Died On This Date (April 5, 2007) Mark St. John / KISS
themusicsover Mark St. John
February 7, 1956 – April 5, 2007
Before joining KISS in 1984, Mark St. John was a guitar teacher and musician in Los Angeles. He was brought on board to record Animalyze. Unfortunately, he didn’t get along with the other members and was starting to have arthritic trouble with his hands so he was replaced with Bruce Kulick by year’s end. But it should be noted that Animalyze is the most successful of KISS’ post-makeup releases and re legitimized the band in the heavy metal community. The album spawned a video for “Heaven’s On Fire,” the only known KISS footage to include St. John. The year following his abbreviated tenure with KISS found St. John teaming up with vocalist David Donato to form the glam metal band, White Tiger. After moderate success with their debut album, White Tiger disbanded while working on demos for its follow-up. Over the next several years, St. John continued to try to get something going with his career and continued to do session work. During that time he worked separately with Jeff Scott Soto, Peter Criss, Phil Naro, and even David Hasslehoff, but nothing substantial materialized, so he reportedly went back to teaching guitar to make his living. On April 5, 2007, Mark St. John died from a cerebral hemorrhage.
Own A Piece Of Rock ‘n Roll History
Mickie Jones was the co-founder of and bassist for pioneering ’70s glam metal band, Angel. Formed with guitarist, Punky Meadows in in 1975, Angel would be the link between Bowie and heavy metal. It was Gene Simmons of Kiss who helped the band get signed to Casablanca Records, and in an ironic twist, the members of Angel chose to market themselves dressed in all white as sort of the “anti-Kiss.” The band’s slick pop metal and androgynous image helped pave the way for such ’80s hair bands as Poison, Warrant and Motley Crue. Even the band’s own keyboardist, Gregg Guiffria would go on to have ’80s metal hits of his own. Even though Angel released some of the most memorable hard rock albums of the ’70s, (IE: Helluva Band and On Earth As It Is In Heaven), they never reached much beyond a cult status. Outside of Angel, Jones played in BUX with Meadows and Joe Perry Project singer, Ralph Morman, and Empire with LA Guns drummer, Steve Riley. It has also been reported that Jones was once asked to join the New York Dolls. In recent years, he was working in the film industry. Mickie Jones died of liver cancer on September 5, 2009.