Saranac Lakers John Warchol and Brandy Clark are preparing for the 10th annual Merry KISSmas show — a fundraiser centered around celebrating music from rock legends Kiss — with their band Sonic Boom.

The entry fee is either to bring one unwrapped toy and three cans of food, or a $10 donation.

This year, they will perform the seminal Kiss album “Alive!” in its entirety. Warchol said if someone is new to Kiss, this is the album he would give them.

“It’s the greatest live album of all time,” he said.

John Warchol of local band Sonic Boom plays at a KISSmas show in 2022 at the Saranac Lake Moose Club. KISSmas 10 will come to the Hotel Saranac on Dec. 7. (Provided photo)

There will also be several raffles, Kiss-inspired cocktails and a Kiss merch museum featuring rare collectibles from Warchol’s own collection to celebrate 10 straight years of KISSmas shows.

Even during the coronavirus pandemic, they didn’t miss a year. In 2020, they did a livestreamed show from Warchol’s living room.

Over the past decade, they’ve raised almost $30,000 for local families and organizations. They’ve stocked food pantries in Saranac Lake, Lake Placid, Tupper Lake, Keene, Keene Valley, Elizabethtown and Brighton, and provided Christmas toys for more than 1,500 families in the area.

Since the show began, the money has been donated to local food pantries, youth centers, animal shelters, fire departments and families experiencing tragedies.

This time, entry fee money will be donated to the Young Life Christian camp on Upper Saranac Lake to fund scholarship for kids whose families can’t afford to go.

The food and toy donations will be direct support for local families at Christmas. Sonic Boom teams up with the nonprofit Families First in Essex County, which has lists of families with needs.

“That’s John’s favorite part,” Clark said.

He and his son Eric, 14, get to meet up with FFEC workers and drop the toys off. The concert creates a network of giving around the area. People like Erin Mitchell have been volunteering since the first KISSmas show.

“Everyone’s in this for the same purpose — to do something good,” Warchol said. “And as a bonus, we have fun.”

Clark loves working with all the local businesses who donate raffle items year after year.

“Folks are just so generous,” she said.

Warchol said they could not do everything the event accomplishes without people donating goods to raffle off.

To donate items to be raffled off, contact Warchol at xmascharity@yahoo.com.

Sonic Boom started in 2014. After Warchol’s brother died, he returned to Saranac Lake for a celebration of life event and put on a Kiss concert with some local musicians in his brother’s honor. The two of them shared their love of the band.

“It just started out really kind of innocently as a couple Kiss fans looking to play some Kiss tunes,” he said.

When Warchol moved to town the next year, they reunited Sonic Boom. Eventually, they started the holiday charity event. In Saranac Lake, he said it was the “natural” thing to do.

He never thought it would turn into such a large fundraiser, or that they’d do it for a decade. KISSmas started out as something for himself, as a Kiss superfan, he said.

At the show, in the Oak Room next to where the party will be going down in the hotel ballroom, Warchol will set up a Kiss museum of sorts. He will display his extensive collection of memorabilia. He’s been collecting his entire life, as had his brother. The collection features action figures, lunch boxes, condoms, statues with crystals, comic books and magazines.

Warchol said he’s looking forward to getting it all out of storage, showing it off and maybe finding time to play with it himself.

His love of the band started when he was a little kid. Warchol said he saw these “four superheroes,” flying, shooting rockets, spitting blood and rocking out.

“It’s just this visual craziness,” he said.

He’s been to 63 Kiss shows, including the band’s final two concerts in Madison Square Garden last year.

Kiss inspired so many kids to pick up instruments for the first time, Warchol said — including himself and other band members.

KISSmas is a way for him to do something positive with this obsession.

Sonic Boom has a couple new band members for this show. Warchol, the lead guitarist, has been there from the start. Lead vocalist Clark and Scott Christopher on guitar have performed in all but the first outing for the band.

Drummer Jon LaPierre has been with Sonic Boom for several years.

This will be Cam Cahill’s first time on guitar with Sonic Boom and Dave Fischer’s first on bass. Everyone shares vocals throughout.

With members spread out in Boston and Saratoga, they are meeting in Albany to rehearse ahead of the show.

“It’s this United Nations of people,” Warchol said.

Clark said she grew up with an older brother listening to Kiss. At the time, she thought it was noise. But now, playing songs like “New York Groove” or “Lick it up” and seeing the crowd’s reaction, opened her eyes. You drive them wild, they’ll drive you crazy.

“Rock ‘n’ roll man,” Clark said.

Warchol said they bring an arena rock mentality to their shows, a sound not often heard here.

On Dec. 7, doors for KISSmas open at 7 p.m. and music starts at 8 p.m.