Kiss Star Gene Simmons Bashes ‘X Factor,’ Calls Contestants ‘Hand Puppets’

Shows like 'American Idol' and 'X Factor' entertain millions of viewers and have produced numerous successful recording artists, but don't count Gene Simmons among their fans. In fact, the Kiss bassist doesn't think that even the most popular singing competition show winners deserve to be dubbed "stars" -- he considers them more along the line of hand puppets.

“A star is bigger than the song that they sing," Simmons recently told Absolute Radio. "These are karaoke stars who never wrote a song and never played an instrument and didn’t go through the dues-paying process. Everybody can get up and sing karaoke and some have natural-born pipes. That doesn’t mean it connects to your soul and to your heart or that you have any passion with it."

He continues: "So all the best of luck to anybody who sings on the karaoke shows, songs that somebody else has written and arrangements that somebody else has done. You’re basically a hand puppet, somebody sticks their hand up your bum and moves your mouth up and down. And you may look good on TV but this is not real stuff."

The quotes came from an interview Simmons conducted while on his recent visit to London to host the Classic Rock Roll of Honour awards show. During the talk, he also discussed the huge influence English rock 'n' roll has had on him.

Meanwhile, in another interview, Simmons continued to bash 'X Factor,' insisting that "the biggest superstars of all time would have never made it on 'X Factor.' Imagine if Jimi Hendrix or Mick Jagger or Robert Plant came out. I wouldn’t make it, and neither would they.''

Listen to Gene Simmons talk about 'X Factor':