KISS members Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons discussed their upcoming avatar-based show, which is tentatively scheduled to launch in Las Vegas in 2028, according to an interview with Billboard.
The production marks Pophouse Entertainment's first major entry into the U.S. market, the Sweden-based music investment firm co-founded by ABBA's Björn Ulvaeus.
Pophouse closed its debut fund in March 2025 after raising over $1.3 billion to invest in intellectual property and music catalogs. The partnership with KISS involves a deal worth more than $300 million. That agreement gave the company the band’s song catalog, name, image, likeness rights, face paint designs, and their artist share of master recordings and publishing rights.
“They’re great new partners,” Simmons said about Pophouse, as Blabbermouth.net reported. “They’re infusing so much money into KISS; you’re gonna have theme parks and cartoons and movies… just some amazing stuff coming.”
Building The Digital Experience
Simmons said that the avatar show will arrive in the next year to two years at a location yet to be announced. Stanley admitted that the project is far more complex than he initially anticipated.
“The idea was never to replicate a concert,” Stanley said, according to Blabbermouth.net. “That’s not what this is about. It’s to create an experience and almost make us your tour guides into something unworldly, and yet totally based in the music.”
The digital replicas differ from the superheroes shown at the band’s final concert in New York on December 2, 2023. Pophouse CEO Jessica Koravos explained that those appearances served as an early prototype. Creative director Thierry Coup leads a team currently testing pyro effects against next-generation LED screens.
Rejection of The Sphere
Pophouse executives and band members ruled out staging the production at the Las Vegas Sphere. Stanley criticized the venue for overshadowing musical acts.
“At the Sphere, the band is on a postage stamp,” Stanley said during the KISS Kruise, according to Blabbermouth.net. “You forget that there’s a band on that little stage.”
Former Pophouse CEO Per Sundin echoed those thoughts in a May 2025 interview with Billboard. Sundin said that the planned avatar concert requires more intimate sites rather than a massive venue where audiences primarily attend for the building itself.
Questions about Pophouse Fund I and the avatar show
When did Pophouse Entertainment close its debut fund?
Pophouse closed Pophouse Fund I in March 2025 after raising more than $1.3 billion.
Who leads the creative team for the avatar show?
Thierry Coup heads the creative team developing the production.
Will the show feature new music?
Simmons confirmed that the production will include new songs written by the band.
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