for this material and get you. Well, lets go one step at a time. No, because i dont want you to list various options. Fine. But you can pay extra to have you personally hand deliver it to their house. Yeah. Thats because when i was a child elvis didnt come to my door and say hey, gene, check out my new album. I am very well off and the fans gave me this opportunity, so i wanted to change the way things are done. The largest box set of all time is the box set i am putting on the website. 0k. But wait. It is three feet tall, 38lb, and spans 50 years of songs with bob dylan and van halen and many people. But i will hop on a plane at my own cost and hand deliver it around the world. I dont know how early sales have gone. Huge oh, so you are travelling a lot next year . I will start injanuary and be out there for 12 months. So you will not get tired and a little frustrated . I will, but so what . When you go run around hyde park, you get tired. For those struggling to think, you know, what is a kiss band . They may not remember. What planet did they come from . We have a clip. Notice how attractive i look. Thats from last year in a way, the offering hasnt changed much in more than four decades. You are now approaching 70. 68 now. Do you not get a bit tired . Oh no. Putting on the make up, and. Do you . But seriously . It is a privilege and an honour. Its more akin to warpaint, the idea. The entire. You know, the roar of the crowd, the smell of the grease paint, the whole process is so exciting. You are backstage and playing music and hanging with the guys and stuff like that and you start to hear the crowd. You know, that thing. There are very few things that get you excited during the course of the day. Come on, you are looking forward to traffic. But to do it for five decades, and you are still having to perform some of the early songs to keep the. Of course, we are and proudly so. Of course. Its wonderful. What betterjob is there . We have more fun than the pope ok, now when you first realised. Kiss was set up in 1973. 1873. In 1973, it was a struggle to begin with, but there was a point when suddenly you started selling records. Well, it wasnt about records. We started selling out stadiums within a year and a half of debuting. We sold out in anaheim stadium. We were headlining above bands that had around for decades. And something happened before cellphones, before voicemail, before anything, really, and itjust happened naturally. Critics never gave us a quarter to get on a bus. And it happened because of the people and we continue. 0ur strongest base, our strongest, you know, at a boy comes from the people. And thats our favourite thing. And for running up debts to get the band going, the money really started rolling in. 0h, big. I remember. My mothers from hungary and she continues to say, how is the orchestra . She has this wonderful. She still has no clue who pays the money or who i work for. Shes been to one of your concerts . She goes all the time and she does my, you know, the hand gesture, and all that, says, i love you. Initially she went up to paul, my bandmate, and did not realise i was on the other end of the room. My life is so amazing. But your life changed as a result of that and as a result of the fact that you were starting to make money, it must have just changed so dramatically. Well, it dramatically changed because i moved to hollywood and i sold out. I became ensconced, which is a big word like gymnasium and power and corruption, all that, but never drugs, never booze, never alcohol. Ive still never been high or drunk in my life. I dont care if anyone thinks im making it up or believes it. Oh, thats a lie. Thats my choice in life and you can do whatever you want. I would never break my mothers heart. She was 1a years of age when she was in the concentration camps of nazi germany. I dont feel i have the right to disappoint her in any way. My mother is proud of her son, i have done myjob. And its because of your mother that you thought i will not do something that affects her health. Youre her only son. Its not about health, its about not breaking her heart. She is 92 and just kicking a. Im not supposed to say that other word. Shes continues to be the inspiration that keeps me going straight, that prevents me from drifting off to the dark side, because, you know, the papers are littered with people who self abuse. But including your bandmates, two of the original members of the band have written about their own problems with drugs, coke and alcohol. 0ne, peter criss, said, i had a coke problem at the time, it was the thing. Everyone was doing it. I wasnt. Ineverdid. I was so stupid and naive about it, i went in to a Recording Studio and there was a mirror there, and sweet and low, the artificial sweetener, had just come out, and i had artificial sweetener in my coffee, i was watching my girlish figure. There was some there, and i thought someone had spilt some sweetener, but it was coke. I did not know what it was, and someone stopped me using it. I rapidly learned to stay away from losers. That is why you got rid of two of the original members of the band. Three different times. They came around three different times and lost fortunes every time. Peter criss, when writing about it, said it made him work harder, it was fuel to him. Oh, thats nonsense. Everyone gets delusional with chemicals inside their body. Without it i would not be creative, that kind of. It is an enabling device. The truth is you are born with everything you need. Anything else you put in your body that numbs your body and mind, it is your enemy. What was it like within the band if you are alone are teetotal . Paul was also a teetotaller. What was it like . There was huge tension. We had argument and fights and lawyers got involved. And of course, invariably, you had to get rid of them. Because how can you imagine playing on a Football Team if you can not depend on them . You pass them the ball and theyre too high to understand it and then you lose it. Well, you dont lose, we all lose. You didnt touch drink or drugs. The women, though, that sort of third element of the rock and roll life, you really went to town there. Its all