There are people who hate when the word underrated gets thrown around in music. There is only one all-female band hard rock band from the 80’s who sold over six million albums, has six #1 videos on MTV and had four songs (two of which hit the Top 30) in Billboard Top 100. That band is Vixen and I do insist that, even to this day, they are underrated despite their commercial success. The band was formed in 1980 by guitarist Jan Kuehnemund, but lineup changes happened along the way until the “classic lineup” of Kuehnemund, lead singer Janet Gardner, drummer Roxy Petrucci and bassist Share Pedersen. This is the lineup that most of us saw on MTV in 1988 when “Edge of a Broken Heart” was all over the airwaves. It was from their 1988 self-titled debut album. For several years, the band was everywhere from MTV, all over radio, to touring with the likes of Ozzy Osbourne, KISS and Bon Jovi. Unfortunately, in 1992 the band disbanded. 

The band would reform several times over the years with some, but never all of the “classic lineup.” In January of 2012, just days before Jan Kuehnemund was going to make an announcement of an official reunion of that “classic lineup,” she was diagnosed with cancer forcing them to delay the announcement until fully recovered and was cancer free. Unfortunately, that announcement never happened because she died of cancer on October 10, 2013 at the young age of 59.

The surviving members reunited in 2013 to carry on the name of Vixen to honor Kuehnemund. Several lineup changes happened again that included lead vocalist Janet Gardner leaving with a confirmation announcement happening in January of 2019. The band was determined to keep moving forward and announced a few days later that Femme Fatale lead vocalist Lorraine Lewis, who had already stepped in to cover for Gardner at a Vixen show in Oklahoma in 2018, was taking over as lead vocalist for the band. Fast forward to October 2, 2023 and the current lineup of Lewis, Roxy Petrucci, lead guitarist Britt Lightning and bassist Julia Lage released their first new song with Lewis as lead vocalist. The song is called “Red” and a full conceptual/performance video was also released for the song. It really captures the special bond and chemistry that the current lineup has. I had the honor of sitting down with lead vocalist Lorraine Lewis recently to talk about the new single and much more. I managed an indie record store in 1988 when Vixen’s as well as Femme Fatale’s debut albums were released. I became a big fan of both bands so this interview was a bit surreal for me. I managed to keep the fan-boying down to a minimum.

Hey Lorraine! What are you up to today?

Lorraine Lewis/Vixen: I’m enjoying my day off.

A day off? That’s pretty rare isn’t it?

Yes it is; I actually had a day off yesterday too. I work in television during the week and I have just been enjoying these two days off and chilling. I have been binge watching Law and Order SVU. I am in season 24 and it is such a compelling show. The cast is really great and it is my guilty pleasure.

Well, let’s get down to business, shall we? You took MTV by storm in 1988 fronting Femme Fatale and here you are now fronting the legendary all-female rock band Vixen.

My career has had a lot of life and this is another chapter. I am honored and stoked to be part of such amazing women and such a legacy band as Vixen. I go way back with Roxy (Petrucci) and the band. To be asked to fill in on vocals is an honor and a pleasure. I joined the band in 2019 and if you do the math, this is my fifth year singing with the band. I would have never thought back in 1988 that I would become the lead singer of Vixen. You just never know where real life is going to take you. We’ve been touring and doing the Vixen catalog and we also do some Femme Fatale songs. The girls are killing it on “Falling In and Out of Love” and “Waiting on the Big One.” Sometimes I do the acapella intro to “Rebel.” Roxy had me start doing that a couple of months ago. She kind of leaves it up to me if I’m feeling it in the moment and if I feel the crowd will dig it. We have been writing collectively but we were presented with “Red” from Fred Coury of Cinderella about a year ago. We fell in love with it when he played it for us and we thought we could kill it. I think I did my vocal with him about seven or eight months ago and we did not record collectively because we all live in different places. Roxy is in Detroit, Britt and Julia are in the Agoura Hills area and I’m in Palm Springs although I do go to Los Angeles a lot. I recorded with Fred and with Barry Porter at Barry’s studio in the valley.

I love that you did an actual video and not just a lyric video. There is a very special chemistry with this band and I think you really captured it in this music video.

Thank you, I’m glad that you noticed that. You have the iconic Roxy Petrucci, who is such a total badass, on drums. Britt Lightning and her lightning fast fingers is amazing guitar player. Julia Lage is a monster bass player; the only job that she has ever had has been playing bass. She has never worked at a Starbucks or been a waitress and then you have me. We’re like sisters in rock; we have each other’s backs. Lucky for us and lucky for the fans, we have really jelled as a four piece. I think it’s indicative in the video just how much fun, respect and bad-assery there is in this group of women. We’re explosive right now! We have a really great time together and I’m glad that it shows in the video.

The industry has changed so much since you started and it’s geared more towards being single oriented rather than albums. Do you ladies have a plan to do just singles or maybe an EP or album?

It really depends on what Roxy wants to do because she is the founding member of the group. We are Vixen together but it’s really whatever Roxy feels is best the band. I feel that we would all love to do an album. We have been writing and we have some really good stuff. The dilemma comes in as to how are we going to pull this off? I know next year we are already getting dates. If they’d like us in the studio for a month or two, we could probably get a lot done. We’re going to take some time off and then start back up in February or March of next year. Hopefully we do get to go into the studio and cut an album together. More realistically, I think it’s more singles or maybe a five song EP instead of a full album. Look, I didn’t know I was going to be the lead singer of Vixen so let’s see what happens. For me personally, it feels really great to have my name on something Vixen. I’m honored to do the hit songs but this is just a whole other level for me. 

