SKID ROW's RACHEL BOLAN On Opening For KISS On Both Of Their 'Farewell' Tours: 'It's A Pretty Great Feeling'

SKID ROW bassist Rachel Bolan and guitarist Dave "Snake" Sabo spoke to Meltdown of Detroit's WRIF radio station about the fact that their band will support KISS on select European tour dates this spring and summer. Rachel said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "When we got these new KISS dates, the 12-year-old me was kind of freaking out pretty hard — again. I think we're one of, or probably the only band that could say we're playing both their farewell tours. [Laughs] But it's so exciting to go out with the band, especially just zeroing in on Gene Simmons. He's the reason I even picked up a bass in the first place; he's the reason why I learned what a bass was. I had no idea. It's a pretty great feeling to be asked to do something like this. Now that they're down to their final 50 shows and to know we will be doing a decent amount of 'em, a big chunk of 'em, it's hard to kind of process. It's really cool."

Snake added that the very first rock show he ever saw as a kid was KISS at Madison Square Garden in New York City in December 1977. "And that's the day that my life was completely changed," he said. "I walked in there as one person and I walked out a completely different person. I was absolutely blown away by what I had just witnessed. It was the most insane experience of my life. Especially being 13 years old, to sit there and to be able to experience something like that, the enormity of it, how bombastic it was, it was incomprehensible. And so when I got home, I knew that I was going to do something in the music business. I didn't know what it was gonna be — I didn't play an instrument; I had no clue — but a year later I picked up the guitar and nothing's changed since then. I knew exactly what I wanted to do from the seventh grade in high school."

Four years ago, Bolan said that he was not convinced KISS's "End Of The Road" tour will actually mark retirement for the 1970s theatrical rock behemoths.

The New Jersey rockers go back a long way with KISS, with a dispute over whether to tour with the New York icons said to have played a part in the departure of classic-era SKID ROW singer Sebastian Bach in 1996.

At the time "End Of The Road" was first announced, KISS claimed each show on the tour would be the band's final visit to that city.

"Man, I have the feeling it's not gonna be their farewell tour," Bolan told the "White Line Fever" podcast in a 2019 interview. "If you remember, in 2000, we played [KISS's first] farewell tour. We opened up for them on the farewell tour, and we were out with them for about nine months. So I have a feeling, as long as they can keep doing it… Maybe it'll take a break, maybe it'll be a decent hiatus, but I have a feeling we're not gonna see the last of KISS."

Offering his feelings upon learning that the band was planning to stop touring, Bolan said: "Being such a huge KISS fan, it's sad in a way, but they've been doing it a long time."

SKID ROW released its sixth studio album, "The Gang's All Here", in October 2022. Helmed by Grammy Award-winning producer Nick Raskulinecz, the album reached Top 20 chart positions in nine countries worldwide. The band also completed a tour of Europe this fall, as well as a Las Vegas residency with rock icons SCORPIONS last spring.

"The Gang's All Here" marked the introduction of SKID ROW's latest addition, Swedish-born singer Erik Grönwall, who famously went from auditioning for the competition show "Swedish Idol" back in 2009 by singing a cover of SKID ROW's "18 And Life" to now fronting the band.

Grönwall joined SKID ROW as the replacement for ZP Theart, who had been in the group for more than six years.