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 The story of the KISS ARMY
INTERNATIONAL is very much related to my KISS life... I started following
KISS in 1981 and since then I collected everything I could find, finally
after 3 years on November 1st 1984, after seen my first concert in
Lausanne, Switzerland, I realized I had a lot of interesting stuff that I
could share with somebody else, so I decided to open a KISS fan club which
was called KISS ARMY ROME. At that point I didn't really have big
expectations but I thought it would've been cool to get in touch with
other KISS fans and trade audio and videos and magazine article from
different countries. Strike was in photocopies and written only in
italian. I had good material for the italian fans, but I certainly
couldn't compete with the other fan clubs in Europe and America, which
most of the time I used to copy to improove Strike. In the beginning of
1988 I reached 100 members... a very big step for me... after 3 years of
hard work. This was probably the most important year for the fan club
cause it was my first year out of school so I could dedicate
 the whole day
to my project. In fact in this year I got in touch with Dan Starr, a
photoreporter from los Angeles, that used to be a very good guy... he was
the first one to give me exclusive photos and articles for Strike. So as I
could count on exclusive material very professionally made, I decided to
print Strike in both english and italian and I started getting members
outside Italy. In March I also printed my first issue (Strike 15) in
glossy paper... no more photocopies. The same month I went to see Ace for
the first time in London and I got to know him and the band... it was
great! That year KISS did a tour in Europe so I bought a rail-pass and I
followed the whole tour (18 shows out of 21). I finally got to know my
idols personally and I spent long time with them and I also spread flyers
of my fan club all over Europe. After the tour I brought back to Italy
tons of photos, some personal things used by KISS and wonderful memories.
I even was able to organize a meeting with KISS and my members before the
show in Modena, which was a very nice experience. So I put together a
great issue of Strike 17 which came out with
color cover, as I could
count on the new members made with the promotion in Europe. The year 1988
was over and I reached 400 members... definately a wonderful year from all
points of view.
Strike since then became the best fanzine all over the world and so
far nobody could do any better, in other words for the past 8 years Strike
has been the best KISS fanzine-magazine around.
For the first 18 issues Strike was in small size (15x21 cm)
so I decided to improove it changing size of Strike 19 to the regular
magazine format (21x30 cm). Strike was getting better issue after issue,
so at the end of 1989 with the next Strike 20 I made a few very important
steps: I changed the name to the club which  became KISS
ARMY INTERNATIONAL, I opened seats in many countries (10-15) around the
world and I started to translate Strike in 4-5 languages. Members were
growing everyday so that was a good push to improove more and more. The
fan club was growing so fast cause I was re-investing all the profits in
the club and also cause I was workin 10 hours or more for seven days a
week including Christmas and Easter. But unfortunately in 1990 I was
slowed down by the military service which lasted one year and didn't leave
much free time. In that year KISS did the "Hot In The Shade" tour in
U.S.A. and I was lucky enough to leave the army for two weeks to go and
see 7 shows. In this tour I had my first laminated pass so I could finally
see them in backstage and see the soundchecks etc. After the military
things started to get better again. Strike 22 changed once again and
became totally written in english. The format was very satisfiing, 32
pages with front and back cover in color, so from Strike 33 it didn't
change much for a long time. Of course in all these years I became friend
with lots of photographers and very big KISS fans, so I could get
exclusive photos and reports and news about any move that KISS was doing,
and so I could offer the fans a better and better Strike magazine. We also
printed every year a different membership kit with photos, posters,
membership card, biographies, KISStory etc. so also that side of the club
was very well taken care of.
1992 arrived and I went again to the States for my first New York
KISS convention where I found tons of cool merchandise for my own
collection and for the fan club. Merchandise lists got bigger and bigger
since then and now we can offer a catalogue with over 1000 items
available. With that trip started for me the "non-stop travvelling"
lifestyle becouse I started to attend almost  all the
conventions around the world and I kept following every KISS tour. In fact
I went to see the club tour in New York and the U.K. Revenge tour so I
kept taking photos, doing interviews and reportages mostly by myself. At
the end of 1992 again the States for the U.S. "Revenge" tour where between
the tons of photos I took my best shot, Gene breathing fire, which ended
up on the inside cover of "Alive III" for my enormous pleasure. They also
used another of my photos on the cover of "KISS Konfidential" and Eric
Singer used all my photos for his new drum-tech video. Having photos on
KISS official products is an amazing feeling for a KISS fan, as well as
when they put my name or my KISS Army in the Special Thanks of "Hot In The
Shade", the "Revenge" tourbook and in the solo albums of Ace, Peter and
Vinnie. In 1993 Gerhard Wimmer, director of the german speaking countries,
put together two very professional Strike magazines which were distributed
in the news-stands all over Europe in different languages. Along with the
magazines were also printed promo mini-CDs which
was a very cool free gift from the KISS ARMY INTERNATIONAL. These
magazines brought a lot of new members to the club and made it look even
better. The same year I went to see KISS in Los Angeles for the
'Foundations Forum' concert. But In 1994 I missed the KISS tour in South
America cause at the same time in Europe Gerhard Wimmer organized the
first ever KISS Convention tour with Peter Criss as special guest and
various tribute bands, which was very succesful. All the directors all
over the world have been doing a great job to promote the club, but
definately Gerhard Wimmer has always been the best of all putting into the
fan club a lot of professional work and very cool
ideas.
In the beginning of 1995 I went to see KISS in Australia where they
started doing their own official KISS Conventions, one of the best thing
in their career to get close to their die-hard fans. And then we had
another KISS ARMY INTERNATIONAL Conventions tour in Europe with Ace as
 special guest.
No rest for me cause I flew again to the States for the U.S. official KISS
Conventions tour... a lot of stress and tiredness for me with all these
conventions and trips, but at least I could afford to buy a very
professional computer and a scanner that changed once again STRIKE. In
fact now our magazine is printed with 8 color pages, out of 32, and the
graphic layout is much more professional... it looks like any magazine you
buy in the news-stands. After the U.S. tour I was also in the MTV studios
for the famous "KISS Unplugged" recordings and that was one of my concerts
ever... well I gotta admit that my favourite KISS is with the original
members and the make-up, so that was a dream come true for me to see the
4-6 members playing together. 1996 started with the great news of the
re-union, we all feel sorry for Bruce and Eric but on the other hand this
is what most of the KISS fans were waiting for. This year also we had a
KISS Expo tour in Europe with Vinnie as special guest, but it turned into
a disaster because of him. Then Bruce came to Europe doing some clinics
and he came to my parents and my apartments and I showed him around
Rome... a really cool experience! And the next month my biggest DREAM in life finally came true
when I went to see 25 concerts of the new KISS tour in USA, Europe and
Australia. I couldn't believe my eyes... KISS are back!! And here we are
to photograph and report all the possible news and stories about the
greatest show in the world... so join the Army and you'll be part of the
best Rock and Roll family... the KISS ARMY!
Nicola Ciccarone
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