Gene Simmons confirmed on Larry King Now that KISS's 'End of the Road' tour is, indeed, the band's final go-around.
Given the respective ages of Simmons and front man Paul Stanley, few have doubted that Kiss is winding down; the real question is when will it be all over?
In the band's farewell initial announcement last year, Simmons and Stanley suggested the tour would last at least a couple years while they said goodbye to their fans all over the world.
Simmons told Larry King Now that the trek is planned to continue through 2021.
"It's a long one..." the bassist observed. "We've got another two years of staying out there — we've already done 93 cities around the world, coming back again, but the reality is that I'm 70."
He continued, noting that at some point he just won't be able to keep performing up to Kiss's standards.
"By the time I'm 72, it's time to get off the stage," he said. "We've both seen bands that stayed too long on that stage, so you wanna get off the stage before they're tired of you, leave them wanting more... Don't stay on there too long."
The 'End of the Road' tour, of course, is not Kiss's first farewell. The band's original lineup of Simmons, Stanley, guitarist Ace Frehley and drummer Peter Criss declared that it was retiring in 2000, about four years after launching its reunion.
While some fans felt bilked by the false retirement, Stanley and Simmons have defended it, saying the original band had run its course.
"By the turn of the 2000s, the early 2000s, it became dysfunctional, to the extreme," Simmons recalled.
But when Kiss did finally take time off, they were met with a "deluge of gifts and inquiries" and opportunities to return, he said. Ultimately, Simmons and Stanley pressed on without Frehley and Criss, and people have kept coming to the shows regardless.
Kiss has left the door open for collaborations with former members on the 'End of the Road' tour, but Criss personally retired in 2017 and Frehley says he won't return as anything less than a full-time member on the band.
Kiss will resume the 'End of the Road' tour in November. After taking most of the winter off the road, the band will return in March to make up a pair of postponed U.S. concerts.