The Bitch Is Back...Live, Lita Ford's latest is hot as fire, and its collection of classic rockers and steely hot guitars takes no prisoners.
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It's too easy to remember Lita Ford as the tousled hair glam queen of MTV, duetting with Ozzy than to recall that she was one of the first and finest purveyors of Marshall Law, femme style. She never met a Marshall JCM800 or B.C. Rich guitar she didn't like, and she went straight from the hard rocking The Runaways to fronting her own power trio for her first solo record in 1983.
This brand new live set was recorded just months ago at the Canyon Club in Los Angeles, after touring the stadium circuit with Def Lappard and Poison earlier in the year - she's partnered up with six string sidekick Mitch Perry (MSG, Asia), and it might just convince you that there's more to Ford than hairspray and high drama. I'll admit to being much more than pleasantly pleased by Ford and her crack band's firepower. Perry never shows up often enough, and it's great to hear him tearing it up with Ms. Ford.
Ford and Perry are joined by metal stalwart Bobby Rock on drums and bassist Marty O'Brien who has spent time with Tommy Lee, Static X, and Disturbed. They're a formidable hard rock machine, and their wall of noise is substantial. Perry and Lita split the lead duties and Mitch's smoother, and more technical forays are a great balance with Ford's more feral approach. They're split left and right, and it's a gas to hear them pitching it back and forth.
The six string mistress is in fine voice as well, and she comes off sounding like one damned tough woman. I'll save the details for Ford to tell in her upcoming autobiography (Spring of 2014), but it appears that her well documented past hasn't beat her down so much as built her up. She includes three tunes from her latest solo effort, Living Like A Runaway, and then delivers the best of her solo career to fill in the set, and it's to her credit that you can't really tell which tunes come from which decade. The band expertly brings it all up to date, and it comes across as a very well balanced greatest hits package.
Close My Eyes Forever is saved from being kitsch by Ford taking the song back from its earlier duet status, and you actually kind of hear that Ozzy weighed the thing down, in spite of the fact that his name on the label probably moved an extra million copies back in 1989, and helped the single climb to #8 in America. The solo section is a nice harmony number by Ford and Perry, and the audience is in their hands. I'm glad that the band chose to record a club gig, and not a stadium show, as the intimacy lends itself nicely in both the fans reactions, and capturing the solid tunes and wailing guitars.
Opening the set with the Elton John cover is brave and brilliant - the band rocks hard enough to keep it out of the cheese factory, and Ford makes it her own. The Bitch Is Back never sounded better.
Lita Ford never gotten her due - she was never on the covers of the guitar magazines, and was never truly championed by the press, who at the time preferred to keep their love in the men's locker room. Truth be told, she rocks as hard if not harder than most of the acts of the hair spray era, and this albums attests to that fact. I'm guessing she's begun a resurgence that will change all of that.
At any rate, her fans will love this new release, and she should certainly pick up some new adherents with this powerful live set. Next week I'll post my recent conversation with the hard rock veteran.
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