The Ben Shapiro Show - The Evolution of a Rockstar | Gene Simmons

00:00:00.000 And then one day, I can't remember who, said, hey, let's go downstairs to Woolworth and bought makeup and black lipstick and red lipstick and decided to put on makeup.

00:00:11.000 If you ask people on the street, just a close-up of Teddy Roosevelt on the You know, Mount Rushmore.

00:00:19.000 Who's that?

00:00:20.000 I have no idea.

00:00:21.000 But as soon as you show those faces, they go, oh yeah, kiss.

00:00:25.000 Even if you hate the band.

00:00:26.000 And I'm talking Africa, Southeast Asia, anywhere you go.

00:00:30.000 It doesn't mean it's the best band.

00:00:32.000 It just means that the imagery connected in ways No other band connected.

00:00:38.000 Gene Simmons is a rock and roll legend, best known as the charismatic bassist and frontman of KISS. With a larger-than-life persona theatrical concert style and signature face paint, Simmons and KISS revolutionized rock in the 1970s and 80s with hits like I Was Made For Lovin' You and Rock and Roll All Night.

00:00:53.000 Born in Haifa, Israel, Simmons immigrated to New York City with his mother as a young boy and was inspired to become a performer after seeing The Beatles appear on The Ed Sullivan Show.

00:01:00.000 With a knack for marketing and a love of music, Simmons created his demon persona to make Kiss a massive success.

00:01:05.000 44 albums later and at 100 million records sold, the band just finished their farewell tour in 2023.

00:01:10.000 Beyond his musical career, Gene Simmons has leveraged his stage personality into a career as an entrepreneur, appearing on reality television and launching a successful merchandising empire.

00:01:19.000 In today's episode, Gene tells the story of his family's persecution and immigration to the United States, how his upbringing shaped his personal philosophy, and his journey to becoming an iconic rock star.

00:01:27.000 He also shares the reason for his deep American patriotism as well as a few hard-learned lessons about love.

00:01:33.000 Gene Simmons' impact on American music and culture is undeniable.

00:01:36.000 Don't miss the legendary Gene Simmons on this episode of the Sunday Special.

00:01:39.000 Gene Simmons, thanks so much for stopping by.

00:01:51.000 I appreciate it.

00:01:52.000 It's my pleasure.

00:01:54.000 You're actually better looking than I thought you were.

00:01:57.000 Wow, I didn't think that was even possible.

00:01:59.000 Since, as everyone knows, I'm just like a godlike specimen.

00:02:03.000 Well, as we both know, these are semantics, but I'm not anti-semantic.

00:02:10.000 Okay, so I want to begin with sort of your recent foray into anti-woke politics.

00:02:16.000 You've been speaking out pretty openly about the evils of wokeism and the extreme left.

00:02:23.000 You sort of consider yourself a political centrist, is that right?

00:02:25.000 Well, I think it's fair to say that I'm completely unqualified in the body politic, especially worldwide body politic, because our perceptions, perhaps yours, mine, and The rest of the populace is based on what we see, hear, and feel emotionally from social media.

00:02:47.000 Having said that, why anybody would care what I have to say about anything other than the fact that I stick my tongue out for a living?

00:02:56.000 By the way, I would have done that for you right away, but the floor is a little dirty.

00:03:01.000 So I think it's fair to say that the powerful and attractive man you see before you Votes on issues rather than political parties or personalities.

00:03:16.000 So, by the way, some of the things you've said I completely disagree with, and other things just make sense to me.

00:03:25.000 And that's what I highly recommend to the rest of the populace of this third stone from the sun.

00:03:32.000 Which is to say that life gives you a menu and you're lucky and blessed to be living in a free society.

00:03:41.000 Pick and choose the items that make sense for you.

00:03:45.000 You may not be changing lots of stuff, but at least you'll be voting your conscience.

00:03:51.000 So am I essential?

00:03:52.000 I don't like labels because they limit who and what you are.

00:03:58.000 A free spirit generally...

00:04:03.000 Very liberal in terms of humanism.

00:04:06.000 Generally speaking, love thy neighbor as thyself.

00:04:10.000 Most of the time.

00:04:11.000 I don't treat Nazis the same way as I would perhaps you.

00:04:16.000 You know, love thy name.

00:04:19.000 You know, don't...

00:04:19.000 What's that phrase?

00:04:22.000 Do unto others what they would unto you.

00:04:24.000 In other words, don't do the stuff you think will hurt.

00:04:26.000 Well, that also generally applies.

00:04:28.000 A sadomasochist might slap you in the face, and I'm going, what are you doing that for?

00:04:33.000 He goes, well, I'm a sadomasochist. 0.70

00:04:35.000 I like that.

00:04:36.000 I thought you'd like it too.

00:04:38.000 So we can apply...

00:04:39.000 Everything's just general.

00:04:40.000 There's always an exception to it.

00:04:42.000 So the short answer, although...

00:04:44.000 You've opened up a can of worms because you can tell I love the sound of my own voice, is that I respond to issues, mull them over, and sometimes I think it makes all the sense in the world to build a wall Around any sovereign state,

00:05:05.000 and it's interesting to note, by the way, that not too long ago, the Pope, who I'm a big fan of, I think is good for humanity, and generally speaking, provides uplifting messages, said, and I'm almost quoting, that building a wall, especially between America and Mexico, is not humane.

00:05:28.000 It's not good.

00:05:29.000 It's not nice and all that stuff.

00:05:30.000 Except for the fact that the Vatican has a massive wall around itself.

00:05:35.000 So, I believe good fences make good neighbors.

00:05:40.000 And you're talking to an immigrant, a legal immigrant.

00:05:44.000 I know I don't look Swiss.

00:05:47.000 I was born in Israel.

00:05:50.000 And in a lot of ways, I... Consider myself American.

00:05:56.000 You know, this idea of Jewish American or Israeli American or African American.

00:06:00.000 So, you know, get used to it.

00:06:02.000 You're American if you love it.

00:06:04.000 And I should probably stop.

00:06:07.000 Otherwise, it's going to be the Gene Simmons show, not the Ben.

00:06:10.000 By the way, you know what?

00:06:12.000 You know, I speak Hebrew, Hungarian, German, English, a few other languages.

00:06:18.000 You know what your name means, don't you?

00:06:20.000 In Hebrew?

00:06:21.000 Yeah, I do.

00:06:22.000 But why don't you give me the explication?

00:06:25.000 Well, full name is Benjamin.

00:06:27.000 Literal translation is son of Jamin, which would be the family of Jamin.

00:06:33.000 Shortened means Ben.

00:06:35.000 Most people don't know that Ben...