What’s the reaction to the new single “Red” been like?

The feedback on the single has been fabulous! The video dropped at midnight last Monday and at midnight it will be a full week that it has been released. I’m looking at it right now and it’s been viewed 78,000 times in five days with almost 400 comments. When I looked at this post on YouTube on Friday, it had 28,000 views, so over the weekend that has more than doubled. It has some really good traction right now and I love the comments. Let me just read you a couple, ‘Awesome song,’ ‘love this song, love the video’ ‘still sexy and still kicking ass,’ ‘all you need to know is that this kicks f’n ass.’ Anytime you put things out there, you’re going to get the occasional negative one. I don’t know what it is about social media where you’re going to get somebody that tries to turn the tide. Human nature is so bizarre. 

Social media was something that obviously was not here back in the day. There seems to be this small percentage that love to spread negativity.

It is such a bizarre phenomenon, but I don’t understand it. I have never posted a shitty comment to anybody. It’s just not my nature; I don’t understand it at all. I just had a birthday and I posted a picture where I had my hair done super glammy. I wanted it to look like the 90’s supermodels so I went to Jose Eber Salon and my stylist Nicholas asked what I wanted my hair to look like. I said Pam Anderson, the 90’s supermodel look. I just wanted to be glam bam thank you mam because my party was at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He did it so fabulous and it was so much fun. I posted that photo and 99.9% of everybody and I had one person, a female, that did not like my hair. They commented about how they liked it more rock and roll and saying it looked too “barbie-esque.” This person would never be in my close circle of girlfriends. I run with girls who lift each other up; we never put each other down. The majority of comments are usually very positive and that’s how I like to keep stuff.

There’s a part in the video where you get on the back of a motorcycle. I haven’t seen anything mentioned about this, but is that Sean McNabb?

Yes, it is Sean McNabb! Oh my God, I love Sean McNabb. He is the coolest; he was at my birthday party. He was my quote unquote love interest in the video. He is a great friend and a great friend to the band. He’s a really, really cool cat. I wanted to ride a Harley myself and I just ran out of time to really learn how to do it on my own (laughs) and no one would let me. So Britt and I reached out to Sean and we made that happen. I actually go way back with Sean; I knew him when he was with Quiet Riot back in 1989. I have footage of me on stage, back in the day, with Rikki Rocket. Rikki and I go way back as well; I dated him back in the day and he’s one of my favorite people on the planet. We were at a Harley Davidson event back in the 80s and I sang on stage with Rikki on drums, Sean on bass, Mitch Perry on guitar and Tone Loc.

What??

Yeah! We used to do the most fun stuff on the Sunset Strip at a place called Spice. It was a bar and a club which was run by this guy we called Biff and also known as Dr Malibu. It was Thursday night at The Spice and you would get this conglomerate of rock and roll people up on stage doing stuff much like on the Sunset Strip now with Chuck Wright and all of those things that they do. Tone Loc and I did Funky Cold Medina and then broke off did some ad-libing. I need to post it on Instagram so you can see it.

Yes, please do! You mentioned dates for the rest of this year, but do you have anything for next year that you can mention?

I know we’re on the Monsters of Rock Cruise which is our first string of dates announced in March but something could land for January or February. Typically our scheduled starts in March and runs through the summer. We’re hoping to double or triple our dates for next year.

Fingers crossed that you get to play somewhere near us in North Carolina! I see that we need to start wrapping this up, so we’ll close with our Three For The Road segment. We hit you with three, fun hopefully not so typical fun questions. Do you remember who your first celebrity crush was?

I’ve had so many (laughs); that is a great question. The first thing that comes to mind is David Lee Roth; however I didn’t really have a crush on Dave. I wanted to be Dave! I really, really liked Andy Garcia the actor; I thought he was hot and I love cop shows. Most recently, I have a crush on Hondo on SWAT.

If you could have literally any person, actor, actress, cartoon character, or whoever be your own inner voice, who would it be?

That’s funny (laughs)! I would love Lady Gaga to be my inner voice because she’s a badass and she’s smart and man she’s tough and she’s had a brilliant career so I would say Lady Gaga / Madonna.

That was a great answer! Ok, last question! If music was over today and you had to go into professional wrestling, what would your wrestling name be?

Oh I love that (laughs)! I’ve always thought of my stripper name but never my wrestling name (laughs). That’s tough! I’m going to be the kind of wrestling that catches you off guard and distracts you. I want to say slippery something. When I was on tour and I would check into a hotel, my name was always B. Bardot. I’m just I’m going to have fun with this and say Boobs Bardot. I’m sweet I’m sassy and I’m bad-assy and that’s the truth!

That’s a character that I would definitely cheer for! Before we end our talk, is there anything you’d like to close with?

I love the people showing up at the shows and digging what I do and what Vixen does. Keeping the legacy going is something I love. It is an honor and a privilege and I don’t take any of this for granted. I love the fans showing up and singing the songs which have been around for 34 years. Please keep it up and keep trying to drown me out because it feels so good. Just know that I really love all of you and I care. Keep supporting the song “Red.” Tell your friends about it and let’s keep rocking and rolling!

Interview by I’m Music Magazine Owner/Editor Johnny Price

Connect with Vixen online:

Website vixenofficial.com 

Facebook facebook.com/Vixen 

Instagram instagram.com/vixen_band 

Instagram lorrainelewisrocks