10 Failed Songs That Became Cult Classics
9. World Without Heroes - KISS
KISS were in the middle of a career tailspin at the beginning of the '80s. Failing to establish common ground with their hard rock audience, their experiment with conceptual rock on Music From the Elder made for a huge mess that not even the band could defend. Most KISS fans would not judge you for skipping this album altogether, but "A World Without Heroes" actually made it seem like the album would be tolerable.
Make no mistake, the story is crazy flimsy from one track to another, but the actual plotline about "The Chosen One" actually seems to work within this song's context. It might be an odd pairing seeing a band as crazy as KISS have a credit from Lou Reed, but the emotional gravitas of this song goes almost too over-the-top to the point where its actually kind of endearing.
Even though KISS have done everything they can to bury this album in the deepest depths of obscurity, Gene Simmons still thought enough of the song to actually perform it during the KISS Unplugged session in the '90s. Music from the Elder is a real stain on KISS's catalog, but if most of the songs sounded like this, it may have been one of the band's overlooked masterpieces.