00:06:38.000 And by the way, our Semitic brethren use a similar word, Ben.

00:06:43.000 Like Ben Laden is the same thing. 0.96

00:06:45.000 It's the son of the family of Laden. 1.00

00:06:48.000 So when people watch Ben-Hur...

00:06:51.000 You're 12, right?

00:06:52.000 So you're not familiar with that movie?

00:06:55.000 Never heard of it?

00:06:56.000 Yeah.

00:06:56.000 It's really about a Jewish guy who tried to survive in Roman times, but the literal translation of his name is the son of the family of Hur.

00:07:05.000 Yep.

00:07:05.000 Well, I mean, whenever I'm called to the Torah, that is the way that you're described, right?

00:07:10.000 I'm Benjamin Aharon ben David Yaakov, right?

00:07:12.000 Meaning Benjamin Aaron, the son of David Jacob, which is my father's name.

00:07:17.000 I notice you're speaking semi-American Svaradit.

00:07:21.000 Exactly.

00:07:22.000 Instead of Ashkenazi. 0.75

00:07:24.000 My wife's Moroccan.

00:07:25.000 That's why I got it.

00:07:26.000 I started integrating all of her habits into my Hebrew pronunciation.

00:07:30.000 Yeah.

00:07:31.000 Always do what your wife says. 0.85

00:07:34.000 You know why men die younger than their wives? 0.97

00:07:37.000 Because they want to.

00:07:41.000 Don't tell your wife that.

00:07:44.000 So, I want to talk to you a little bit about the sort of heterodox politics that you described, because it used to be in the United States that that was sort of considered the norm, is that you could hold a wide variety of views, sometimes in conflict with one another, that heterodoxy was sort of the way of the world.

00:07:58.000 That is the way that you approached political issues.

00:08:01.000 It wasn't straight-line partisan.

00:08:02.000 You could hold by one party.

00:08:03.000 You could hold by the other party.

00:08:05.000 You could have a mix of the two.

00:08:06.000 And now it seems as though all the heterodoxy seems to have moved to one side of the aisle.

00:08:11.000 It's one of the bizarre...

00:08:12.000 Things that sort of happening in American politics today.

00:08:14.000 If you look at the left side of the aisle, there's not a lot of ideological diversity.

00:08:17.000 If you look to, for example, the Trump coalition, you have people who disagree on pretty much every issue that it's possible to disagree on.

00:08:25.000 You have pro-choicers and pro-lifers inside the Trump coalition.

00:08:27.000 You have people who are pro-big government and pro-small government.

00:08:30.000 You have people who are interventionist and isolationist.

00:08:32.000 All inside sort of the same coalition.

00:08:35.000 And I wonder how much of that has to do, you think, with, say, Donald Trump.

00:08:39.000 And how much do you think that has to do with the sort of increasingly censorious nature of the left?

00:08:45.000 Well, in the full interest of full disclosure before the fact, I knew the gentlemen somewhat ran into each other and spent a little time arguing.

00:09:03.000 I'm a big fan.

00:09:04.000 In other ways, I have a problem.

00:09:06.000 I would say that the extreme left has taken over the left, and the extreme right has taken over the right.

00:09:14.000 And the vast majority of us, which is why the polls got it wrong again, and they will continue to get it, because the big swath, that big middle, Don't really want to get into arguments and stuff.

00:09:28.000 They just want to do what the founding fathers in America designed.

00:09:32.000 When we used to have curtains and you voted, you vote your conscience and it's nobody's damn business who you're voting for.

00:09:41.000 Nowadays, families get split down the middle when the kids vote one way and dad votes another way.

00:09:48.000 But I think it's a wake-up call for everybody.

00:09:51.000 It's twofold.

00:09:52.000 One is...

00:09:54.000 Have a sense of humor.

00:09:55.000 You know, just laugh a little bit.

00:09:57.000 You're not gonna die tomorrow.

00:09:59.000 It's gonna be okay.

00:10:01.000 Two, it bears noting that no matter how extreme somebody's views are in America to you, in the same way that American currency has two completely different parts that don't resemble each other, it's their America as well.

00:10:18.000 Certainly as well as yours.

00:10:20.000 So we can agree to disagree And I would prefer to have conversations that don't start off politically and find out what makes us, you know, Americans, which is, hey, you like burgers?

00:10:35.000 I love them.

00:10:37.000 And do you like, you know, find the stuff that you go to.

00:10:40.000 When you have a camera that goes across a football field or a baseball field or any public thing, you'll find people of all kinds of denominations, races, political views, and all that stuff.

00:10:54.000 Everybody's allowed to be in that game, or do you have to sign in and say, Are you a Republican?

00:11:01.000 Are you a Trumpian?

00:11:02.000 Are you a thisian?

00:11:04.000 Are you a thatian?

00:11:05.000 Mostly it's Armenians that have the IAN. Or, north or south, depends. 0.97

00:11:10.000 It could be a YAN. I'm here with life lessons, Ben.

00:11:15.000 So, I would recommend some of my best friends are toe-the-line The cult of personality, basically.

00:11:25.000 From step one to step ten, whatever our current president says, they fall in line with.

00:11:32.000 And I'm kind of in the middle.

00:11:34.000 I'm Gladys president.

00:11:36.000 My crypto holdings in the millions are doing very well, thank you.

00:11:43.000 Dow Jones industrials are way up.

00:11:45.000 And I think that has a lot to do with perception.

00:11:49.000 And so far...

00:11:52.000 It's been very good.

00:11:53.000 I think it bears noting, and most people don't know this, is that our current president, and I think it bears noting that before he became a political animal, because once you become a politician, your tail grows and your fangs come out and it's adversarial stuff.

00:12:10.000 That's what it's all about.

00:12:11.000 He was actually a big supporter of Democrats.

00:12:15.000 And Bill and Hillary Clinton went to his wedding.

00:12:19.000 And they were pals.

00:12:21.000 And if you take a look at when Barbara and the original cast of The View were on and Donald Trump came on, kissy kissy, hug hug, they loved him.

00:12:32.000 Even Whoopi.

00:12:33.000 I knew Whoopi a little bit.

00:12:36.000 So, I think people have a mistaken sense of what the body politic is all about.

00:12:43.000 So, I would recommend everybody start off with, before, you can easily list what you don't like about somebody.

00:12:51.000 I don't like what Trump said here, I don't like what, well, first of all, Use the word president, because if you don't like the person in office, at least respect the office he was elected to.

00:13:03.000 He is President Trump.

00:13:06.000 If you don't like it, next time vote for somebody else.

00:13:09.000 That's democracy.

00:13:10.000 So find good things to say about Trump.

00:13:15.000 He's not a Nazi.

