WOKE UP THIS MORNING

They say don’t meet your heroes. But they’re wrong.

What they should be saying is, when you meet one of your heroes— no, when you interview one of your heroes because it’s your job—for God’s sake, don’t let him know until after you’ve asked all your stupid little questions.

I showed up at Ace Frehley’s home in scenic, where-the-hell-are-we Sparta, New Jersey, on a sunny early-October afternoon with my good friend Jamie, who was accompanying me as both a first-rate photographer and my own personal fanboy bullshit detector. You see, when it comes to meeting Ace, I need to be kept on a very short leash. The mission was simple: to try to unravel some of that Spaceman mystique as a hardhitting CREEM reporter while not revealing to him that he’s defined coolness for me since I was a 6-year-old KISS fan in 1978 and hey would it be okay if I moved in here with you and we built some kinda life together? (I did eventually ask that, well into our fourth hour. His response: “Well, there’s five bedrooms.” That’s not a no!)