true. 4,800 women is supposedly your record, your tally. Well, you know, one or two, thats all in the past. Im married. Yeah, you know, one or two, whatever that is, yeah, i love my wife, shannon, and i waited like a jackass. Are you allowed to say that word . Thats fine. Im a jackass and i have been all my life, im a lonely child and its like living in a bakery and being on a diet, youre in a rock band and everything gets thrown in your face, the bad stuff, women, all that stuff. I didnt want to grow up, i was caught up, i was arrogant, self engrossed and all that. It took forever, it took shannon, my wife, my two kids, nick and sophie, to kick me in the nuts and make me grow up and be a man. Your wife made you burn the polaroids which were the proof of the 4,800. It was a public thing, it wasnt a secret. You put it all behind you but you have run into difficulties very recently because of the things you said when he went into fox news, you were banned for life because you barged into a staff meeting. I didnt. You didnt . Certainly not. The story is you barged in, you opened your shirt and you said, chicks, sue me what is your first name . Sarah. I go on social media right now and says sarah met me backstage and she said, and i can say whatever i want, it goes on social media and if its at all. So what happened . Nothing. Heres how i wear my shirt, someone there apparantly had the goods in for me and called the daily beast or something and said whatever they said i did. I did nothing. I aways have people around me, like when i come here, ive got handlers and everyone sees what im doing. You cant go into a public area and do anything. Let me finish. The problem with social media today is nobody calls you and says, do you have a comment . The story was printed and of course everybody exploded. And fox, theyre nice people, i like them a lot, but theyre closed ranks and theyre afraid of getting sued by everybody but nothing happened, i stand by every word. Nothing happened but they banned you . Thats right, thats exactly right. I stand by every word ijust said. You will know the hash tag metoo, where women are calling out behaviour where they have suffered in the past Sexual Harassment at the hands of men and your name has appeared in a couple of tweets. Why would i want to do anything. Look, im not even going to hold up the hypothetical. Nothing happened. All of a sudden, 44 years on in a rock band somebodys coming up and saying this guys a bad guy, its not true. I think the climate is horrifically, bad and yet at the same time empowering to the right women. There are some really bad guys out there, ijust happen not to be one of them. When you read what women are saying are happening to them, what do you think about the culture that you and in one sense everyone lived through . The women who were going after the weinsteins of the world . Yeah. They should go to the cops. The police are here and the court system is here for you to do what the women did with bill cosby. If you have a complaint, go to the cops. Going through the court of Public Opinion on social media is maybe exactly happened the way it happened. Why dont you get yourself a lawyer and do Due Diligence . Isnt there a question of changing the culture, the kind of stuff you maybe dont go to the police over but you think, im going to go and call this out because women dont have to accept it any longer. There is an organisation in england, i saw it yesterday on a chat show, the woman heads it, about the victims, the men who are committing suicide were wrongly convicted of all kinds of nonsense. What about them . Do you think its gone too far . Im not saying its gone too. Im saying go to the cops. Lets go back to your mother. Now i like you. The single most important person in your life. Should be the single most important person to everybodylife. Its because of her background, she was a survivor of the holocaust, and also because when she arrived in america, she was with you, single mum, you were aged eight, and you remember that time and it seems to have had a huge effect on you throughout your life . Well, our. My father. I fall back on our because it still hurts. My father abandoned me when i was about seven years old and my dear mother took on the reins and the responsibility the way so many millions of mothers around the world raise families as a single mother, whether theyre married or not. We came to america when i was eight years old and i was totally unprepared for everything and my mother had language difficulties, she only spoke hungarian, i spoke hebrew, hungarian and one or two other languages, none of us spoke english. It was enormously hard for my mother and what i saw was the most empowering, inspirational human being id ever seen in movies, television, anything, and it was my mother, who would wake up at the crack of dawn and go to work every day and make sure her son would turn out 0k. Thats why i have a lifelong responsibility. Youre going to get me choked up here so im going to stop now. Go ahead. I wonder how it makes you feel about whats happening in america now about attempts to stop immigrants . I am an immigrant, im a illegal immigrant, i dont know why anyone would care what a guy in a band thinks about immigration or politics, but youre asking so im going to give you one citizens opinion. That is that Legal Immigration is the right thing because at least people know who you are, where you come from. Some vetting, its called Due Diligence in business, but you want to vet who comes and goes, and i give that power to the government. I willingly say i want you to know where i am if im pay taxes and so on, if i commit a crime, i want you to know where i am, heres my fingerprints, im all for that. There are 11 20 million Illegal Immigrants in america. Now, my heart goes out to anyone that comes to america or england for a better life and all that. I get it, i get it. Emotionally and sympathetically im with you all the way. But unfortunately bad guys come along with that as well. I just want to say the following, the pope, who im a big fan of him, i think hes a good human being, he said walls around your land are not a nice thing. Maybe so, but