00:13:17.000 My mother was a concentration camp survivor of Nazi Germany.

00:13:22.000 The rest of our family wiped out.

00:13:25.000 I know what a Nazi is. 0.80

00:13:26.000 He's not a Nazi.

00:13:27.000 It may not align with your version of what it is to be liberal and stuff, but maybe I don't either.

00:13:34.000 And trust me, I'm not a Nazi.

00:13:37.000 His children, well, none of them smoke, drink, get high, any of that stuff.

00:13:42.000 Neither do I. I've never been high, never been drunk, never smoked cigarettes.

00:13:47.000 That's a pretty good indication.

00:13:48.000 If you come to Hollywood, the most liberal, most progressive folks have really messed up kids.

00:13:56.000 Some.

00:13:57.000 Some.

00:13:58.000 Rehab, shmehab, on and on and on.

00:14:01.000 The permissive society, wokeism and all that.

00:14:05.000 So, I think it's a fair statement to say that yours truly is, I take up a lot of space in the middle.

00:14:13.000 And then in the menu of life, I choose the things that make sense for me.

00:14:18.000 Folks, we'll get some more of this in a moment.

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00:15:25.000 So, as you mentioned there, you know President Trump.

00:15:27.000 You were on The Apprentice with President Trump.

00:15:29.000 What was that experience like?

00:15:31.000 Well, he had a kind of a take-no-prisoners attitude.

00:15:34.000 I know the guy who created the show, Mark Burnett, who early on, I'm sure, realized it's difficult to get a tiger in a cage.

00:15:46.000 Okay, now behave.

00:15:48.000 Now you're in the middle of a cage.

00:15:49.000 He's a tiger.

00:15:50.000 Those are the stripes on the animal.

00:15:52.000 So he basically said what he wanted to say.

00:15:55.000 And he was kind enough.

00:15:58.000 I had a roast where all kinds of comedians cut me a new one.

00:16:04.000 And he was kind enough, you know, to send his five or ten jokes that made fun of me.

00:16:12.000 Look, at the end of the day, if you didn't know somebody and they didn't talk about politics, you'd have no problem sitting down because you probably recognize The human part of that.

00:16:29.000 And I would urge everybody to, when you first meet somebody, it's not a litmus test.

00:16:37.000 Don't start talking about, do you want to transition?

00:16:40.000 Or don't start the conversation.

00:16:42.000 Wait!

00:16:43.000 It'll come up.

00:16:45.000 Don't worry.

00:16:45.000 Don't talk politics, religion.

00:16:48.000 There's always going to be something you're going to object to, and you're not going to win the argument.

00:16:55.000 People are allowed to live and decide for themselves what makes sense for themselves.

00:17:01.000 And if you like being around them, that's fine.

00:17:04.000 But, hi, nice to see you.

00:17:05.000 I'm Gene.

00:17:07.000 Are you a supporter of Donald Trump?

00:17:09.000 Well, you're not going to get very far.

00:17:12.000 So you mentioned earlier your story that you come from Haifa in Israel, that your mom is a Holocaust survivor.

00:17:19.000 You have an amazing American story.

00:17:22.000 Can you tell me about how you ended up being a child growing up in Israel to being one of the great rock stars in the United States of all time?

00:17:32.000 That's a pretty great story.

00:17:34.000 You just figured out the secret.

00:17:37.000 Ego, ego, ego.

00:17:38.000 You just fed the beast.

00:17:40.000 Good job, Ben.

00:17:42.000 Good job.

00:17:44.000 Well, I had nothing to do with it.

00:17:47.000 My father, unfortunately, left us.

00:17:52.000 And yours truly, I'm an only child for my mother, who has always been my hero, my moral compass.

00:17:59.000 Without her, I would have veered right into darkness.

00:18:03.000 So by the time I was seven...

00:18:06.000 My mother found herself having to get up at the crack of dawn and working six days a week from 7 a.m. 0.91

00:18:14.000 until 7 p.m.

00:18:15.000 at night.

00:18:16.000 And Israel, in those early days, we didn't have an infrastructure.

00:18:21.000 You'd go once a week down to the...

00:18:24.000 A place where the government officials are and they give you a newspaper that's cut out and you get a slab of butter.

00:18:32.000 And I remember this.

00:18:34.000 With the print, you know, falling off onto the food, you get bread, a slab of meat and so on.

00:18:44.000 And that was supposed to, you know, some other stuff, fruits, vegetables, that was supposed to last you for a week.

00:18:49.000 There were no paved roads or anything.

00:18:51.000 I never saw a television set, never heard of it.

00:18:55.000 We didn't have a radio.

00:18:56.000 There was an outhouse, literally a hole outside the front door.

00:19:02.000 We had a one-bedroom, I remember as a kid, and there was a big hole right above the, well, the living room was the bedroom, was the kitchen.

00:19:13.000 You know, the kitchen was over there.

00:19:14.000 It was just a sink.

00:19:17.000 There was no refrigerator.

00:19:18.000 There was an icebox.

00:19:19.000 Once a week you'd get ice and that was it.

00:19:23.000 I know it sounds like another century, but most new countries start that way.

00:19:28.000 And when we...

00:19:30.000 My mother had two brothers who escaped Nazi Germany and all that before World War II and succeeded.

00:19:39.000 My uncle George, my mother's brother, became a...

00:19:49.000 Periodontosis, it's a big word.

00:19:51.000 Basically, he made bridges, fake teeth.

00:19:54.000 I have to tell you, one of the first impressions when we landed with El Al Airlines.

00:20:02.000 We got out, and I think it must have been close to winter, because there was a big billboard, and there was Santa Claus, who I'd never heard of before.

00:20:13.000 I never heard of Jesus or Santa Claus, any of that.

00:20:17.000 And he's sort of leaning back, holding a cigarette over here.

00:20:21.000 And in the background, I'll never forget this, there were reindeer over there with the chariot or whatever they pull.

00:20:29.000 And he's like that, smiling with the big beard.

00:20:31.000 You know, all I knew was, oh, that's a rabbi.

00:20:34.000 That rabbi is smoking a cigarette. 0.68

00:20:37.000 And I didn't know that.

00:20:39.000 And then when we came to my Aunt Magda's house, the wife of my mother's brother, Larry, who, bless him, had his own bakery and made a small fortune.

00:20:53.000 And my waistline is proof of that.

00:20:57.000 And I want to tell you that I saw my first television set at Aunt Magda's house.

00:21:06.000 And it must have been at the right time in the afternoon.

00:21:09.000 They turned it on, and I had a spoon in a schmucker's jar, and I was eating the jam because I'd never tasted anything like that in my life.

