Peter Criss

Peter Criss, Kiss's original drummer and the Catman, has always struck me as the human heart beneath all that theatrical greasepaint. A Brooklyn kid who came up the hard way, he's too easily overshadowed by pyro and platform boots, yet he wrote and sang Beth, proving there was real soul under the makeup. He's more than a timekeeper: a singer and songwriter too. When he finally entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2014, it felt like overdue justice. Even his messy cycle of exits and returns makes him, to me, the band's most relatably human member.

Name (English)

Peter Criss

Name (Japanese)

ピーター・クリス

Reading

ぴーたー・くりす

Born

December 20, 1945 (age 80)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Sagittarius / Rooster

Origin

Brooklyn, New York, United States

Occupation

drummer / singer / songwriter

Awards & achievements

• Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

• Official sitehttps://www.petercriss.net/
• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter%20Criss
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%94%E3%83%BC%E3%82%BF%E3%83%BC%E3%83%BB%E3%82%AF%E3%83%AA%E3%82%B9
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q137881

Tags

• New York
• drummer
• singer
• songwriter

Last updated

2026-06-11

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.