SSik? Kiss?

Rip It Up, Issue 6, 1 November 1977, Page 12

SSik? Kiss?

Mike Chunn.

Kiss Love Gun Casablanca

On browsing through a selection of children’s records at the Mangere kindergarten, I came across what appears to be the latest offering from a talented foursome of actors in the States going by the collective name Ssik. Based on the Warren comic strips, the record is an original rock opera that tells the story of four uglies from an underground garage that menace eardrums, entice eyeballs and make a lot of money.

The opera is essentially a social comment epic designed to express, in a childish medium, the steady decline of todays living standards, inflation, the upsurge of suburban depression in the home and other relatedsociological elements of life in developed countries. Of course for your average 12 year old all this is incredibly boring so Ssik portray these topics with incredibly boring music. The effect is as one would expect mass boredom. The rest of the opera spells out a numbing plot, describing tortuous journeys through fantastic situations and yet as in the first song, echoing a continual, monotonous drivel. Absolutely effective. Incredible. And then of course there’s the climax; the apex of satisfaction arid pinnacle of relief. The end.