00:21:18.000 And both my aunt and my mom were laughing, tears and everything.

00:21:23.000 I never saw a refrigerator.

00:21:25.000 I know this all sounds like...

00:21:26.000 I never saw a fridge.

00:21:29.000 I said, you know, Hungarian, because my Aunt Magda spoke Hungarian, not Hebrew.

00:21:33.000 Mios! 0.97

00:21:34.000 Mios! 0.97

00:21:36.000 You know, like, I want a little bit of that.

00:21:39.000 Can I taste it?

00:21:40.000 And she said, of course.

00:21:41.000 And she gave me a spoon, expecting me to just take a little bit.

00:21:44.000 And I put a little bit in my mouth.

00:21:46.000 And I thought, she said, sure, you can have that.

00:21:48.000 So, you know, I started eating that.

00:21:50.000 And they turned on the television.

00:21:52.000 And I put down the jar because what I saw was a guy flying through the air with a cape.

00:21:59.000 I'll never forget that.

00:22:01.000 And I, no matter how good this was, I... What is that?

00:22:06.000 You know, look up in the sky, it's a bird, it's a plane.

00:22:09.000 This amazing land where you had movies and images and people flying through the air and big buildings.

00:22:18.000 I was afraid, I swear to you, I was afraid to cross the street at my Aunt Magnus' house because there were cars going by.

00:22:28.000 You know, I was scared to death.

00:22:31.000 Anyway, I could go on forever.

00:22:33.000 So you're growing up now in New York.

00:22:38.000 You're a kid.

00:22:38.000 How do you get into music from there?

00:22:42.000 First, my mother, to keep me off the streets, put me in yeshiva. 0.96

00:22:48.000 I was a Lubavitch.

00:22:50.000 Well, what can I say?

00:22:54.000 It kept me off the streets, but then I discovered girls. 1.00

00:22:57.000 And it's been The bane of my existence ever since.

00:23:02.000 On the other hand, you could take a look at it biblically.

00:23:04.000 All the chasing the skirt is really biblical if you think of it.

00:23:09.000 It said, spread thy seed.

00:23:12.000 And that's what I've been doing.

00:23:13.000 I was just doing the Lord's work.

00:23:15.000 That's what it says.

00:23:17.000 See what I did there?

00:23:19.000 And so I'm minding my own business.

00:23:25.000 I always had a job delivering newspapers, working at a butcher store, and just, you know, always worked.

00:23:32.000 Even when I was six years old in Israel, picking cactus fruit and selling it with Shlomo, my Moroccan friend, Solomon in English, To bring some prutah, you know, the shekels, the Israeli pennies of the time, and bought my first ice cream when I was a little kid, six and a half years old, and I still remember That taste, I'll never forget that as long as I live.

00:24:02.000 Because nothing is as sweet as something you, you know, by the sweat of thy brow, it says in the good book.

00:24:10.000 Nothing is as sweet and rewarding as something you worked for.

00:24:14.000 You don't have to thank anybody, it's all yours.

00:24:17.000 And then I put all the rest of the money on the table in front of my mother and she was amazed.

00:24:24.000 I remember her hugging me and saying, that's my little man.

00:24:28.000 And ever since then, I've been working for women. 0.98

00:24:30.000 Without the money, I don't get much attention.

00:24:35.000 So, I must have been 13 or something, and it was a Sunday night.

00:24:42.000 And of course, Sunday, I went around getting everybody's money for delivering the newspapers and all that.

00:24:48.000 And by the early evening, I was at home at my mother's apartment.

00:24:57.000 And the Ed Sullivan show came up, and the Ed Sullivan show, for those of you that don't know what it was, was the biggest show on television.

00:25:05.000 When the Beatles were on, literally 75 million people were watching this.

00:25:11.000 At the time, half the population of the United States of America.

00:25:16.000 The total population at that point, 64, 60-something, was about 160 million.

00:25:24.000 So...

00:25:26.000 Again, I remember what I had.

00:25:29.000 I had foshirt, which is Hungarian hamburger, and peas, which I hated.

00:25:35.000 And I remember putting...

00:25:36.000 My mother always treated me like a king, so I had like a...

00:25:42.000 A little stand with legs on it so I could stand in front of the TV, sit in front of the TV and watch it.

00:25:47.000 And I'm watching the Ed Sullivan show.

00:25:50.000 And, you know, they're singing and stuff.

00:25:52.000 And I never saw or heard anything like that.

00:25:56.000 They looked very feminine.

00:25:59.000 Little guys with cutesy haircuts and, you know, hair above their ears.

00:26:03.000 I've got some hair left as well.

00:26:06.000 And... 0.81

00:26:08.000 That sound, that high-pitched sound of girls in the audience screaming like turkeys about to get their heads cut off. 1.00

00:26:20.000 I'd never heard anything like that in my life. 0.94

00:26:22.000 What the hell is that?

00:26:24.000 And the cameras kept panning to their faces. 0.82

00:26:28.000 You know, they looked like they were having a conniption.

00:26:32.000 Outside of New York City, you think it's a conniption.

00:26:35.000 No, it's not.

00:26:37.000 They were like having seizures.

00:26:39.000 I never saw anything like that.

00:26:40.000 And then I figured, that's probably not a bad job to have.

00:26:45.000 And then right after that, by about 14, I joined a band.

00:26:49.000 I couldn't play an instrument then.

00:26:51.000 And I started to talk like that, you know.

00:26:55.000 Yeah, you know, I started to put on an accent and I got the response.

00:27:01.000 You know, the girls were saying, oh, you're not from here.

00:27:03.000 No, not from here.

00:27:05.000 And they go, oh, all of a sudden you get more attention.

00:27:09.000 Basically, Ben, dress British, think Yiddish.

00:27:14.000 See what I did there?

00:27:15.000 And the Beatles changed my life because I didn't realize it.

00:27:21.000 I didn't know how to verbalize it.

00:27:24.000 Early on, but they made it okay to be different.

00:27:30.000 They spoke with an accent, and so did I. Talk like this, you know, like Israelis with clipped vowels. 1.00

00:27:39.000 And they looked different, and I sure didn't look like I came from Sweden.

00:27:44.000 They made it okay to be different.

00:27:47.000 Not only okay, they were, you know, top of the pile.

00:27:51.000 And so I... I taught myself how to play guitar initially, and then pragmatism rules, big word like gymnasium.

00:28:01.000 I picked up a bass guitar, a cheap Japanese version, because I realized everybody wanted to be a guitar player or drummer.

00:28:10.000 Nobody wanted to be a bass player, but every band had a bass player.

00:28:15.000 So increase your chances of being in a band.

00:28:19.000 Play bass.