the vatican has an enormous wall going around it. But your own daughter said, were a country built on immigrants and survivors. Legal immigrants. And whats happening right now when were closing our doors on that is shocking to me because my family wouldnt be here. Both my parents are immigrants. I love sophie, shes the rights holder of anybody, and when youre 20 and 25 years old, i did too, immigrants is all encompassing, its not. When youre illegal immigrant theres a vetting process, when you keep the doors open, im going to suggest in your country, let everyone in, without any vetting, are you for that . What about the children of Illegal Immigrants, the dreamers . It breaks my heart and i dont have the answer because if i was here illegally and i had a child, id say do whatever you want with me but please let my child have a better life. Thats the emotion and romance of it. You have said about trump, give him time. Its President Trump, and ill tell you why. I dont necessarily like ordislike him. Did you vote for him . He was duly elected and ill tell you why i wont answer that either, i may not have, but the reason your founding fathers, and in america they have those curtains when you vote, its nobodys damn business who you voted for and if a citizen asks you that youre just going to get into an argument. I wonder, given the record youve seen so far whether youd be prepared to vote for him for a second time . I know the man personally a little bit, i also know president clinton and president bush. Youve worked with him as well, havent you . Yes. President trump doesnt really care how you think about him, hes really a lone guy. Thats neither not good nor bad, it is what it is, he doesnt pretend to be a politician and he really doesnt care what you think about him. This is either going to turn out to be good or bad. I know hes hurt a lot of people by the things hes said, hes unfiltered, what you see is what you get, hes not an ideologue, hes neither republican or democrat. Dont think for a second that because im saying this im for this or this. I dont trust politicians, neither side would have me, socially im very liberal. Gay rights, lgbt community, if you want to worship a rock or be an atheist, im on your side, i will march right with you, dont tell me what kind of life to have. But foreign policy, im as conservative as you would imagine. Fiscally im very, very conservative. What does that make me, a member of the american party. Let me ask you finally then about family. Finally i thought we were going to be for the whole day. You arrive with your mother, youre eight years old. You look at where you are now and how successful you have been, she feels proud of you . Oh, yeah. My mother. Wow. Shell take a book or magazine or something i have been in and she will start crying. From her perspective of being a concentration camp survivor and seeing her whole family to being in israel and then coming to america and seeing her son scale the heights and all that, shes taught me to be fearless and look bbc right in the face and say, to thine own self be true. Take it or leave it, i dont care how you feel about it, im clean inside and this is who i am and i learned that from my mother. Gene simmons, thank you for coming on. It was a pleasure to see me. Hello there. Wednesday is going to bring some fairly disturbed weather across the country, courtesy of what the Irish Weather Service have named storm georgina. Across the uk it will bring gales and heavy rain which could cause travel disruption. Your local bbc Radio Station will keep you up to date with that. Here is the storm drifting across the north west of scotland. Look at those white lines, the isobars on the chart. That shows we will have pretty strong and gusty wind, showers feeding in below around scotland during the first part of the morning and these, to give you an idea of the wind gusts we expect, 50, 60, 70 miles an hour in exposed spots. Gusty winds and showers into northern ireland. As we drift down across england and wales, a band of heavy rain, and intense downpour accompanying particularly squally and gusty winds. That rain band with the gusty wind will only track eastwards slowly as we head on through the day. Lets run wednesdays weather through. Windy wherever you are, a band of rain sinking south and east across england and wales with gusty wind. Behind the rain band, bright skies. Spells of sunshine, showers chasing along into western areas, there could be wintry showers are the high ground in the north because you will get into some slightly chilly air. 6 10 degrees by the end of the afternoon, one of those days where the temperature drops away as the day goes on. Into wednesday night it will be a cool night generally, a fresh feel and clear spellsk still showers flinging in from the west and temperatures by dawn on thursday will be between two and seven degrees. Thursday, not a bad day for many. Spells of sunshine around, still some showers drifting in from the west. A little area of low pressure drifting across the country, acting as a focus for those showers moving eastwards as as far as far as temperatures go on thursday, still a slightly fresher feel, 5 nine degrees. For the time of year that is not too bad. That area of low pressure responsible for showers should drift away on thursday night and we try to bring in a bulge of high pressure, a little ridge toppling in from the west. If the timing is right it would give some frost to start friday morning but should bring a decent day. Rain into the far north west later perhaps temperatures of 4 9d. And the weekend . After a slightly chilly couple of days to end the week, the temperature should start to climb again. Cloud and rain in the north west but hopefully some sunshine as well. Im rico hizon in singapore. This is newsday. The headlines free trade in a spin, as President Trump slaps tariffs on some asian imports. Executive actions uphold the principle of fair trade and demonstrate to the world that United States will not be taken advantage of anymore. The us attorney general becomes the first member of President Trumps cabinet to be questioned by the special counsel. Im Babita Sharma in london