“You’re not going there to see a band – you’re going to see screens”: Why Paul Stanley was against Kiss performing at the Las Vegas Sphere
Boasting a 580,000 square-foot spherical enclosure packed with 1.2 million programmable LED puck lights, the Las Vegas Sphere, it could be argued, currently sits as the pinnacle of venue design.
Capable of hosting up to 20,000 concertgoers, the venue, since opening in 2023, has hosted acts from across the music spectrum, from Eagles, U2 and Dead & Company in the rock world to dance artists like Anyma and Zedd.
Indeed, more and more artists seem keen to jump on the bandwagon and see how their unique artistic styles fare on the Sphere’s ma-hoosive spherical screen, including Metallica, who recently made waves by announcing their 2026 residency at the venue.
But not everyone is quite so convinced, it would seem. Speaking to American Songwriter, Kiss frontman Paul Stanley explains why the glam rockers were never tempted at the thought of performing at the venue.
“Towards the end of the [End of the Road farewell] tour, people were saying, ‘Why don’t you play the Sphere?’” Stanley recalls. “The truth of it is, the Sphere minimises a band. It makes a band miniature. You’re not going there to see a band – you’re going to see screens.”
While Kiss officially hung up their black-and-white outfits and makeup bags in 2023 with a massive swansong set at New York’s Madison Square Garden, the band are set to continue with a string of widely anticipated avatar shows, in which hologram technology will be used to project their likenesses onto the stage, much like ABBA’s Voyage shows.
So it would seem Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, Tommy Thayer and Eric Singer aren’t totally averse to new and emerging technologies, just not the Sphere itself as a concept. He continues:
“We wanted to incorporate the highest of technology, but we want to be the centre of it. It’s a very, very different experience than going to see a postage stamp with a band on it. This is the antithesis of that – it’s 180 degrees from that. The show is going to be spectacular, but it’s only as good as what you put into it.”
Stanley concludes: “If you’ve seen the ABBA [Voyage] show, everybody who’s there is having an amazing time. You become immersed in those four people on stage. This takes it even further.”
Paul Stanley isn’t the only rock veteran against the idea of playing at the Sphere. In August 2025, Iron Maiden singer Bruce Dickinson revealed he hated the idea of the band playing at the venue, saying: “What’s the point of even being there, if you’re a band?”
Kiss’s avatar shows are tentatively scheduled for 2028. Check out a list of upcoming events at the Las Vegas Sphere.
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