00:28:20.000 Sure enough, everybody wanted me to be in their band because I could sing.

00:28:24.000 It's a matter of opinion.

00:28:26.000 And thump away at the bass guitar.

00:28:29.000 And it's made me a pretty good living since then.

00:28:33.000 I was thinking of buying Rhode Island, as a matter of fact.

00:28:37.000 We'll get to more of this in a moment.

00:28:38.000 First, let's talk about something that affects all of us responsible, hardworking Americans.

00:28:42.000 Taxes.

00:28:43.000 The October 15th deadline has passed.

00:28:45.000 Are you prepared for what's coming next?

00:28:46.000 Do you owe back taxes?

00:28:47.000 Are your tax returns still unfiled?

00:28:48.000 Miss the deadline to file for an extension?

00:28:50.000 Well, now that October 15th is behind us, the IRS may be ramping up enforcement.

00:28:53.000 Let me tell you, they're not playing around.

00:28:55.000 You could face wage garnishments, frozen bank accounts, even property seizures if you haven't taken action yet.

00:29:00.000 But here's the good news.

00:29:00.000 There's still hope.

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00:29:37.000 Don't let the IRS take advantage of you.

00:29:39.000 Get the help you need with Tax Network USA. So, how do you go from being a teenager just like, you know, a million other teenagers across the United States?

00:29:46.000 You want to be in a band, you start playing.

00:29:48.000 It's still a pretty long journey from there to, you know, the top of the heap in terms of rock music.

00:29:53.000 So, how does the band come together?

00:29:56.000 Well, initially, what I noticed...

00:30:00.000 About being in a band was in the patois of the street.

00:30:06.000 There were a lot of chicks. 1.00

00:30:08.000 I mean, if I announced or held a sign of, I'm studying to be a dentist, they're just not going to care.

00:30:16.000 Later on they do, once they realize you're making good living and that's what it's about.

00:30:22.000 And so it was the payoff was immediate.

00:30:27.000 You get more popular.

00:30:29.000 We get more girls and all that because that's our primordial, you know, the urge to merge.

00:30:37.000 That's what we...

00:30:38.000 I'm giving you a lot of stuff here.

00:30:40.000 You're going to be able to use this in political discussions.

00:30:44.000 And so...

00:30:48.000 At the same time, I was working.

00:30:50.000 I became the assistant to the director of the Puerto Rican Interagency Council, a government research and demonstration project.

00:30:58.000 I was the only Jew there, but because it was a government research and demonstration project, there was a percentage of non-Puerto Ricans who had to be there, and I was the one, because I took typing classes in high school, pragmatism, because all the girls... 1.00

00:31:16.000 We're taking the typing classes.

00:31:17.000 So I signed up.

00:31:18.000 I also signed up for another class where only girls took it.

00:31:22.000 Greg and Pittman.

00:31:24.000 It was called Shorthand.

00:31:25.000 I signed up.

00:31:26.000 And that gave me the ability to get hired by Kelly Girls, which became Kelly Services, that hired me out for lawyers, real estate companies, all that.

00:31:41.000 In fact, I became...

00:31:43.000 The assistant to the director of the research and demonstration project.

00:31:47.000 And then I became the man Friday to the editor of Vogue magazine.

00:31:52.000 Again, on a floor where there are only girls, bottles and everything else. 1.00

00:31:56.000 Then it was terrible.

00:31:57.000 I gotta tell you, it was just torture.

00:32:00.000 Couldn't wait to get out of there.

00:32:02.000 And at the same time, decided to get serious about putting a band together.

00:32:09.000 And happened to accidentally meet another member of the tribe.

00:32:14.000 That's failed language for the rest of the world. 1.00

00:32:18.000 May not know what that means.

00:32:21.000 And Stanley Eisen became Paul Stanley.

00:32:25.000 And we put a band together.

00:32:26.000 And the idea was, even though we weren't able to verbalize it, let's put together the band we never saw on stage.

00:32:36.000 Almost the way girls... 1.00

00:32:39.000 Really have it in their DNA. There's a club and she calls ahead because she wants to know what's going on.

00:32:44.000 And she gets the word, uh-oh, just beware, all the girls are wearing short black minis. 1.00

00:32:51.000 So she thinks and goes, I think I'm going to put on a red short minis.

00:32:57.000 Many, so that you stand out.

00:33:01.000 Shakespeare figured it out, the whole world's a stage, and, you know, figured out how to get people to look at you.

00:33:07.000 Once you get the attention, it's what you do with it.

00:33:09.000 And KISS was formed way before you were born, at the end of 1972. By New Year's Eve 1973, we played our first show.

00:33:26.000 We didn't have a record contract.

00:33:28.000 The first record came out in February 1974. Within a year and a half before MTV, before voicemail, before digital, before anything.

00:33:43.000 No cell phones.

00:33:45.000 Rock was not heard on radio or anything.

00:33:48.000 We were headlining Anaheim Stadium in California.

00:33:51.000 It just exploded.

00:33:54.000 In those days, magazines and imagery was the way it impacted stuff.

00:34:00.000 In the same way that TikTok is the modern version of stuff, like how do you become Mr. Beast?

00:34:05.000 Well, go on.

00:34:06.000 You know who that is?

00:34:07.000 I do.

00:34:09.000 Or how do you become Ben Shapiro?

00:34:11.000 Well, do this stuff.

00:34:12.000 And that's the modern version of it.

00:34:16.000 So KISS exploded and that's been, I know it's difficult to believe, that was about 53 years ago.

00:34:27.000 But for 50 years and we finally sold our IP and all that in December a year ago to an amazing company called Pop House.

00:34:38.000 And they paid a pretty shekel, Ben. 0.95

00:34:43.000 And we continue on, you know, we're doing new stuff and everything.

00:34:48.000 But during the course of Kiss's active years, every year we'd tour and stuff and kept breaking the rules by making toys and games and licensing and merchandising, where other bands were concerned about things like credibility.

00:35:05.000 That never entered into our minds. 0.96

00:35:08.000 That's for losers. 0.94

00:35:10.000 Credibility? 0.98

00:35:11.000 You never even went to music school to learn how to To learn the basics of music.

00:35:17.000 You can't read or write music.

00:35:19.000 Lennon, McCartney, Hendrix, The Stone, they can't read or write music.

00:35:22.000 You just kind of make it up.

00:35:24.000 You're completely unqualified to do that, but you're concerned about credibility.

00:35:29.000 Get out of here.

00:35:30.000 You know, it's noise. 0.98

00:35:31.000 You're lucky enough if you can make some money and the chicks chase you, and then you die. 1.00

00:35:36.000 That's all there is.

