JV wrote:

I knew some rabid fans, but for whatever reason I never got excited about Kiss. Same goes for Rush, although I warmed to them later. Never gave Kiss an open-minded effort, though.

I was admittedly late with Rush. I didn't get into them until Moving Pictures.
I understand the animosity toward Kiss. The music isn't complicated. The lyrics are inane (How many times can you write a verse rhyming "knees" and "please?"), the makeup and theatrics are cartoonish, and their blatant commercialism is off-putting. But none of that matters when you're 13-years-old. The first time I heard "Alive," I was hooked. I have four CDs in my car - "Alive," UFO's "Strangers in the Night," Hound Dog Taylor's first album, and KC & the Sunshine Band's Greatest Hits.
(The last one, not really.) 

"Not so much about Kiss. Sorry."

Don't be. I understand their audience, as Ian Faith would say, is selective. I've seen them four times, three in an arena in three different decades - '78, '82 and '96 - and once in a club for a warmup show before a European tour during their no makeup phase. The three arena shows weren't just sausage fests. They were sausage fests for a certain age group, men who are probably now 50-55 years old, who got into Kiss when they were early teenagers during the Alive/Destroyer/Love Gun era and stuck with them. People who were a little bit older HATED and still hate Kiss, and people who were younger missed the wave after it had already crashed on the beach. The club show was an unannounced gig at a bar across the street from Fenway Park where you had to know someone who knew someone who knew someone to get in, and I had a buddy who was very connected to the Boston music scene at the time. I watched the show literally five feet from Gene Simmons.
The only other concerts I've been to where the crowd has been more male-dominated is when I've seen Rush. You couldn't find an attractive woman at a Rush show with a map and a divining rod.

I started ignoring the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame when the BeeGees were inducted, to the point of making a point not to attend the facility when I was in Cleveland, though there's not much else to do when you're in Cleveland.
But I wanted to watch this year's ceremony to see Kiss inducted, even though I knew they weren't going to play due to the on-going grudge between the two current members and the Hall of Fame. The part I watched started with a nice tribute to Linda Ronstadt, whose voice I've always liked a lot. I could have done without the empowered women's segment at the end and Sheryl Crow warbling her way through a Buddy Holly song, but that's OK.
Tom Morello's induction speech for Kiss hit everything every Kiss fan has felt for the past 40 years. I wished he had taken a little higher aim at Rolling Stone magazine, Jann Wenner and the rest of the douchebags who thought it appropriate to induct rap groups into their silly little hall of fame and keep out one of the most influential rock acts ever because of some spiteful vendetta, but I suppose discretion dictates a level of decorum toward your host.
The speeches by Kiss themselves, especially Ace and Peter, proved once again the two best guys in the band are no longer in it. Gene wasn't a total dick, and I thought it was appropriate to at least mention the other members of the band, and Paul mostly took the high road.
The next act to be inducted was Cat Stevens. The first thing he said when he got to the podium was "I never thought I'd ever be on the same stage as Kiss." That's when I turned the channel. Fuck you. Your vapid folk songs suck. No one ever picked up a guitar or wrote a song because they wanted to emulate Cat Stevens, playing to a bunch of hippies and then turning into a terrorist-loving jihadist. 
So I'm back to where I started - ignoring the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.