An Interview With Tommy Thayer Of Kiss

Feature Photo by Kevin Mazur

As Kiss’s longest-tenured lead guitarist, Tommy Thayer has lent his licks to several studio albums in 1998’s Psycho Circus (as a session player), 2009’s Sonic Boom, and 2012’s Monster. Beyond the records, with Kiss, Thayer has toured the world while firing off rockets from shimmering signature guitars, helping Kiss close out their touring career with a bang in 2023. Since then, Thayer has kept busy, occasionally performing live and doing his part to keep Kiss’s proverbial ball rolling in new and exciting ways.

Lately, Thayer has been promoting his latest release alongside longtime friend and former Black N’ Blue bandmate Jaime St. James, Bombshell. The EP is a hard-hitting collection of all-new material that Thayer and St. James are extremely proud of—and that fans are eating up.

There are rumblings that Kiss may also record new music, but Thayer is leaving that to “the powers that be” to decide. In the meantime, he’s having a blast doing what he’s doing, which could lead to similar projects. “I know Jaime, and I will continue to spend time together, staying close friends and being creative, that’s a certainty,” Thayer tells ClassicRockHistory.com. Adding, “This year especially, I’ve been exploring all kinds of music, meeting new people and musicians, writing and recording with different artists, and just enjoying the process.”

For Thayer, that process has been reinvigorating. “I don’t think I ever fully realized before how much music truly means to me and how much I love being creative,” he admits. “And I’m not complaining about the past at all. I’ve been incredibly fortunate, but before, music often felt more like a job that had to be done, very structured and tied to timelines and expectations.”

Lately, though,” he says. “I’ve rediscovered how much I genuinely enjoy it. It takes me out of the day-to-day issues of life and lets me disappear into my own little musical world and just create. Honestly, I love it now more than ever.”

Tell us about your new EP with Jaime St. James, Bombshell. How did this get started?

Jaime and I have been longtime friends; I’ve known him longer than anyone in my life outside of my family. We get together every so often just to catch up, and honestly, there’s no one I laugh harder with than Jaime when we start telling old stories.

He was at my place in Vegas last year, and we started talking about maybe recording some tunes we’d written years ago as a follow-up to The Lost Tapes, which we released a few years back. That project was five demo tracks we had written and recorded around 1989.

Once we sat down, he said, “Hey, I’ve got a couple new ideas, can I show you?” I said, “Of course,” and I immediately loved what he had. We started finishing the songs right on the spot. That led to a couple more the next time he came over, and another after that.

It all started with just wanting to have a good time and get creative again, because we were always a great songwriting team — and lo and behold, we ended up with some great new gems.

Which tracks came together first, and what was the general process like recording? And how does that compare to the old days with Black N’ Blue?

We finished five songs, and Jaime came back to Vegas in early 2025. We went to this little shit-hole rehearsal studio and worked out the final tempos and arrangements so we wouldn’t waste time once we got to the recording studio. We wanted to record in an old-school way, in one room, drums and guitar together, since Jamie plays drums, of course.

Once that was dialed in, we booked Rob Daiker’s studio in Portland and met up there a month or two later to record the basic tracks for the first five songs, me on guitar and Jaime on drums. We knocked it all out in about four hours.

Around the same time, a band from the Czech Republic called Turbo, who are family friends, asked if we’d write a song for their new album. While we were recording, Jaime and I were staying at my place in Cannon Beach, and he said, “I’ve got a good idea for that.” He played me what became “Time of My Life.” Most of it was already there, and we just finished the arrangement right then and there.

That afternoon, we went back into Portland and recorded it as a demo for Turbo. But it turned out so good that we thought, “We have to finish this ourselves and put it on our record too.”

I know that’s a little long-winded, but the whole recording process was way quicker than back in the Black ’N Blue days. We’re both more experienced, and Rob got great sounds fast. We knocked out basic tracks in hours instead of spending two weeks like we used to.

And the other big difference, it probably cost us $10–15K this time, compared to a couple hundred thousand dollars back in the day… which I still don’t understand! [laughs]

The reception for Bombshell has been great. Is it exciting for you to see that there’s still an appetite for new rock music, and that the fans still want more of what you and Jaime do together?

The reception has been amazing, and that’s really the frosting on the cake, because we honestly did this just for fun. It was about getting together as brothers, being creative again, and having a good time.

Of course, it feels great to write new music and have people appreciate it. I don’t think there’s enough of that happening these days in the hard rock genre. People have already been asking if we’re going to do more, and we’ve been thinking about it.

What guitars and amps did you use for this record, and how did that compare to what you might use on a Kiss record?

It’s funny, I think you asked me that before, and I still don’t really have a specific answer. Rob Daiker’s studio was well equipped, and he had a great, interesting selection of amps. I know one of them was a Twin Reverb, which I don’t think I’d ever recorded with before, but in combination with some of the other amps, it gave me one of the best guitar sounds I’ve ever had.

I also brought an [Gibson] SG that had just been sitting around the house. I never even thought it was a particularly great-sounding guitar, but I ended up using it on a lot of the tracks. These days, my focus isn’t really on gear as much anymore, as long as it’s good stuff. I really believe if you know what you’re doing, you can make almost anything sound the way you want it to sound.