00:35:38.000 What does it mean?

00:35:39.000 Where is this going?

00:35:40.000 Do I have my mother's hips? 1.00

00:35:41.000 Shut up! 1.00

00:35:42.000 Just be lucky you didn't have to join a symphony orchestra where you'd have to pay your dues to learn about Tchaikovsky and Chopin and music. 1.00

00:35:52.000 You know, just an idiot like me picks up a thing and like a caveman, you sort of fumble through it. 0.99

00:36:00.000 And if you can't sing, then write a song called Wild Thing. 1.00

00:36:03.000 It goes like this.

00:36:04.000 Wild Thing, you make my heart sing.

00:36:10.000 You make everything.

00:36:12.000 You know, you don't have to sing well.

00:36:14.000 Ask any rapper.

00:36:17.000 Going to 7-Eleven, going to go to heaven and stuff.

00:36:20.000 You know, you're not talking about musical mindsets.

00:36:23.000 But you can be enormously popular and wealthy.

00:36:29.000 Just scientists call it a singularity.

00:36:34.000 Having the right thing. 1.00

00:36:36.000 And the right thing can be as idiotic as Gungam style. 1.00

00:36:40.000 Which was billions and billions of downloads. 1.00

00:36:43.000 Not the Beatles.

00:36:44.000 No.

00:36:45.000 Not Beethoven.

00:36:45.000 No.

00:36:46.000 It's this guy with the Gungam style, you know, who came from Korea, could barely speak English, but it caught on. 0.93

00:36:53.000 You know, it became a thing.

00:36:57.000 And And there was also one about the shark.

00:37:02.000 And the shark said, or is it the fox?

00:37:04.000 I think the fox said...

00:37:05.000 What did the fox say?

00:37:06.000 Yep.

00:37:07.000 Of course you know it.

00:37:09.000 Of course.

00:37:09.000 Yes, and my kids?

00:37:10.000 Yep.

00:37:10.000 Absolutely.

00:37:11.000 Yeah.

00:37:12.000 Yeah, because you didn't memorize that yourself.

00:37:14.000 No, no, no.

00:37:15.000 I've never listened to such tripe.

00:37:17.000 No.

00:37:17.000 Of course not.

00:37:18.000 Yeah.

00:37:19.000 Either as if I was a rich man.

00:37:23.000 So, I think the scientific version of it, the headlines are having the right thing At the right place and the right time.

00:37:34.000 So, before the advent of sort of modern social thought, you know, those things, you, no matter how good looking you are with a kippah on your head, would have tried this a few decades ago.

00:37:51.000 Wouldn't be as easy.

00:37:54.000 It's a more, except culture is a moving target as people get more I'm educated to the idea that not everybody looks like you, walks like you, or talks like you.

00:38:05.000 You have an advantage.

00:38:07.000 Yeah.

00:38:08.000 Yeah, and I was going to ask, you know, so obviously you come up with this characteristic look.

00:38:12.000 How do you come up with the face paint and the sticking out of the tongue and all this?

00:38:16.000 I mean, obviously you're somebody who is thinking in advance of how do you differentiate yourself from the crowd?

00:38:20.000 How do you come up with that form of differentiation?

00:38:24.000 I think part of everything that we do is part of the puzzle of our DNA and our experiences early on.

00:38:33.000 And I happen to have been born with a prodigious oral appendage.

00:38:41.000 Ben, you wouldn't believe it. 0.65

00:38:43.000 It's a hideous looking thing.

00:38:47.000 Yeah.

00:38:48.000 And, I mean, I would do it now except the floor is dirty.

00:38:53.000 I would show it to you.

00:38:56.000 And, you know, it seems to have a life of its own.

00:39:00.000 And I remember in sixth grade, should I pause, pregnant pause, while you want to laugh?

00:39:07.000 Okay, so I was always the tallest kid in class, and a clown, because I wanted attention, and they'd stick me in the back of the room.

00:39:17.000 Of course, Stella and Irene, I remember their names, sixth or seventh grade, In the middle of the class, I'd get in trouble because they'd whisper, hey, Gene, do that funny thing you do when you stick your tongue out.

00:39:32.000 And I thought it was like, oh, you know, like a funny face.

00:39:36.000 So I'd stick it out and wiggle it and make it twirl around because, you know, it can do those things and yours can't.

00:39:43.000 And they'd go, okay, Mr. Klein, get...

00:39:48.000 My mother's maiden name, get over here, what were you doing? 1.00

00:39:51.000 I was just sticking it out.

00:39:52.000 Show the class what you were doing.

00:39:53.000 I'd stick it out and they would all laugh.

00:39:56.000 And so, again, singularity.

00:40:00.000 The four original members of KISS, John, Paul, George, oh no, that was another band.

00:40:07.000 Myself, Paul, Ace, and Peter, we were lucky enough to find each other in the beginning.

00:40:14.000 And not everything lasts forever.

00:40:16.000 Not everybody's designed to run a marathon.

00:40:19.000 It's just life.

00:40:20.000 But in the beginning, all for one, one for all, we had written some songs, pretty good.

00:40:27.000 We found the right guys.

00:40:28.000 We were in a rat-infested loft, 10 East, 23rd Street, only 10 blocks from 33rd Street, Madison Square Garden.

00:40:39.000 And then one day, I can't remember who, said, hey, let's go downstairs to Woolworth, which was a New York store, and bought makeup and black lipstick and red lipstick, and decided to put on makeup.

00:40:53.000 Bought some mirrors.

00:40:55.000 And pretty much on that very first day, what became possibly the four most recognized faces on the planet More recognized than Mount Rushmore.

00:41:10.000 Yeah, that's a marketing truism.

00:41:14.000 If you ask people on the street, just a close-up of Teddy Roosevelt on Mount Rushmore and say, who's that?

00:41:22.000 They have no idea.

00:41:25.000 Well, who's on Mount Rushmore?

00:41:27.000 Elvis?

00:41:28.000 No.

00:41:29.000 But as soon as you show those faces, they go, oh yeah, kiss.

00:41:33.000 Even if you hate the band.

00:41:34.000 And I'm talking Africa, Southeast Asia, anywhere you go.

00:41:38.000 It doesn't mean it's the best band.

00:41:40.000 It just means that the imagery connected in ways no other band connected.

00:41:47.000 You don't know what everybody in foreigner looks like.

00:41:52.000 You just don't.

00:41:53.000 And they had hit records and all that stuff.

00:41:56.000 So there was a decided difference between We'll get to more on this in a moment.

00:42:12.000 First, did you know you spent a third of your life sleeping?

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00:43:16.000 When you talk about doing all of this, and obviously so much of this is transgressive and designed to gain attention, but there's also the music.

00:43:25.000 And the fact is that a lot of people now consider rock music to basically be a dead genre.

00:43:31.000 It is.

00:43:32.000 So why do you think that happened?

00:43:33.000 Why did rock die?

00:43:35.000 Well, music changes because new generations come along.

00:43:43.000 And when my mother and I first came to America, this was pre-Beatles in 1958. Sometimes I think it's 1858. The first music I heard was Chuck Berry, even though I couldn't speak English.

00:44:01.000 Chuck Berry, Little Richard.

00:44:03.000 As a matter of fact, ironically and strangely, I did the eulogy for Chuck Berry's open casket when he passed away.

00:44:15.000 The Berry family asked me to do that.

00:44:17.000 It's on YouTube.

00:44:20.000 And...

00:44:22.000 Again, when the Beatles came along, it was a seismic shift.

00:44:26.000 So before the Beatles, there was a sound.

00:44:29.000 Before Chuck Berry and everything...

00:44:30.000 Music used to be that way.

00:44:39.000 It was called doo-wop.

00:44:42.000 Doo-wop because it was New York-based.

00:44:44.000 Wop was a derogatory term for Italians.

00:44:48.000 The Passports, W-O-P, without papers.

00:44:53.000 A WAP. And even Little Richard. 0.90

00:44:56.000 A WAP, Baba Luwap, a WAP, Bamboo, Toot-a-Fruity!

00:44:59.000 You know, all that.

00:45:00.000 So music kept changing based on the way the ears were tuned, what people heard.

00:45:06.000 And as soon as Elvis started doing black music, it changed white music.

00:45:11.000 In those days, it was called race music.

00:45:16.000 You couldn't hear that stuff on radio.

00:45:18.000 Elvis opened the doors for black music that was shamefully not allowed to be played on regular radio.

00:45:27.000 So as you go through the different eras, there was the big band era, the so-and-so era, populations and tastes change.

00:45:38.000 And even through rock and roll came in...

00:45:42.000 Based on Chuck Berry.

00:45:45.000 And they stopped doing that and it became riffs.

00:45:47.000 You know, the Zeppelin thing.

00:45:51.000 That moved it a little to bigger sound, less complex, bigger riffs.

00:45:57.000 And so we're a product of all those English bands, actually.

00:46:02.000 But even during our reign...

00:46:06.000 As the Gallup polled number one band on the planet, three years in a row, 77, 78, 79, above the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and the Bee Gees, there was something going on.

00:46:18.000 It was called grunge.

00:46:20.000 It came out of Seattle, and it was a different form of music.

00:46:24.000 Then there was new romance, new wave, alternative.

00:46:28.000 Music keeps changing.

00:46:30.000 There was once something called big band, It was, you know, they had the template which is lots of horns and that's what you did.

00:46:39.000 And the Beatles came along and all of a sudden it was less about the temptations and four or five guys Moving together with steps with a big band in back of them, and it was just four or five guys in the front playing their own instruments, writing their own songs.

00:46:54.000 So music will continue, and now we finally come to the end of days when you can be an EDM artist and make an awful lot of money, and the expertise goes in front of 50,000 people.

00:47:10.000 The expertise goes something like this.

00:47:15.000 The finger presses above.

00:47:18.000 You see 50,000 people jumping up and down because of this computerized, pre-recorded stuff with lights and everything.

00:47:26.000 But all the guy's doing is jumping up and down with them.

00:47:31.000 And by the way, I fully support that.

00:47:34.000 Life is short, and if music in any way, shape, or form makes the experience of living At this planet for another day, I'm all for it.

00:47:46.000 It doesn't have to make sense for me or be my taste.

00:47:49.000 I never understood rap.

00:47:51.000 That's just, in my day, it was talking.

00:47:54.000 You know, it is just talking.

00:47:56.000 And culturally, I don't understand and don't care. 0.98

00:48:01.000 But...

00:48:03.000 There is music for everybody, including the guy who picks up his finger.

00:48:07.000 Oh, see this finger?

00:48:08.000 He's about to press it.

00:48:09.000 Here we go.

00:48:12.000 And by the way, with the future, which is right around the corner, you won't have to do the thing.

00:48:20.000 You'll just say, go.

00:48:22.000 I've got a modern, massive place Ben, I'm really rich.

00:48:28.000 So I've got a huge place in Malibu, one of six houses, God bless America, and this thing is so computerized and so everything, I talk to it.

00:48:42.000 Let me see if it goes, hey Josh, turn off all lights.

00:48:49.000 Well, I'm in the back bedroom, so maybe you didn't hear.

00:48:52.000 But there's literally, you just talk to it And, hey Josh, get me a hot fudge sundae in the background.

00:48:59.000 And all of a sudden...

00:49:01.000 Well, yeah, I have to say I did my musical education wrong.

00:49:04.000 I'm the normal Jewish kid who took violin lessons from the age of five till the time I was maybe 17 years old and it got pretty good and then I realized that there ain't no money in classical music and I learned it at school talent shows that the guy who could play three chords was definitely going to do better with the girls than the guy who was playing Fritz Kreisler and Beethoven.

00:49:22.000 So just lessons that you learn along the way for sure.

00:49:25.000 It's worth noting That you don't even need three chords.

00:49:31.000 Bo Diddley by Bo Diddley is one chord.

00:49:36.000 It never veers away.

00:49:41.000 There's no bridge.

00:49:42.000 There's no nothing.

00:49:43.000 And funky Broadway...

00:49:48.000 Never veers away from that one chord.

00:49:51.000 Wow, yeah.

00:49:51.000 I wasted a lot of time.

00:49:52.000 And then it turns out, actually, that my greatest musical accomplishment was having a number one charting rap single.

00:49:58.000 That literally was me talking, as you mentioned.

00:50:00.000 So that was the thing that we did last year.

00:50:03.000 Oh, come on. 0.87

00:50:04.000 You've got to give me a little bit.

00:50:06.000 How did it go?

00:50:06.000 Oh.

00:50:07.000 Let's see.

00:50:07.000 My riff was, I've got the facts, I've got the stats, my money like lives in my pockets are fat.

00:50:11.000 That was a little bit of sample there.

00:50:15.000 Have you ever heard somebody make the observation...

00:50:20.000 That you're like the Flash Barry Allen.

00:50:23.000 You probably should have been doing commercials because you talk so fast.

00:50:28.000 Oh man.

00:50:28.000 Those of us...

00:50:30.000 Oh yeah, when I get to the disclaimers at the end of the commercials, that's when I go into my mode.

00:50:33.000 Yeah, exactly.