Speaking of Kiss, there’s rumblings that the band could record new music. Do you see that as a viable option?

I’ll leave those questions and answers to the powers that be, but I hear the rumblings, too. And honestly, I can’t imagine not recording with KISS again at some point.

The KISS Kruise Landlocked event in Vegas was a big hit. What was it like reconnecting with your bandmates after not performing together for a couple of years?

The KISS Kruise Landlocked in Vegas went really well. After two years, the fans were ready for something like this, and I think they got everything they were hoping for, and then some. We loved it. too.

Getting back in the same room, putting a set together, rehearsing, and playing those shows again was smooth as silk. If anything, I think everyone was inspired to go out and kick a little more ass than usual — which we did. I’m sure you’ll see more events like this for the fans.

2026 marks the 40th anniversary of Black N’ Blue’s Nasty Nasty. The record is widely considered the band’s best. What do you remember about where the band was at after hooking up with Gene to make that record?

I can’t believe it’s been 40 years already. I think it was a great record, but honestly, I think a couple of the others were just as good, if not better. At that point, we were really looking for someone who could help get us back on track and be the of band we truly were, which was a straight-ahead hard rock band.

We felt that Gene could be that guide, kind of like a rudder for the ship, to help steer us in the right direction. Whether we realized it or not at the time, we were feeling a lot of pressure from the business side and the record label to be more commercial, get songs on the radio.

Of course, that’s what everyone wants, but we also felt like we were compromising who we were by doing that and even starting to look like other bands that had already been successful, instead of staying true to our roots. I think Gene helped us do that with Nasty Nasty. It became a great classic, a straight-ahead hard rock record.

Do you remember recording the title track, which features a Kiss riff? How did that happen? And how about the solo?

Funny story about all that, the riff you’re talking about is in the song Nasty Nasty, and I believe Gene borrowed it a few years later to write “Domino” for KISS. We always felt kinda flattered by that, and honestly, it was only fair, because we’d borrowed plenty from Kiss up to that point.

What’s even funnier is that the middle music section riff in Nasty Nasty came straight from a song “Only You” on the Music from the Elder album, and we didn’t even realize it at the time. Gene had suggested it.

Around when Nasty Nasty was released, a friend of ours who worked for us ran into Paul Stanley at a deli in Beverly Hills. Paul told him dryly, “That part of that song sounds a lot like us.” It was funny, but hey, a lot of artists and songwriters borrow from the things they love. You can go back to Bob Dylan and even The Beatles; they all borrowed a lot. If it was okay for them, it’s okay for me.

Two lesser-known credits of yours came in 1989 or1990, with Doro and Harlow. Tell us about these records.

It was 1989, and Gene was busy out on tour when he was asked to be the executive producer for Doro’s new record. I had never met her before, but he hired both Pat Regan and me as associate producers. Gene gave us direction and helped with song selection, but honestly, Pat and I ended up doing about 80% of the hands-on work.

Doro was a pleasure to work with, and she’s still a very close friend to this day. We had a great time making that record. We’d record songs and then get Gene on the speakerphone wherever he was on the road so he could listen and give us feedback. In the end, I really think it was a high-water mark for her and one of her best records, truly a pleasure to be part of.

The Harlow project was something Teresa Straley, Pat Regan, and a nice guitar player named Brad Bailey put together. They landed a deal with Warner Bros. Records, with Roberta Petersen as the A&R. Pat and Teresa hired me to come in and play all the guitars because it wasn’t working with Brad.

That record is exceptional, and if anyone hasn’t heard it, they really should check it out. The songs and production are fantastic, Teresa’s vocals are soaring, and I honestly think it’s some of the best guitar work I did in the ’80s — no question. The shame is that it never really got any attention, and most people never heard it.

When you look back on Black N’ Blue and your career in general, do you have regrets and anything that you’d change?

I honestly don’t really have any regrets, because I believe everything in life has its own path and course, and hopefully it all leads to something better in the future.

We were young and suddenly thrust into a situation with Geffen Records. We were very fortunate. John Kalodner signed us, and we were willing to do whatever it took to make it. Everyone around us had the same intention. But somewhere along the way, we kind of lost our vision and direction of who we were as a band.

I think that may have come across on the records, too. We did four albums, and each one was a little different from the last. That probably confused some people. But at the same time, those were some of the best days of my life.

We were a gang of brothers, five guys moving from Portland to L.A. to chase a dream and try to make it in Hollywood. The amazing thing is, we struck pay dirt within six months and were suddenly thrown into a whole new world of the music business. And I haven’t looked back since.

You can get a hold of Tommy’s new EP at his website…https://www.thayerstjames.com/

Check out similar articles on ClassicRockHistory.com Just click on any of the links below……

Classicrockhistory.com claims ownership of all its original content and Intellectual property under United States Copyright laws and those of all other foreign countries. No one person, business, or organization is allowed to re-publish any of our original content anywhere on the web or in print without our permission. All photos used are either public domain Creative Commons photos or licensed officially from Shutterstock under license with ClassicRockHistory.com. All photo credits have been placed at the end of the article. Album Cover Photos are affiliate links and the property of Amazon and are stored on the Amazon server. Any theft of our content will be met with swift legal action against the infringing websites.