00:50:34.000 When I'm reading NMLS numbers and stuff and giving the warnings at the end of the drug commercials, that's where it's at.

00:50:39.000 I mean, I missed my calling.

00:50:41.000 But when you're making a political or observational point to somebody who doesn't like you, those of us who are slower, the pregnant pause, it doesn't respectfully impregnate my slow mind until after you're done.

00:51:04.000 Well, that's the thing.

00:51:06.000 I'm planting seeds.

00:51:07.000 And then a year later, people realize what I'm saying and realize that I was right all along.

00:51:11.000 I wish I could slow it down, but that's the bane of my career.

00:51:16.000 Literally my entire career, people have been saying I speak too fast because it's true. 1.00

00:51:20.000 And I've been trying it to slow it down.

00:51:22.000 And, you know, hopefully as my brain ages, then it'll gradually...

00:51:26.000 How old are you?

00:51:28.000 I'm 40 at this point.

00:51:29.000 And maybe I'm a little slower than I was when I was 30. I don't know.

00:51:33.000 75, bitch. 1.00

00:51:36.000 So, I want to ask you about, you know, I have to ask you about the women, obviously, because, you know... 0.99

00:51:44.000 There are some.

00:51:44.000 I've noticed.

00:51:45.000 So, but now you're a proponent of monogamy.

00:51:49.000 You dated your wife for 28 years before you got married.

00:51:51.000 That is a long time to date your wife.

00:51:53.000 I barely dated my wife for 28 days before we got engaged.

00:51:57.000 It was literally about three and a half months, and then we got engaged and married for...

00:52:01.000 16 years.

00:52:02.000 And so, that's a long delay between meeting somebody and marrying them.

00:52:07.000 You don't hear a lot of 30-year engagements.

00:52:11.000 Well, I have to be completely upfront.

00:52:14.000 I was raised by my mother, and I've always worshipped the ground that women, especially single mothers, walk on.

00:52:24.000 Because there's so much pressure.

00:52:26.000 Not only do they create life, but once the man walks out, they've got to earn a living and be mother and father and protector and all that stuff.

00:52:35.000 So the highest form of life on the planet is a single mother. 0.93

00:52:41.000 You and I just work here.

00:52:44.000 We can't create life.

00:52:47.000 So my mother has always been my moral compass.

00:52:53.000 But I was aware that I was the male of the species.

00:52:56.000 And I never wanted to get married.

00:52:59.000 I mean, I always had the appetite.

00:53:00.000 Some of us have a larger appetite, some not.

00:53:05.000 But we're attracted, the heterosexuals among us, which is predominantly the life form on the planet.

00:53:13.000 Predominantly, the vast majority are heterosexuals.

00:53:17.000 There might be 10% or so, but, you know, males going after females. 0.90

00:53:24.000 Biological.

00:53:25.000 And I think it's worth noting that I didn't figure this out until much later in life.

00:53:31.000 I didn't want to turn into my father.

00:53:35.000 I didn't want to start something.

00:53:37.000 Now I can verbalize it, but then it was just a feeling.

00:53:40.000 And the feeling was...

00:53:43.000 Well, let me put it this way.

00:53:45.000 I lived under the roof of my mother, who...

00:53:48.000 Did everything.

00:53:49.000 So she was able to lay down the laws.

00:53:52.000 Don't do this.

00:53:52.000 Don't lie.

00:53:53.000 Don't this.

00:53:54.000 And of course, without that, I would have been in darkness.

00:53:56.000 So you can't wait because you think you're so important and know everything to get out from under your mother's roof.

00:54:04.000 And no sooner do you leave your mom's house than you meet a girl.

00:54:08.000 And if you decide to move in with her, same questions.

00:54:11.000 Where are you going?

00:54:12.000 Where have you been?

00:54:13.000 And I'm going, when do I get to be free?

00:54:15.000 And who wants to know?

00:54:18.000 Well, I don't want you to see another girl. 1.00

00:54:19.000 Why not?

00:54:21.000 So there were all those new rules.

00:54:23.000 You ever live with your mom?

00:54:24.000 There are these rules.

00:54:26.000 And then there were new rules.

00:54:28.000 So I was too busy and too selfish and arrogant, but it made business sense.

00:54:36.000 You can't have it all.

00:54:38.000 How many hours in the daytime?

00:54:40.000 Totally devote all the man hours to myself.

00:54:46.000 Because sometimes, what's more important, your band or me?

00:54:50.000 Well, actually, the band.

00:54:52.000 Because you're not going to pay my rent, and first I've got to make money, and then I can afford you.

00:54:59.000 These are not romantic notions, but pragmatism has always been the key.

00:55:04.000 And so, I never wanted kids.

00:55:08.000 I never wanted to get married.

00:55:12.000 But along the way, I was attracted to women, Cher and Diana Ross, you know, no greater, classier women. 0.50

00:55:21.000 The best, I'm the luckiest guy to have ever known them, much less living with them.

00:55:27.000 But I actually, and it always comes back to you.

00:55:31.000 It's not about self-aggrandizement or anything.

00:55:34.000 It's just about the realization, do you know yourself?

00:55:38.000 Who are you?

00:55:40.000 And I'm finally comfortable in my own self to realize that my father was one person.

00:55:47.000 I don't have to be my father.

00:55:51.000 I can be my own ethical, moral, loving father, husband, all that.

00:55:57.000 I never imagined that I'd be That I could be like that.

00:56:06.000 Well, Gene, this has been great.

00:56:09.000 I really appreciate you taking the time.

00:56:10.000 I definitely learned some things that I didn't know.

00:56:13.000 And so for that, I appreciate the education.

00:56:15.000 And really, thanks for stopping by.

00:56:17.000 Bye, I appreciate the time.

00:56:18.000 The Ben Shapiro Sunday Special is produced by Jessica Krams and Matt Kemp.

00:56:27.000 Associate Producers are Jake Pollock and John Crick.

00:56:30.000 Editing is by Olivia Stewart.

00:56:32.000 Audio is mixed by Mike Koremina.

00:56:34.000 Camera and lighting is by Zach Ginta.

00:56:36.000 Hair, makeup, and wardrobe by Fabiola Christina.

00:56:39.000 Title graphics are by Cynthia Angulo.

00:56:41.000 Production intern is Sarah Steele.

00:56:43.000 Executive assistant Kelly Carvalho.

00:56:45.000 Executive in charge of production is David Wormis.

00:56:48.000 Executive producer Justin Siegel.

00:56:50.000 Executive producer Jeremy Boring.

00:56:52.000 The Ben Shapiro Show Sunday special is a Daily Wire production.

The Ben Shapiro Show - December 08, 2024

The Evolution of a Rockstar | Gene Simmons

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